Journal Entry – 003 | On Digital Gardens
This was supposed to be a part of a bigger journal entry, but I found that I had more things to say on this topic, so it gets its own dedicated entry.
Blog Posts vs Notes on a Digital Garden
An interesting observation I've made is that I bookmark blog posts, but I do not bookmark notes from digital gardens.
Does this mean that blog posts provide more valuable information? Not necessarily, but they have their advantages from a reader's perspective.
I think it's just easier to settle on a blog post I want to read, than to pick notes to read from a huge digital garden. It kinda relates to the article I read about Overchoice. It is hard to make a choice, when there's too many choices to make. And that's usually the situation with notes on a digital garden. The chronological or reverse chronological order of blog posts, which is looked at as a bad thing nowadays, is what makes it easier for me to pick something to read.
There's also the fact that blog posts usually contain an author's processed and synthesized notes. They are more coherent and they serve to paint the bigger picture on a certain topic. Notes on a digital garden on the other hand, are really atomic sized thoughts. This means a reader will have to piece together ideas by following the links provided on the notes. That makes reading blog posts a better use of your time, because the author has already pieced together the notes for you.
Literature Notes vs Permanent Notes
I used to get confused about the idea of “writing things down in your own words”. I somehow thought that made the note my own. Writing it down in your words does make it your own version of a thought or idea. But that doesn't make it your own original thought or idea.
Which lead me to this...
One way to distinguish between a Literature Note and a Permanent Note is by asking this question: “Is this someone else's idea or mine?” If the answer is, “It is my idea.”, then it is a Permanent Note.
Misc
Lastly, if you want to publish your digital garden online, but don't want to pay for the “Publish” feature from Obsidian, check out Quartz. This is an open source repo that can turn an Obsidian vault into a digital garden website.
When my “Publish” subscription ends, I plan on giving Quartz a try.
Tags: #JournalEntry #DigitalGarden #LiteratureNotes #PermanentNotes #Zettelkasten