Open The Dialogue

Recently, Jamin Brophy-Warren of the WSJ took a deep look at the simmering trend of people sharing the minutae of their daily lives online.  This goes far past pictures of their kids or love songs written about cats and more towards the average mean of pepperoni slices consumed throughout the calendar year.

Everyone creates data — every smile, conversation and car ride is a potential datapoint. These quotidan aggregators believe that the compilation of our daily activities can reveal the secret patterns that govern the way we live. For students of personal informatics, the practice is liberating because it shows that our lives aren’t random, and are more orderly than some might expect.

Along with a host of data-centric social applications (DOPPLR, Last.fm, Brightkite/Fire Eagle), the Nick Felton-created Daytum and M.I.T.-incubated Mycrocosm are both sites that help aggregate this personal data.  The more social applications, like DOPPLR, aim to connect people in ways that weren’t possible previously while Daytum and Mycrocosm are focused on “collecton of the self.”

In an age where we have CEOs on Twitter, telling a great story means making it as believable as possible for your audience.  What better proof points than straight, sometimes raw, data?  Showing that you actually did someting or are in the process of doing something as opposed to just talking about it.  That is the power behind not only this trend but greater social technology as a whole. 

Do you think this matters for PR?  Can a company or brand use these tools to represent/humanize themselves online?