Building a Memex

In 1945, the Memex was proposed as the ultimate personal library for a user’s books, correspondence, and records. In addition to just storing this data, users could navigate, organize, link, and share it with others.

Unfortunately, zero were ever built but the Memex had a direct influence on the first interactive computers and the development of hypertext and the internet. In an age when computers were room-sized analog devices for simulating missile trajectories or calculating payroll, this idea presented an alternative vision of what computers should be able to do.

Though computers are more powerful and ubiquitous than ever, our digital histories are often inaccessible, fragmented, or locked behind corporate platforms. As a long-time journaller, note-taker, and digital packrat, the idea of the Memex resonated with me. Inspired by this seventy-year-old vision, I'm now attempting to build an app for making my personal history accessible for search and introspection.

Here's a conference talk that goes over more details:

What I've built so far:

• Real-time importers for all the digital history I generate (email, browser history, photos, podcast listening, ebook reading, etc). Each of these activity streams gets processed into a graph-like schema, accessible through a unified API.
• An interface for searching, filtering, and analyzing all this personal data.
• A flexible authoring tool for composing, organizing, and annotating information.

Updates

I'm working towards publishing more details but if you’re interested in learning more now, I'd love to chat by email or you can sign up for the development newsletter.