Why Note-taking is Broken

… and suggestions towards a solution

It’s not unusual to hear of note-taking apps being described as “information graveyards” or “silos of non-essential data gathering dust”. Some time ago I began to ask people about their experience with note-taking apps. It turns out that many are dissatisfied with the status quo. There is a huge desire for better software, but the failings of existing apps are harder to define. Everyone had a hard time describing the problem in more specific terms. And nobody who tried to suggest improvements was completely happy with their own suggestions.

Of course, if there was a clear path from existing apps towards a better solution, it would have already been realized. What we need is a fresh new look at the problem.

Note-taking apps can be classified according to their understanding of what needs to be controlled. In order to understand what I mean by “control” let’s consider the practice of wu wei from Taoist philosophy. The literal meaning of the Chinese word wu wei is “not doing”. But wu wei is not an invitation for being passive or accepting fate at any price. Instead, wu wei is much better described as “not trying to control what ultimately cannot be controlled”. The martial arts – most notably Judo and Aikido – provide great examples. An important principle of Judo is not to oppose strength with strength. Attacked by your opponent, you do not oppose him. Instead you yield to him and use his strength to bring about his downfall (c.f. Alan Watts, What is Tao?). This approach could also be described as “not forcing” or “not obstructing.”

The 900 pound gorillas of note-taking

How do note-taking apps measure up against the ideal of forcing/not forcing? The feature-rich 900 pound gorillas of note-taking have certainly brought significant advances – most notably ubiquity – but fundamentally fail by encouraging users to try to exert levels of control which are almost impossible to maintain. What the user is encouraged to control is nothing less than the future. The opponent is information overflow, and the tools of the trade are folders and tags.

There is nothing wrong with folders and tags per se. It is the usage pattern they encourage – or fail to prevent – that causes harm: there is no inherent relationship between the note and the folder where it is put. The same goes for tags. It is the sole responsibility of the user to come up with a meaningful system of organization. Furthermore, it is the duty of the user to maintain this system indefinitely.

Any new system can look great when we start using it. It seems obvious and clear. But we tend to organize things according to our current view of our work and interests. At some point, the arrival of new information will inevitably require a re-evaluation of our previous approach and the need to reorganize notes. Our work is changing; we constantly learn new things and adapt our views and goals accordingly. By attempting to come up with a complete system we are indeed trying to control the future.

There is nothing wrong with folders and tags per se. It is the usage pattern they encourage that causes harm.

It gets worse. In consistently adapting and extending our system, we’re required to actually remember it. How many of us write and maintain a document describing the organizational scheme they’ve devised? And if we don’t, how are we supposed to remember to keep using it consistently? If the relationship between the contents of our notes and the folders and tags we use is not completely obvious, it is not possible to keep using the scheme consistently without regularly going through all notes to refresh one’s memory. And who does that?

Although we like the apparent power that comes with the ability to create arbitrary hierarchies of folders and tags, they provide us with plenty of rope to hang ourselves. The solution would be to only use folder names and tags which reflect the actual contents of the note. Even if we were capable of the kind of self-restraint required to make such naming and tagging viable, a typical note often contains multiple thoughts. Completely classifying those isn’t feasible.

In consistently adapting and extending our system, we’re required to actually remember it.

Back to wu wei. Our 900 pound gorilla note-taking app is mislead by its apparent power and wants us to attack information overflow head-on. Doing so is possible, but requires a lot of energy and resolve. We are only human, and most of us will fail to keep up the stamina required to make it work over the long run. When that happens, our information turns stale – ultimately leading to the feeling of having produced an information graveyard.

The Tao of note-taking

Is there another way – perhaps a way of “not-forcing”? So far we have looked at one end of the control spectrum. But what about the other end? Some apps don’t use tags and folders but rely on full-text search instead. These apps never encourage the user to invent an organizational system external to the actual content of notes. As search is the only tool available, users might even be inspired to write their notes with this restriction in mind.

While I would always prefer a minimalistic app, I believe that they are leaving too much on the table. My ideal app’s understanding of what should be controlled lies somewhere between minimalistic apps and the 900 pound gorillas. This means that such an app would need to provide an alternative to tags and folders, that discourages the creation of an external organizational system. But this alone wouldn’t be enough. Since a typical note can contain an arbitrary mix of heterogeneous thoughts, it cannot be uniformly described no matter how clever the tag/folder alternative might be.

I believe what we need is a new interface metaphor for keeping small pieces of information like a single idea or thought. Longer documents won’t go away of course, but at least when it comes to note-taking we often misuse them. How could such an alternative look like? It turns out that 18th century naturalists not only experienced a case of information overload, but also devised a technology – paper based of course – to cope with it. In a future article, I will explore this idea in depth and what we can learn from it for our digital age.

This post is a modified version of an article which appeared on kards.io where I and my team are working on an alternative to traditional note-taking software.

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Thanks Jacob for your invaluable copy editing. ☺