Could the process of recording our lives empower us to change the way we live for the better? Is it possible that technology will provide us with a more vivid and concise way of gaining insight into our missteps be they social, professional, financial, emotional or spiritual? And furthermore, could it help us to view the sweeping repetitions that erode the best parts of our lives in patterned ways. Would we stop being inclined to err if we could more accurately see how we end up so often doing the very things we hope to avoid?

Software currently being developed at Microsoft in San Francisco will allow the documentation of an individual’s lifetime’s worth of experiences creating a digital “memory” so that anything that has happened in a person’s life could be archived in a retrievable database. Thus, it will be possible to view our lives from a vantage point never before seen. In the same way archeologists study sedimentary deposits in soil and can determine what transpired, so too, we will be able to see the layers of our lives in real time available for retrieval, review and possible realignment. Currently, the digital archiving process is a manual one. However, it is expected that in as few as 15 years it will be common to carry nearly all our “memories” around with us in a single device that will automatically record the sound and video of our daily activities, creating an inventory of the conversations we have, the faces we see and the articles we read, etc.

According to Popular Science magazine, that data would be tied to communications that are already tracked electronically, like our e-mail and event calendars, as well as TV shows, movies, podcasts and other media we take in. The end result: on-demand total recall.

The project, spearheaded by the respected Gordon Bell, is known as MyLifeBits. Microsoft’s Media Presence Research Group is experimenting with Bell by having him scan his old photographs, research documents and notes. Next, he began recording his meetings and phone calls and cataloguing his new photos and the movies he saw. Every e-mail exchange he had was digitally archived, and he started using the company’s prototype SenseCam, which he wears around his neck, to automatically snap photos throughout the day. Bell now documents about one gigabyte of information every month, all of which is stored in a searchable database on his PC.

The biggest challenge to the success of MyLifeBits is developing the software required to search your memory database effectively. So far, MyLifeBits pulls together more than 20 data types to link various memories to one another. Using a full-text search, Bell tracks down what he’s looking for in no more than 30 seconds. Soon, when searching through meeting notes, for instance, photos of people attending those meetings and their contact information will appear side by side. The effort could be pushed along by Columbia University researchers who are using statistical-analysis programs to automatically sort hours of recorded audio by time and location (office, café, etc.).

Next, they’ll tackle speaker recognition, which would allow for categorizing and searching conversation by who’s talking. Meanwhile, miniaturization and the falling cost of image sensors and data storage will soon allow for unobtrusive recording, as well as on-person storage, of several terabytes—which means a vast upgrade in personal processing power. “Having a surrogate memory creates a freeing and secure feeling,” Bell says of his self-experiment. “It’s similar to having an assistant with perfect memory." To view an abstract of the MyLifeBits project click here: MyLifeBits: Fulfilling the Memex Vision Or you can review these del.icio.us MyLifeBits tags. Another article: IEEE Spectrum