I believe it's a form of bikeshedding[1]. Not everyone might be experts on AI or gaussian splats or whatever, but taking notes -- everyone did that, so everyone can comment on that.

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bikeshedding

It (note-taking tools) really is a big thing among this cohort. I think there’s this deep belief that if you just had the right organizational system, you could get more done and be more productive. Having gone down that line of thinking before, I get the appeal, though I think it’s overrated when it comes to actually being productive. But man it feels good to play with new toys.

Can echo the feeling, it's magical thinking that "only if I had the perfect organisational system I'd unlock my potential". It's a trap, and I fell for it for a while when I was younger.

Nowadays I gave up on all the Notion/Evernote/orgmode/whatever-tool-someone-is-peddling with systems of systems, tagging, etc. to organise oneself.

I realised after getting a bit older that pen and paper is the system that works for me, just a nice notebook, without pressure to use it for everything, no rigid system but a system that organically evolved for myself; keep it accessible wherever I'm that I might need to take notes, and it just flows while being easy to use for myself.

I think that looking for the perfect amazing organisational system is just another form of procrastination. I'm very happy for the people who manage to have found a very neat system for themselves, searchable, available on every device, etc., but it's not for me.

I think it’s caused by being stressed. We hope to find a simple solution from being overwhelmed.

Obsessive organisation can be a form of procrastination.

I think it’s a common shared problem and everyone is looking for the no-compromises solution.

For me…

- One trusted place for all the notes (something that the stuff everywhere model lacks… things get lost or end up being hard to find)

- Portable, avoiding lock-in. The assumption is the usefulness of the notes will outlive any closed platform.

- Multiplatform, with sync. To make it easy to have that one trusted place, and it always be accessible.

- Modern features… can’t sketch too well in markdown and embedding stuff is tedious and doesn’t seem like it will scale well over time without tooling. But tooling brings back the lock-in issue.

And probably some other stuff. The perfect system doesn’t really exist. Compromises need to be made. Each person makes different concessions, while many of us jump from tool to tool, system to system, hoping to have it all, but ultimately living with constant pain and disappointment.

I’ve given up. I’m use Obsidian and work and the Apple stuff at home. If/when I need to migrate off Apple, I’ll deal with it then. Switching every few months sucks.

> I don’t understand how note taking is such an impassioned subject on this site.

Neurotic people thinking that they are going to organize their existence on this earth.

I think that's because a lot of Hacker News readers are autistic and/or ADHD (I am). As autistic I love to catalog things and as ADHD sufferer I need notes to be able to function in the modern works.