Ernesto Ramirez

April 14, 2013

Here’s some great pieces from around the web to get your mind working and give you some insight into what we find interesting and compelling.

The Diabetes Paradox by Thomas Goetz: A fascinating look at how we can think about self-tracking from the point of view of those who may track the most: diabetics. He also offers some great insights into how to design the self-tracking experience. Be sure to check out the comments for some great discussion.

How life-logging can change the way we view and express ourselves by Elia Morling: A very nice overview of lifelogging and its potential impact. I especially enjoyed the leading image (pictured here). Maybe a future cover for a Quantified Self Magazine perhaps?

Know Thyself: How Mindfulness Can Improve Self-Knowledge: A short but wonderful overview of an interesting research article by Erika Carlson that explores how mindfulness may be pathway to improving how and what we know of ourselves.

Specifically, mindfulness appears to directly address the two major barriers to self-knowledge: informational barriers (i.e., the quantity and quality of information people have about themselves) and motivational barriers (i.e., ego-protective motives that affect how people process information about themselves).

The Secret Life of Cats: What You Can Learn by Putting a GPS on Your Kitty by Alexis Madrigal: This book review and interview is fun, interesting, and touches on some very important ideas about self-tracking and technology. I’ve been ruminating on this special nugget since my initial reading:

 Technology can do many amazing things, but no GPS unit or CatCam can tell us what questions we should be asking in the first place.

Do you have any interesting articles or links? Send them our way!