So I decided to use this space for what it should be used for… my online home.

As I mentioned earlier, I have been blogging regularly on samharrelson.me. I’ve also had my email hosted through an @gmail.com address, have been reading feeds through Google Reader, keeping my calendar on a free @gmail Google Calendar, keeping my documents dispersed through that associated Google Docs account as well as my Dropbox account, precious family photos on Flickr, Facebook, Posterous, Picasa and SmugMug and notes on Evernote.

That needed to change.

So, I’ve been streamlining and pulling things together to reflect a little web content creation maturity. My criteria were; 1) apps/data have to provide a mobile access point 2) apps/data had to have their root on the samharrelson.com domain and 3) backups, backups, backups and 4) data portability or an export function (even RSS or XML works for me).

Here’s what I’ve come up with so far in my efforts…

- My email is now an @samharrelson.com address accessed through a Google Apps Premier account. As much as I wanted to use only IMAP or POP through my server here, GMail is just too good to leave behind. If things go awry, I can always point that MX record elsewhere and take my mail (downloaded hourly on a Thunderbird backup on my “backup computer”) elsewhere.

- My calendar is also associated with that @samharrelson.com Google Apps account now, but I’m really considering switching that to the calendar I’ve set up on samharrelson.com/cal. It’s a private installation of WebCalendar that isn’t as pretty as Google Calendar and doesn’t integrate into GMail as well… but it lives on this server. I haven’t decided yet but I’ll probably stick with the hosted GCal app for the time being.

- I’m moving my documents from everywhere around the web into that Google Docs App account. I’ve also got backups here on the server.

- Pictures are in transition from god-knows-where to samharrelson.com/pics where there will be physical and virtual backups as well as a password required for access. Flickr, etc are great but the older I get (and my child gets) the more uncomfortable I am with family images being out and about on the network. Call me old-fashioned.

- My feed reading has been moved here as well. Thanks to the awesome Fever self-installed app (at http://www.feedafever.com), I’m able to have my very own powerful RSS reader (complete with a fantastic iPhone interface) right here. You can see (or subscribe to) my shared items from Fever down below in the footer. I highly recommend it if you like my style since I subscribe to a good number of feeds and find some interesting posts throughout the week.

- I’ve been using WriteRoom for notes the last few months and love the service. Best of all, I can bake my own WriteRoom instance on this server. I’m working on that now.

- I’m still using Dropbox for file storage and access along with the new backups here and the redundant physical backups I keep. I’ll also be hanging onto that Posterous account and Twitter account (of course). However, I’m making a conscious effort to have much more of my flow originate from my home here.

- Speaking of home, I have to thank Pavel and the good folks at LivingDot who have provided the hosting for this blog (and all of my sites) for the last three years. They are pros and I do feel like my home here is safe in their neighborhood.

I love the social web and the incredible apps that have come along these last five years. However, I also love my independence. There’s something to the “Coral Reef” idea that Dave Winer spoke of in regards to Twitter a couple of years back that appeals to me in terms of net identity. I like to think of samharrelson.com as my digital coral reef that provides the biosphere and anchor for all the species of web apps that make up my online content ecosystem. That’s the hope here.

I’ll keep you updated on my progress.