A PhD with the title "A Unified Approach to Personal Information Management" has recently been defended.

Abstract:
Humans keep and manage personal information for different purposes as part of their domestic and professional lives. The aim of this Ph.D. project is to research how interactive systems can support personal information management.

Personal information is characterized by being private and kept for ones own use. Additionally it is often semi-structured or unstructured, and the context in which the information is used may change over the course of its lifetime. These issues pose a set of challenges on the design of interactive systems that support management of such information. Moreover, interactive systems must support a variety of activities to support personal information management efficiently.

Both paper-based and electronic-based tools are used to facilitate the process of keeping and managing personal information. The focus is on how interactive systems support personal information management. Also in the last decade a drastic increase in networked resources and network accessible information has been observed, which has increased the demands on interactive systems supporting individual management of information. In the project a unified approach to the support of personal information management is being researched.

You can download the thesis from here:
http://www.cict.dtu.dk/Centre/CICT/English/Research/Ph.D.%20Projects/A%20Unified%20Approach%20to%20Personal%20Information%20Management.aspx

Peter.

Peter,
thanks! It is very interesting, I've just downloaded it.
W.