Sue Lueder contracted mysterious ongoing stomach ailment after a vacation to Spain that her physician dismissed as heartburn. To find the true root of the cause, she began to track her symptoms and diet. In this talk, presented at our 2013 Global Conference, Sue describes how she used the data to make sense her illness.
In 2009 Tim Ngwena switched on Last.fm and he’s been running in across all his devices ever since. Earlier this year he decided to take a deep dive into his listening data to see what he could learn.
Shawn Dimantha is always looking for easier ways to track his health. He uses a variety of self-tracking tools, but a few months ago he became interested in exploring what he could do given his engineering and health IT background. He was inspired by immersion, an MIT-developed email analysis tool, which helped him understand who…
One interesting aspect of personal data is how it can reveal what is unique about you. Nowhere is this more true than with genetic information coming from DNA testing kits. However, people are still at an early stage on how they apply that information to their lives. Ralph Pethica, who has a PhD in genetics, was…
This is Adam Johnson’s third QS talk. Previously he’s discussed the lifelogging tool he developed and uses and how he re-learned how to type in order to combat RSI. In this talk, Adam gives an update to his self-tracking focused on three areas: tracking an long-distance cycling trip, his streamlined lifelogging process, and how he’s…
Cliff Atkinson is a consultant who helps people tell their stories and showcase their data in clear and understandable ways. It’s no surprise that when he became interested in understanding himself he turned to his experiences with visual storytelling. In 2012, at a New York QS meetup, Cliff spoke about how he’s embarked on a…
Steve Zadig is the COO of Vital Connect, but when he’s not busy with his job he’s out racing high performance vehicles. In this talk, presented at our 2013 Global Conference, Steve explains how he uses data to help him achieve his racing goals. What did Steve do? Steve wanted to get more information about…
Like many people, Christel de Maeyer felt that her sleep could be better. Presenting at our 2013 conference in Europe, Christel shares what she learned from collecting over three years of sleep data. What did Christel do? Christel tracked her sleep for 2 years with various devices. She tested the effects of different variables on her sleep…
Paul LaFontaine has been tracking what he calls “upsets” to better understand himself, the way he works, and to see if he can improve his mental and physiological response and recovery.
Like many of us, James Norris remembers his first kiss. Unlike many of us, he also knows who it was with, where it was, and his age. How does he know this information? When he was 13, he realized that he forgot some detail about his life that he thought was important. To prevent that from…
Like anyone who has ever been bombarded with magazine headlines in a grocery store checkout line, Kouris Kalligas had a few assumptions about how to reduce his weight and improve his sleep. But data from his wireless scale, diet tracking application, activity tracking devices, and sleep app revealed surprising results.
As part of the Quantified Self Public Health Symposium, we invited a variety of individuals from the research and academic community. These included visionaries and new investigators in public health, human-computer interaction, and medicine. One of these was Jason Bobe, the Executive Director of the Personal Genome Project. When we think of the intersection of…
We’ve featured the work of our friend and QS community member, Doug Kanter, many times here on the Quantified Self website and we were excited to have him participate in our Quantified Self Public Health Symposium. Doug is both a toolmaker and self-tracker, focusing primarily on using his experience with tracking his diabetes-related data to…
This week we’re taking a look back at our 2014 Quantified Self Public Health Symposium and highlighting some of the wonderful talks and presentations. We convened this meeting in order to bring together the research and toolmaker communities. Both of these groups have questions about data, research, and how to translate the vast amount of…
Personal data, personal meaning. That’s the guiding principle of much of the work we do here at QS Labs. From our show&tell talks and how-to’s, to our worldwide network of meetups and carefully curated unconferences, we strive to help people make sense of their personal data and inspire others to do the same. However, over…
On July 4th, 2009 Jan Szelagiewicz decided to make a change in his life. After taking stock of his personal health and his family history with heart disease he began a weight-loss journey that included a variety of self-tracking tools. Over the course of a few years Jan tracked his diet, activities such as cycling,…
Lee Rogers has been collecting data about himself for over three years. The daily checkins, movements, and other activities of his life are capture by automatic and passive systems and tools. What makes Lee a bit different than most is that he’s set up a personal automation system to collect and make sense of all…
When we decide to track one thing, we sometimes find that we are indirectly tracking something else. That is the theme of today’s talk. When Mark Leavitt was 57, he found out that he had heart disease, a condition that runs in his family. Mark set about making some life changes. He tracked his weight…
One of the benefits of long-term self-tracking is that one builds up a toolbox of investigatory methods that can be drawn upon when medical adversity hits. One year ago, when Mark Drangsholt experienced brain fog during a research retreat while on Orcas Island in the Pacific Northwest, he had to draw upon the self-tracking tools…
At our recent Bay Area QS meetup, Kevin Krejci presented a short update about the ongoing self-tracking and treatment projects he’s undergoing as part of living with Parkinson’s Disease. Back in January, Kevin first presented his tracking journey and how he’s using different tools to understand and improve his life. Watch his short talk below…
