Executive Summary

The desire to capture an on-going record of history is an elemental need of humankind. Anthropologists attribute the evolution of both the spoken and written word to this rooted desire in society. The modern world of digital technology creates the ability to record history as its happening in the present. This proposal details how a website designed to collect the stories of the individual today will build an encyclopedia and recorded living history of a civilization for tomorrow.

The beginning is simple - a record of one’s existence. That record is added to other records to build a family tree. While there are other software programs and websites that create family trees and link them to others, this website would expand on the idea on a new and unexplored level. Each identity has memory to store written documents and audio files detailing moments in that life. Each record would have a content label featuring key words and phrases indicating the topic within the record. The entries would collectively create a database of real time history that could be researched and cross-referenced by year, geographic location, event, demographic, etc. Families would be able to research, read and hear the stories of their forefathers directly from the source.

This living recorded history would have larger function than just serving the individual family. The database would be used by a multitude of researchers looking for specific information.  The same principles of the collective intelligence that keep Wikipedia honest and accurate would apply. Writers and historians would then have an unlimited source of materials to track how the world was changed one person at a time. The medical community could start with one person’s disease, illness, or questionable health issue and track it through a family or a community. The personal and professional possibilities of usage are without limit.

The facts and details of historical events will always be documented by those who make it their job to do so. But so often what is missing is the individual story that gives every historical moment its humanity. People remember where they were and what they were doing when John F. Kennedy was shot, the space shuttle Challenger exploded, and when the planes hit the twin towers in New York. Everyone has a story and the majority of those stories are missed. The proposal seeks to capture all of the stories from the people who lived them and are willing to share.