Lifelogging: is it worth the effort?

Barry Collins spends a month logging everything about his life using a variety of apps and gadgets. Did he learn anything worthwhile? Here’s how he tracked his social media use

Tracking how you use social media

While RescueTime acts as a nicotine patch for my Twitter addiction, there are Twitter analytics sites that keep fuelling my habit.

Klout is a dangerous site for those with even a shred of ego, rating your influence and comparing it to that of your contemporaries, based on a rather opaque set of criteria.

I won’t pretend it doesn’t hurt when I get a message telling me my influence has dropped over the past 90 days, nor will it stop a wry grin spreading across my face when one my missives is retweeted by one of my “super-followers”, who broadcast my message to their audience of tens or hundreds of thousands.

I’ve been stubbornly stuck at a score of 59 or 60 for months, so if you’re reading this, Justin Bieber, would it hurt you to retweet a vain technology journalist?

However, the real nerdgasm arrives courtesy of Twitonomy, which turns your Twitter output into an elongated infographic. Apparently I send an average of 32.63 tweets a day, which certainly supports RescueTime’s accusations of wanton time-wasting, not least because my most active Twitter day is Wednesday, and my most active hour is 5-6pm.

Now my main worry is that I’ll not only continue to plunder work hours on Twitter, but I’ll also spend even more time analysing quite how many I’ve lost.