Sorry, I can't switch to Firefox, as I've never not used Firefox.
I used it already when it was called Netscape. Before that I used Mosaic, which itself is not entirely stranger to Netscape creation.
Also, FF is not "a great alternative to Google Chrome". FF is a great browser in its own right. (Almost) always has been. And how could it be considered an alternative to anything when it was there first (or second, right after Mosaic)?
You're welcome ;)
If you decide to give a try to a Zettelkasten and if I was to share a single advice it would be to keep it simple. Ignore all subtleties, you will know it when you need them.
The day I find a cabinet like that at the local “marché aux puces” I will probably do a paper Zettel as well. It’s beautiful and fulfilling.
Allow me to correctly rephrase that sentence of yours: "the day you find a cabinet like that at the local “marché aux puces” you instantly send me a message to ask me if I want it". Which I am, and I will thank you wholeheartedly, even though I had no idea where I could put it in our small apartment ;)
Ah oui t’es un jlailu toi aussi, j’avais pas remarqué.
Neither did I realize you were too ;)
I do love my obsidian Zettel for one useless function: The graph view that looks like a brain with synapses etc 🤷🏻♂️
Obsidian has a lot of qualities. It's just that... I find it was incredibly overwhelming when I first installed it. I spend an entire week just getting familiar with it and learning its base procedures. In comparison, getting familiar with a pile of index cards and a fountain pen took me... a few seconds.
And then everything is flat on a screen, and intangible and stuck withing that limited screen. You can't touch it, you can't easily put it in whatever order — or disorder — you fancy or drop it wherever you want. I like to spread my cards on a couple tables and then mix them as ideas and connections start to fuse. I also enjoy flipping through those cards like I would flip through the pages of a book (it's generally when the most interesting surprises will happen) much more than I appreciate being able to Ctrl or Cmd-Search for an exact keyword.
Anything 'collectible' has become a no-go for me. Simply put, anything that is collectible has turned into a business, with more or less artificially created scarcity and with entire businesses thriving on people gullibility, FOMO and with their obsession with making a quick and easy buck. There is no way I want to participate in that scam.
On a more personal note and experience:
I was a book and comics collector for many decades myself. I started as a book-lover teen and and then as a student, selling used books and comics as a way to earn money and then pay for College. It was a lot of fun, back then. Like really. And exciting too.
Then, as a young adult earning more than a decent living, I started spending serious money in rare and original editions, this time without any idea to make money out of it. It was just my hobby and I earned enough to not worry, and it was still fun and exciting too. At least, it was fun in the beginning.
Still, a couple decades ago I donated my entire library (3k+ books) to a charity because... Well... Money was king everywhere. And what I used to love was now making me feel so sad.
Sure, I should be happy as I had accumulated a small fortune on my shelves but I did not enjoy it the slightest. People (like myself) were not giving a crap anymore about content or the authors they once genuinely admired, they only worried about the books value. Realizing I was that kind of person myself made me feel very ashamed of myself. I wanted to get back to what really matter, the content, the text, the art. and not their fucking retail value as collectibles.
Getting rid of my entire library (save for very few books, not even rare) was liberating and, so many years later, still feels like the best decision ever. I don't care the slightest about those books potential resale value anymore. I barely own any books myself nowadays, I read most of them from the public library, and I've rediscovered the unadulterated and incomparable pleasure of enjoying reading.
Indeed. But I will remain on the older computer-less models. My latest acquisition is a Typestar 220, that is a replacing another but worse Typestar. Loving it ;)
:)
Thx, fixed
I don't trust brands, I trust their customer support.
Any device/product can fail, no matter how excellent it is. To me, what matters is how efficiently the issue is dealt with by the support.
Like, I trust Apple customer support and now, after approx. 40 years being their customer, their customer support is the sole reason I'm still buying Apple stuff (I don't like at all what they became and how they make their device unfixable on purpose, it's a shame for a company that so much pretend to care about being eco-friendly). I'm also a fountain pen user and a collector, but the brands I trust the most are not the most hyped and expensive, far from it, they're TWSBI and Lamy, because of their amazing customer support. Or, say, I mainly wear Merrell shoes for hiking (because they fit me well, obviously) because they have a fine customer support. And so on.
I have zero brand loyalty beyond that, and will not hesitate to change brand if they ever cut on their customer support.
This. We have not owned a TV since the very early 00s, when we realized they wanted us to pay in order to watch... ads. More and more of them.
First, thx.
Then, to answer your questions:
The Zettelkasten was devised to be constantly updated and searched and linked, be it analog or digital. My index is the key entry point, next to the my many bibliographical and authors cards and then I simply follow the links from one card to the other(s).
I can easily update any entry by adding more cards to it, with a sub-digit ID linking it to its parent.
I'm not a huge fan of videos, but you could do worse (much worse) than watch a few on Scott Scheper's channel (https://www.youtube.com/@scottscheper/videos) the only real downside imho, beside the sheer amount of videos, is how much he insists on being hostile to digital. Even though I'm an analog user myself I find his constant attacks tiring (not necessarily all wrong, but tiring) and counter-productive. The same with his book (a really excellent understanding of what an analog Zettel is and how one could use it, with way too much anti-digital remarks). A more neutral and not less interesting reading would be Bob Doto 'A system for writing' (https://bobdoto.computer/) — reading it this very moment and not yet finished, but I like what I've been reading so far. The kind of book I would likely offer to a newcomer.
As for cost. There are many options to reduce it to barely nothing (say, much less than the cost of a cloud subscription to host your files for a few decades):
For storage, I have yet to find a decent filing cabinet. Living in France, I don't have access to the variety of new cabinets you have in the USA, or only at absurdly expensive prices. And used 4x6 filing cabinets are not that common. So, for the most part I've been using a (high tech) mix of shoe boxes (they work surprisingly well) and of those office index card boxes (plastic or metal boxes with a removable lid and optional separators). Both are ugly as fuck, that's for sure, but at least they do their job. One day, hopefully, I will get my hand on one of those nice and well-made cabinet :p
Edit: typos (part thx to Apple's autocorrect moronic decisions, part because I just suck at English ;)
Nope. I simply refuse to watch ads.
Either the website or their author will have provided the means to support them directly, or I won't. And if they try forcing ads on me, I quit using their website.
I'm fine with spending money to support content or services I appreciate. I refuse to waste a second of my life watching ads. That's the reason why we have not owned a TV since the early 00s: my spouse and I realized we were screwed as, at least here in France, we were supposed to pay for watching TV but still would have to watch ads, more and more of them for that matter. So, gone the TV.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_the_web_browser ;)