Home Memiary: Save Your Life From the Oblivion of Forgetfulness

Memiary: Save Your Life From the Oblivion of Forgetfulness

I don’t remember what I did last Monday, do you? I’d have to think pretty hard to remember what I did even on my last birthday, and that was only two weeks ago. That’s depressing.

Enter Memiary, a startlingly simple diary service that prompts you to enter up to five sentence fragments about what you did today and lets you look back by date at what you did in the past. It’s really simple, from the gracefully implemented account creation process to the AJAX item editing. I’ve bookmarked it and am going to try to fill it out daily for awhile; I’d sure like to be able to look back at any given day in my life and remember what happened. This is so simple I might actually use it.

Memiary is a weekend creation from Sid Yadav, long-time app reviewer at the blog Rev2.org. Yadav wrote a good post about the process of creating the service, how fulfilling it was and how proud his first user (mom) was of him.

These kinds of projects can go well, or not. We wrote about the relaunch of Diary.com last month, where private diaries are now combined with “lifestream” aggregation of activity from around the web. That site claims 11k diaries have been created, a number lower than what you’d think they could have managed with that URL and no effort at all.

Twitter’s not made for this kind of thing, either. That company gives and takes away access to users’ own archives as it suits their scaling needs and people tend to send more messages in a day than is appropriate as a personal history.

Even more simple could be the way to go. That’s what I’d like, I realize now, after checking out Memiary. Hopefully Memiary’s Yadav will implement a simple XML data-export option so I don’t have to resent the control he holds over my life, trapped in his website. I’d also like to be able to enter more characters per line than is currently allowed. Simple is good but so are complete sentences. I would also like a reminder to make my entries – for me that would work well as an IM at 5:00 PM.

Little services like this might not turn the world upside down, they might not take markets by storm or get acquired for tens of millions of dollars – but they can make a difference in the lives of the people who use them. Isn’t that really why most of us are here on the internet, anyway?

About ReadWrite’s Editorial Process

The ReadWrite Editorial policy involves closely monitoring the tech industry for major developments, new product launches, AI breakthroughs, video game releases and other newsworthy events. Editors assign relevant stories to staff writers or freelance contributors with expertise in each particular topic area. Before publication, articles go through a rigorous round of editing for accuracy, clarity, and to ensure adherence to ReadWrite's style guidelines.

Get the biggest tech headlines of the day delivered to your inbox

    By signing up, you agree to our Terms and Privacy Policy. Unsubscribe anytime.

    Tech News

    Explore the latest in tech with our Tech News. We cut through the noise for concise, relevant updates, keeping you informed about the rapidly evolving tech landscape with curated content that separates signal from noise.

    In-Depth Tech Stories

    Explore tech impact in In-Depth Stories. Narrative data journalism offers comprehensive analyses, revealing stories behind data. Understand industry trends for a deeper perspective on tech's intricate relationships with society.

    Expert Reviews

    Empower decisions with Expert Reviews, merging industry expertise and insightful analysis. Delve into tech intricacies, get the best deals, and stay ahead with our trustworthy guide to navigating the ever-changing tech market.