(2020-10-01) Koss Roam Is A Notetaking Tool And A Dream Of A Better Self

Hal Koss: Roam Is a Note-Taking Tool, and a Dream of a Better Self.

Scroll around #RoamCult and you’ll notice a congregation of academics, engineers and artists sharing Roam tips with one another

they may even invite you to the community Slack workspace

scholars, project managers and marketers

people who, in Kyle Stratis’ words, “want to learn more effectively, to understand and synthesize new ideas.”

People who are not just angling for productivity, but who are in a sense hoping to optimize themselves. People who, in essence, want a second brain. (personal development)

The Road to Roam

Notion

Evernote

Apple’s Notes, Bear, Todoist, OneNote, Obsidian, Ulysses, TiddlyWiki, Workflowy and many others that, all in their own ways, try to help people stay more organized and efficient.

You can trace bi-directional linking in note-taking back to 1945, when The Atlantic published renowned engineer Vannevar Bush’s essay “As We May Think.” Bush lamented how difficult it was to learn when resources were organized by hierarchical classification systems, like alphabetical or numerical order. “The human mind does not work that way,” Bush wrote. “It operates by association.” (associative)

Alas, the web as we know it still doesn’t work that way, and Wikipedia is probably the closest mainstream approximation to Bush’s dream that we have.

Another touchstone is Zettelkasten, a note-taking method popularized by Niklas Luhmann.

The Zettelkasten and other personal knowledge organization methods produced dedicated followers, but remained largely on the fringes.

Until our digital capabilities caught up. Eventually, the proliferation of software apps — and, perhaps, the influence of self-optimization tacticians like Tim Ferriss — allowed advanced note-taking methods to reach new audiences.

‘I Check My Roam First, Even Before Google’

Stratis said that Roam has become “the focal point of every workflow that I have,” whether it’s his work tasks, personal to-do lists or brainstorms for potential blog posts.

newly created notes connect to already existing notes. It’s a lot like how knowledge works when you learn new information.

When asked if Roam was just a fancier way to store notes, to preserve what knowledge he already has, Stratis said that it does that — plus a lot more. What makes Roam so valuable, he said, is how the act of using it spurs new ideas. (idea generation)

The idea is that the ability to see links between seemingly unrelated ideas helps spark new ones. So, the “Midwest” tag from the previous urban planning book example could, let’s say, be viewed in relation to a New York Times article you read about the decline of industrial manufacturing in the Midwest

Tools for the New ‘Creator Economy’

With tools like Roam, “you don’t necessarily have to be a programmer to become an advanced computer user,” Nathan Baschez told Built In.

He shared that he’s been using Roam in recent months, which coincides with him and his business partner getting their newsletter media company off the ground.

Stratis, too, made the connection between the rise of Roam and the surge in individual content creators. “I think a lot of people are shifting toward working toward their passions. A lot of that is some form of knowledge work. And if you want to excel in that, you have to find the tools that work for that,” he said. “Any sort of craftsperson needs their tool.” (Craftsmanship)

But What Is This All About, Really?

Is the rise of Roam just the culmination of a decades-long search for a better way to take notes and remember research? Maybe. Or perhaps it’s something deeper than that, something more existential. Maybe it’s about transcending natural human limitations.

“A lot of people find it fun and satisfying to take ideas seriously and study them and take notes on them,” he said. “There’s definitely some ambition in there, but there’s also a playfulness that’s kind of disconnected from a means to an end.”