Timelines tell stories; what are yours?
Work at Longer Timescales so Deadlines Don’t Sneak Up On You
We overestimate what we can do in a year. And underestimate what we can do in ten years. Long term, intergenerational projects require new tools for looking across long time scales. We need to change the way we see time by changing our daily view.
Stories About Our Work
Our calendars and schedules are more than just plans for our future. They’re stories we tell ourselves–stories about what we’ll work on next week, and what our capacity might be next month.
Cram those stories into 30-day grids and they’re likely distorted and incomplete: and so is the story you’re telling yourself.
Longer Views
And if you’re tackling intergenerational problems–climate change, greenbelts, space flight–you need a calendar that can look out towards the horizon of your projects.
Even folks working on short-term projects, or kids doing schoolwork, can benefit from doing their daily work at a longer timescale so deadlines don’t sneak up on you.
History of the polio vaccine
Example Timelines
We created these to show folks what DayBack can so, and also to help put our own stories in context.
Stories about the pandemic, the 2020 campaign to flip the US Senate, and the story of our first software platform.
History of the polio vaccine
Lots of parallels with vaccine distribution today; in some ways it’s reassuring to know we’ve been here before.
Women’s Suffrage
We were able to vote in November because generations of activists, lawyers, and teachers marched, fought, and VOTED.
Science Fiction
We wanted to make some really long timelines, so this looks at when some of the milestones of science fiction were set.
The 2020 US Elections
Some of our most detailed timelines, recouting Trump’s coronavirus response and the history of voter suppression.
History of Claris FileMaker
The history (and fanciful future) of our original software platform.
Tell Your Own Stories
These timelines draw data from Google Sheets
DayBack can share timelines from any of its data sources. Most of these examples were drawn from Google Sheets as they’re cheap, simple, and easy to get started with.
Augment Your Stories with Rich Media
Add images, rich text, and charts to your timelines to tell the stories guiding your projects.
