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What is a Lifestream?

In it’s simplest form it’s a chronological aggregated view of your life activities both online and offline. It is only limited by the content and sources that you use to define it.

Where did Lifestreaming Originate?

Lifestreaming originated as a concept in 1996 as a project at Yale by Eric Freeman and David Gelernter. The original concept has come to fruition with the ability to create and distribute content utilizing many new technologies. Here is an interview with David Gelernter where he provides more insight.

What is Lifelogging?

Lifelogging is tracking personal activity that can be generated by devices or web services based on our behavior. This concept was pioneered by Gordon Bell. Some of the new devices that have become available can track our physical activity, sleep, and other areas. I’ve created a list of devices, services, and resources here. You can also watch Gordon describe Lifelogging at a Quantified Self meetup.

How to Create a Lifestream

1. Start by defining the services you want to use to create your Lifestream. The services listed on that page offer the ability to track our activities such as bookmarking  (Delicious), listening to music  (Last.fm),  sharing photos (Flickr), or creating or liking videos (YouTube).You may already have accounts on existing sites, or want to create new ones.

2. Determine how you want to create your Lifestream. I recommend starting with one of the many available services and then once you get the hang of it you can add one to your personal site or blog.

I was inspired to create a blog for Lifestreaming after doing a little research which I wrote about on my blog in February of 2007. Most of the information I found was pretty scattered and there wasn’t a central repository of resources so I thought I should create one. I feel that beyond the self expression of allowing people to track their actions in a passive manner there will be many more exciting technologies that will surface from the backend data aggregation that can occur from people supplying this information.

Here are some more helpful posts to get you started

• Why create a Lifestream? – I provide some insight here. Also check out Lea Woodward who also provides some great reasons to create one here
• 5 elements for a well balanced Lifestream - My thoughts on how you can create a fresh and interesting Lifestream

Here are great resources on the web

• How to create a Lifestream of your online activities – Chris Spooner provides a great tutorial from a designers point of view utilizing Simplepie
• Why are we all screaming for Lifestreaming? – A good post that generated a great conversation in the comments discussing why you may want to be Lifestreaming
• Some thoughts from Dana Lookadoo on why to Lifestream & what is gained