When I used browser bookmarks, I had too many bookmarks. When I used an RSS reader, I had too many feeds to keep up with. I have too many emails backlogged. I'll deal with them because otherwise they never go away. Compare this with with my ad hoc list of little projects I want to do. I never do most of them because I forget them. This is annoying but fine, although it'd be nice if I could note down all those projects in a way that they too haunt me until done.
The problem is that there is an impedance mismatch between my memory and the memory of my information gathering applications.
Here's a feature I want from my RSS feeder. Every so often it should silently hide one of the feeds. If I notice, and if I remember what it was is that's been hidden, I should be able to say: Hey, you forgot feed X, give it back!, and the application would say: Okay then, you got me banged to rights, here it is. If I don't notice or can't remember, the feed is deleted permanently.
When I used browser bookmarks, I had too many bookmarks. When I used an RSS reader, I had too many feeds to keep up with. I have too many emails backlogged. I'll deal with them because otherwise they never go away. Compare this with with my ad hoc list of little projects I want to do. I never do most of them because I forget them. This is annoying but fine, although it'd be nice if I could note down all those projects in a way that they too haunt me until done.
The problem is that there is an impedance mismatch between my memory and the memory of my information gathering applications.
Here's a feature I want from my RSS feeder. Every so often it should silently hide one of the feeds. If I notice, and if I remember what it was is that's been hidden, I should be able to say: Hey, you forgot feed X, give it back!, and the application would say: Okay then, you got me banged to rights, here it is. If I don't notice or can't remember, the feed is deleted permanently.