Ernesto Ramirez

April 28, 2013

Here we are again. Another week and another great list of articles, projects, and posts. We hope you find these as interesting as we did.

Data Science of the Facebook World by Stephen Wolfram: “I’ve always been interested in people and the trajectories of their lives. But I’ve never been able to combine that with my interest in science. Until now.” Stephen Wolfram sets his mind and data crunching services and the mounds of data available through the Wolfram|Alpha Personal Analytics service.

There’s an App for That by John-Paul Flintoff:  While many people write about QS, every once in a while a piece stands out as a thoughtful and personal assessment of the meaning of self-tracking. The only major fault with the piece is the accompanying illustration which proclaims that “the overexamined life is not worth living,” a conclusion the article does not actually make.

Disciplinary Power, the Oligopticon and Rhizomatic Surveillance in Elite Sports Academies: Elite athletes and sports programs push Quantified Self tools to their extremes. This article from an academic journal about surveillance discusses the tracking mechanisms employed in elite sports academies that transform performance into a type of numerical language that contributes to new social norms, personas and senses of the self

Refugees of the Modern World by Joseph Stromberg: A common cultural signature in the world of the Quantified Self is the formation of loose-knit groups around common interests and conditions. So it was fascinating to learn of a tight-knit group that has formed around the choice of a common environment in which to live. This is the stort of a self-diagnosed group suffering from “electromagnetic hypersensitivity” who live together in an area of West Virginia in the U.S. National Radio Quiet Zone.

Body 01000010011011110110010001111001 by Stanza: Artists have been playing with connecting #quantifiedself and “smart city” technologies for several years. I think projects like this are useful for opening new channels of thought not yet constrained by utility.

Goggles Can Provide Vital Data and Distraction by Matt Ritchel: Google makers incorporate data streams into heads up displays. But why include text messages? That seems like a mistake.

Thanks  to Joshua Kauffman and Gary Wolf for contributing to this weeks post! If you’ve found something interesting be sure to send it to us and we can post it in the upcoming weeks.