Self tracking, or “personal informatics” if you’re not into the whole brevity thing, is a growing trend that interests me. I knew I wanted to keep track of it and thought, why write notes for yourself when you can embarrass yourself by keeping a public blog?

No doubt there have always been weirdos who’ve kept detailed accountings of their lives, and putting the trend in historical perspective is something I’d like to do here. That said, there’s a reason why it’s a growing trend now and I think that has to do with what Merlin Mann calls “ubiquitous capture.” It’s now easier than ever to keep a log that stays synced across devices, and it’s even easier to . In some cases the data collection is automatic. For example, consider the Fitbit pedometer/sleep tracker. So, I’m going to try to explore the capture angle.

The other things that I think are worth looking into are reasons and tools. Tools is an obvious category. I plan to review and critique self tracking tools. By reasons I mean I want to look at why people do this. There are certainly many motivations and they’re each interesting. From compulsive impulses fueled by autism or other disorders, to simply tracking progress toward a goal, and everything in between.

Tip of the hat goes to Kevin Kelly’s The Quantified Self, which as far as I can tell is the only other blog looking into this subject matter. (If I’m wrong, I’d love to be corrected.) It’s been a great resource so far.

So, stick around and see if this turns into anything.