About Pickles
Pickles is a journaling companion designed to support reflection, awareness, and personal evolution. At its core, journaling is not simply the act of recording daily events. It is a practice of looking back at the flow of emotions and thoughts, and by putting them into words, gaining new insights. Psychology has shown that writing down one’s emotions can have therapeutic effects; Pickles extends this principle into a structured, supportive tool.
Yet journaling is more than self-care. It is also a form of self-research, treating the self as a site where countless phenomena unfold. By observing and writing, we can notice questions we had not yet recognized, or deepen the ones already within us. We describe this process as a form of “fermentation”: the gradual transformation of accumulated reflections into meaningful knowledge. Pickles is designed to assist in this fermentation of memory.
Once a week, Pickles reads the journals you keep privately in platforms such as Notion or Google Docs. It then sends an email pointing out subtle connections you may not have noticed, or suggesting questions that might spark further reflection. Importantly, Pickles does not replace the act of journaling itself. The meaning emerges from your writing. The AI only nudges gently, avoiding definitive interpretations, leaving space for your own discovery.
By writing your life, finding meaning, and receiving these weekly prompts, Pickles sustains the practice of journaling and helps cultivate the ongoing fermentation of your life experience.
Currently, Pickles operates as a closed experiment with beta testers.
Dominique Chen & Yuki Agatsuma
Based in Tokyo, researcher Dominique and engineer Yuki started to collaboratively design open-source software prototypes following ethical principles: tools that resist addiction, foster care, and evolve like fermentation. They gather experimental app ideas—from journaling and psychogeography to wellbeing alerts—guided by critical perspectives (decolonial, feminist, evocative computing).
For testers
If you are interested in trying out Pickles, please send a message to dominick.chen@gmail.com
