So I did a google search and found this interesting article "Why Shoot to the Right" about shooting with the histogram a little to the right. The idea is that more data gets lost in the darker areas, and shooting to the right when shooting RAW will allow the camera to capture more information. You may choose to drop it some in post processing, but at least you have the information.
It's worth some experimenting to see how it works with my T3i camera.
