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Comment on Ask HN: Are methods like zettelkasten / Roam a waste of time?

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so this is a handwavy, ymmv answer to a broad question, but i will avoid saying 'it depends' and try for a concise 80% hot take answer.

if you use journalling as a 'write only' medium where you don't often review what you've written, you just want to get the thoughts to stop ping ponging in your brain, then yes these kind of systems tend to be a waste of time because you don't get good roi out of the effort required to link and crosslink verious notes over time. too much organization to content ratio. use paper, joplin, onenote or kjots and move on.

if however you already do something like the weekly getting things done review OR want to / have to keep a lab notebook to refer to what you previously learned and since forgot (which is what i want to try using onenote per https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=28678449) then adding the additional complexity of roam (eww saas) or zetelkassen (no saas yay) then go for it.

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