The Last App You'll Ever Need (Until the Next One)
Issue #4
Hi guys,
Just a few months ago, everywhere I looked people were talking about Notion. They were saying you could use it for everything: task management, taking notes, collaboration, a digital archive, and anything else you could think of. I jumped on the bandwagon and had a lot of fun playing with the app, setting up templates, and overall getting organized. I ditched my task-manager of choice for many many years (Things 3) for a more customized setup in Notion and am pretty happy with the results.
Lately the hot new app is Roam, and once again people are going on about how it’s “the app that can do it all”. I’ve been trying out Roam for about a week, and although I don’t think it’s the app to do it all I do think it has strengths over other apps like Notion, and that has given me a good insight.
As much as I wish it did, I don’t think “the one app to rule them all” exists.
And so for at least the near future I’m going to stop pretending like I can use just one app for everything I need. What’s the point of that anyway? I already use separate apps for mail and calendar, but somehow I have this idea that being able to do everything else in one place (in this case Notion) would be amazing.
For now I’m going to stick with Roam for taking notes. It just feels so much better for that purpose than Notion. Notion is a cool name for an app, but I think it’s not really the right name for itself. Taking notes is not what Notion does best.
Notion is a database app first and foremost, and for any use case that is not best suited for a database it really is too slow and clunky. While it still makes sense for me to manage my projects and tasks in there, it’s proving to be completely useless as a digital archive. I’ve tried saving interesting things I’ve found around the web but they are already collecting dust.
It’s the same problem I had using Evernote; things would go in but they never seemed to come back out again. For this problem I’m giving mymind a try, with the hope that the things that I save will resurface when the right time occurs.
And I’m coming to peace with the fact that it’s OK to spread my various digital needs across as many different tools as it takes.
Until next time,
Ryan
This Week’s Recommendations 🤔
📼 Video - 100 ROAM TIPS: Beginner to Advanced in 25 Mins | Roam Research Course
Whether or not you’re interested in Roam, you can learn a lot from this video about creating engaging content; it is a fantastic accomplishment for a “tips” video. Not only does he cram in such a massive amount of tips, he does so in a fast-paced and entertaining way. The production value is top-notch and he does a really nice job throwing in bits of humor and slight (but not distracting) asides.
I’m inspired by this video to make my own “tips” video, although I don’t think I will get anywhere close to 100!🎥 Channel - Alpha Gaming
I’ve watched a lot of videos this week from Harris Heller’s YouTube channel Alpha Gaming. He has excellent advice for creating quality content, plus the kinds of things that actually matter and are worth focusing on for a beginning channel.
A few particular favorites are Dear New Youtubers.. Stop Doing This and How To REALLY Go From 0-1000 Twitch Viewers.Music 🎧 - 4K 🔴 Lofi Radio 24/7 🌃 Aesthetic Lofi Hip Hop Beats to sleep/ study to
I love using music as a focus device, and lofi seems to be the best genre to help me get into the zone. It’s just interesting and stimulating enough to keep me engaged, but simple and distraction free enough to not get in my way. Music without vocals is especially necessary, so that makes this a great choice.
What I’m Reading 📚
The Practice: Shipping Creative Work by Seth Godin
For many years I have admired Seth Godin’s work. His advice always sounds like nuggets of wisdom and he practices what he preaches. By that I mean he is very prolific, and sometimes he succeeds and other times he doesn’t, but he keeps on doing the work. I’ll be honest that this particular book is not doing much for me, but it might be because I already believe in the overall message so I don’t need to be convinced.
This week’s videos 🎥
31 WRITING FOR STRINGS TIPS - Beginner to Intermediate Advice from A Film Composer & String Arranger
HOW TO USE SECONDARY DOMINANTS - Essential Harmony Explained with Examples From Real Music