The idea of whether we should need to have access to our fancy notes systems on mobile devices makes me remember: when I used a non-cloud-syncing Palm III, and then a Handspring Visor (before I ruined everything with a color Palm Zire), I entered 99% of the information directly, with a stylus. I may have made a few edits to Contacts or DateBk info on Outlook on a PC and synced the changes, but most of it was done right on the device. It was all I had, but I didn't mind. In fact, it was a pleasure because the UI was so refined and fast. There was no WiFi connection, so no lure of news, messages, and social media constantly pulling me away from the task at hand. And crucially, no nagging worry in the back of my mind every time I added or updated a record in a database, hoping the sync mechanism was still working and connected, matching everything continuously with its master source in the cloud. It was a mentally quiet process. All of that made it
joyful. I rarely feel anything approaching that on the iPhone. It's infinitely more powerful than the Palms were, but it's so stress-inducing that I'm always itching to be done with it and put it down. I feel like I can be productive with "real" work only on the laptop. What if I had an iOS device (like my 2009 iPod touch) but even more limited, not able to pull news sources, email and Instagram out of the air, and focused on what information I could put
into it without it pushing stuff at me all the time?
#Old Handspring Visors are $20–$25 on eBay and I am so tempted to get one.
#If TiddlyWiki were natively better at outlining, it would be unstoppable.
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