Zinzy

In my journey as a human with a personal computer, and more specifically as somebody who performs Knowledge work, I’ve developed a somewhat platform- and application-agnostic approach to computing. When I consider using a particular app or platform, I pay close attention to how it will let me work with the things I create. This has helped me keep my writing organized since 2005.

Like everybody else I have tool preferences. I prefer Spark over other email apps, I currently enjoy Obsidian more than other note-taking apps, and I will choose Mac OS X over any other operating system. Still, central to my choices is that I don’t want any long-term engagement with products that force me to limit my relationship with my data.

Tools don’t matter means:

• I focus my attention on an object, not on the tool I can use to manipulate it (example: I maintain a large collection of plain text files. Over the years, I’ve used countless apps to manipulate these files.)
• Currently, in Obsidian, I use a dozen of the excellent community apps built for this software, but data is a first-class citizen. I don’t use anything requiring too much mark-up (such as special highlighting plugins).
• With analog writing, rather than fixing myself to a particular method of archiving, or a set of writing tools (which is what a part of me desperately needs) I mix up where and how I write. At the end, I’m left with a large collection of loose notes that I bind into an annual book.
• I don’t use desktop or smartphone apps that require me to export my data and back it up independently (example: Evernote, Notion, Moodnotes)