In November of 2004 I wrote a posting up here called “Web based email on your home network” where I mentioned some of the control issues I had around being able to manage most of the technology I used and not depending on other services in order to have things I want.

As I started thinking about this recently, I realized just how much of my digital life I have “outsourced” over the past year. When I think about it, I’ve outsourced my picture storage to Flickr, my bookmarking to del.icio.us, my contact management to LinkedIn, my email to Google Mail, and Jonna and I have recently started tracking our schedule on a shared Google Calendar. Hell, I’ve even outsourced my goal tracking to 43 Things. Even most of my entertainment is retrieved from the Net, as I haven’t listened to radio in months opting for programming found through podcasts.

The network is becoming the one area that I cannot live without, because most of the relevant things that I need to track about my life is on it now. I no longer have to search for files on my hard drive and ensure that I get that notepad text file with all of my contacts through the years. Its on the net. I no longer have to worry about backing up my digital photos, because thats all taken care of for me by Flickr.

My how the times have changed since late 2004. I’ve actually moved away from the control issues that I used to have about having to run and maintain everything I use here in the Labs. As a matter of fact, I am now dependent on the whole network in order to know whats going on with my life.

Just a brief observation. I’ve been thinking about it quite a bit lately.