Blog

Have Faith in Ingenuity by Jose Gomez-Marquez

February 19, 2016

At the Little Device Lab at MIT, Jose Gomez-Marquez and his colleagues focus on bringing the ingenuity of the maker movement to the world of health and healthcare. In this talk from QSPH15, Jose uses specific examples from a new course at MIT to explain the idea of “transparent boxes” — systems and technologies that allow individuals to be creative in their exploration of themselves through data.

Mark Wilson: Three Years of Logging my Inbox

February 17, 2016

“My inbox has become a barometer of my stress level.” Email overwhelm is something that most people of first world means can relate to. Getting a handle on this digital deluge is a Sisyphean endeavor that is, perhaps, only endured by deluding ourselves into thinking that it is possible if only we found the right…

Who Asks the Questions by Dawn Nafus

February 17, 2016

Dawn Nafus, is an anthropologist at Intel Labs who has written with great clarity about the Quantified Self movement. In this talk from QSPH15, Dawn explores the concept of data access and literacy in terms of who gets to ask the questions that direct research.

Bethany Soule: Extreme Productivity

February 12, 2016

“That’s insane! I want to try it.” Bethany Soule is the co-found of Beeminder, a commitment tool which she characterizes as “goal-tracking with teeth.” Her and Daniel Reeves, the other founder, have spoken on how they tracked the development of the tool and integrating it with other QS tools. In this talk from QS15, Bethany tells…

Jacek Smolicki: Self-Tracking As Artistic Practice

February 11, 2016

“I don’t have a concrete goal. I don’t have a concrete aim to advance myself. It’s a way to explore different aspects of my life through data.” Since 2009 Jacek Smolicki has experimented with using personal data as a mode for artistic exploration. In this talk, he presents some of his practices: Making a collage…

Building a Culture of Health by Stephen Downs

February 11, 2016

Stephen Downs, Chief Technology and Information Officer at the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation, looks forward to the day when healthy choices are easy choices. That day may not be tomorrow, but identifying the early adopters, innovative thinkers, and technological disruptors can move us closer to that healthier world. In this talk from QSPH15, Stephen explains why the foundation decided to support the Quantified Self movement.

Health Data Explorers by Kevin Patrick

February 9, 2016

Dr. Kevin Patrick is the director of the Center for Wireless and Population Health Systems at Calit2. At the 2015 Quantified Self Public Health Symposium, Kevin offered novel ways to think about the social utility of data.

Robby Macdonell: The Data Is in, I am a Distracted Driver

February 4, 2016

“When I see someone driving towards me with their face buried in their phone, I get gloriously indignant about it.” Robby Macdonell has given great talks on transportation logging and time-tracking. Here, he combined those two data streams, using Automatic and RescueTime, to prove that he does not use his phone while driving nearly as…

Scaling the QS Movement by Larry Smarr

February 3, 2016

Renowned physicist Larry Smarr is the founding director of the National Center for Supercomputing Applications (NCSA), who helped bring the power of computing to scientific research. In this talk from QSPH15, Larry reflects on consideration for scaling the QS movement and how the values encoded in tools created during the birth of new fields can influence future developments that affect hundreds of millions of people.

Tuning My Brain With Music For Reading, Programming, and Archery by Rocio Chongtay

February 2, 2016

In this fascinating talk Rocio Chongtay shares her novel and thoughtfully designed experiments in using music to adjust her concentration and relaxation depending on what she’s doing. Using a consumer EEG device from Neurosky, Rocio tried different types of music while tracking the relaxation and concentration dimensions identified by the Neurosky algorithm. She had experience…

Quantified Self Public Health Symposium

February 2, 2016

Many participants in Quantified Self meetings around the world are involved improving public health as researchers, policymakers, clinicians, and community leaders. Once a year, we convene a Quantified Self Public Health Symposium to explore how we can better support new discoveries about ourselves and our communities.

Finding My Optimum Reading Speed by Kyrill Potapov

January 21, 2016

As an English teacher Kyrill Potapov spends a lot of time working with 12 year old kids who are trying to improve their reading, writing, comprehension, and analytical skills. In this talk, he explores a remarkable method of speed reading, called Spritz, that promises to let you “read Harry Potter in three hours” with full…

Re-Living My Life with Mood Tracking by Kouris Kalligas

January 8, 2016

Kouris Kalligas, a long time participant and contributor at Quantified Self meetings, is the creator of the very easy to use data aggregation service AddApp. AddApp is an iPhone app that makes it simple to gain insights from data gathered on dozens of different devices. While running his startup, Kouris has also been doing ongoing self-tracking experiments….

Daniel Reeves on Frictionless Tracking with Beeminder

January 7, 2016

It’s  been an honor to have Beeminder founders Daniel Reeves and Bethany Soule participating in Quantified Self meetings, giving us a chance to watch the evolution of their very useful tool for setting and achieving personal goals. These days they are working on the forefront of device and service integration. In this talk Daniel gives…

Randy Sargent on Using Spectrograms to Visualize Heart Rate Variability

January 4, 2016

Let’s start 2016 with a very interesting talk by Randy Sargent about how to visualize the very large data sets produced by some kinds of self-tracking. Randy’s idea about using spectrograms, normally used for audio signals, to create a portrait of your own time series data, is completely novel as far as I know. If…

Effects of A Year in Ketosis by Jim McCarter

December 16, 2015

In this fascinating short talk by geneticist Jim McCarter, we see detailed data about the  effects of a ketogenic diet: lower blood pressure, better cholesterol numbers,and vastly improved daily well being.  Jim also describes the mid-course adjustments he made to reduce side effects such as including muscle cramps and increased sensitivity to cold. Jim begins:…

Vinod Khosla on machine learning and the Quantified Self

December 13, 2015

I talked with Vinod Khosla over the summer about machine learning and the Quantified Self. Khosla was a founder of Sun Microsystems and is one of Silicon Valley’s most experienced investors in Quantified Self companies. His portfolio includes AliveCor, Ginger.io, Jawbone, Misfit, Narrative, and many other toolmakers that people doing QS projects will recognize. In our…