Design beyond the numbers: sharing, comparing, storytelling and the need for a Quantified Us

In this article we discuss the social side of self-tracking. Technologies that allow users to keep track of various aspects of their lives tend to focus on individual needs and goals (the Quantified Self), but as these technologies become more enmeshed with users’ lives, appropriation practices reveal a desire of users to connect to others through self-tracking. To better support these needs, we argue for an expansion of the technology and the associated scientific field toward a more socially oriented Quantified Us, that values and facilitates interpersonal communication and connection through self-tracked data. These matters are illustrated with examples from self-tracking practice, highlighting communication needs and existing workarounds associated with self-tracking. We conclude with directions for future work.