When we receive information on the web, it usually comes to us in random drips, or an uncontrolled blast If information is presented in a manageable way, it’s easier to understand. Lifestreams help us manage and present this information in an often refreshing, simple way. Microsoft researcher Gordon Bell kept a lifestream that included: Records of over 200K Web sites Over 150K e-mails Almost 20K documents Thousands of songs, videos, photos and phone conversations
Lifestreaming originated as a concept by computer science professors David Galernter & Eric Freeman at Yale in 1996 and was described as: “a time-ordered stream of documents that functions as a diary of your electronic life” A current description and implementation is: a reverse chronological aggregated view of your activities both online and offline… only limited by the content and sources that are used to create it. As you see here, FriendFeed is one lifestreaming service. It can be used to aggregate your activity on, say, Twitter, Flickr, StumbleUpon, and about 50 other sites.
Here we poke fun at the most common negative stereotype against the use of Twitter. This user simply said, “eating a hamburger,” and in this form, that content was just not valuable to anyone. It could have been, however, simply if the person had provided some context.
Here’s how you can easily take that post and experience…and make it social. From here, you can talk to others about your experiences in your socialstreams. A socialstream is a stream where you can talk to folks, whereas a lifestream may serve as the focal point for some interaction, but it serves as a main hub for your digital activities You can fit your 140 character lifestyle into a lifestream in a way that the information becomes more visceral, and therefore valuable. In this case it’s Brightkite, but this can be done with YouTube, Flickr, and most other services to publish content directly to Twitter. This is the meat (literally) of fitting your 140-character Lifestream into 140 Characters Some lifestream services are blog like, and can publish content to your socialstreams. Others can aggregate. We’ll talk about workflows in a bit, but you can certainly use lifestreamed content on your socialstream. Mark: How do you link up your accounts?
There are different types of lifestreaming services, of course. Some look like blogs, while others aggregate However, you’ll figure out which service you’ll use based on your workflow. Here we show an example of a Lifestreaming workflow. We may also want to discuss how it can be a fairly complex process to set this up depending on the multiple devices and services you want to integrate. A possible question for us could be: Question #1: What tips or services do you use to help manage your Lifestreaming Workflow? (Mark, but for others)
Sometimes, you can use the lifestream format, whether it’s aggregated or not, to tell a specific story. Kevin, you have some grand plans as to how storystreaming could work for mainstream media. Please explain this.
Here’s an example of curation by using images posted to Twitter to create a Storystream To Kevin: Tell us about 140pix
While Kevin’s ideal storystreams are carefully curated, others are automated. This is a topic page for the New York Times on “Pakistan.” While it mostly auto-aggregates content for SEO purposes, it tells the story, through NYT content, of Pakistan. I would say this is a very rudimentary example of a storystream. There are sites that can pull streams as well in real time. Twazzup and Muckrack There are services that storystream in real time Question: Does the lifestream format affect digital storytelling? Has it changed the way YOU consume news?
More brands are starting to take advantage of the lifestream format as well, whether it’s on a social media news release, Here we see a crowdsourced Brandstream for REM. Fans were provided specific tags & hashtags to use for REM tour dates, and a website would then aggregate their photos, videos, tweets, and blog posts. This tells a story that’s based on REM, its fans, and its fans’ experiences. This is just one brandstream example, and others are experimenting with things like social media news release, press centers, etc. Question for Mona: We’re starting to see more brands experiment with streams. For instance, many started on FriendFeed, but many of those efforts seem to have fizzled out quickly. Why do you think that is? How can different types of companies and brands brandstream? Is it for everyone?
One last takeaway: Mine: Make sure that your content gives consumers the full story. Your socialstreams can feed into your lifestreams, and your lifestream can push out into your social stream, but make sure you provide a valuable experience for your friends, readers and consumers in all places.