Depot student Dominik has already provided a good overview of how to export data from the ING depot via the ExtraETF workaround. However, not every tool can handle the CSV export properly. For example, DivvyDiary immediately recognized the relevant columns, but the balances didn’t match. The reason for this is that CSV files can vary significantly, as can the data within them. Sometimes, columns aren’t separated by a comma but by a semicolon. And while the difference between 1,000.00 and 1.000,00 might seem minor to us, for DivvyDiary, a 1000 turned into a 1 because the thousands separator was treated as a decimal point.
The solution: As much as I dislike working with Excel, if you open the CSV file in Excel and then save it again as a CSV, even DivvyDiary (and many other tools) can handle it.
There are a few topics that have been on my mind for decades, one of which is how to store and retrieve information and knowledge in a meaningful way—essentially, a Memex. In the 90s, I was a fan of Apple’s HyperCard, and since then, I’ve tried many things, but nothing has proven reliable. Data formats have disappeared (like Apple’s HyperCard), and even though the technical possibilities today are much broader than back then, I don’t have the impression that they have solved the fundamental problem. There is no quick fix that reads articles and books for you and also makes you understand them. I don’t trust summary services like Blinkist, not to mention that they don’t help me with scientific articles either.
In recent months, I’ve turned again to a system that I had used in the 90s but abandoned in favor of HyperCard: the Zettelkasten. Not just any box with index cards, but a Zettelkasten following the Luhmannian principle. Niklas Luhmann was one of the most significant sociologists of the 20th century, with an incredible number of academic publications to his name. His Zettelkasten, which actually consists of several boxes, contains about 90,000 slips and is being digitized at Bielefeld University. Luhmann attributed his productivity to this Zettelkasten system, and after several months using it, I can understand why. So how does the Zettelkasten work?
First of all, there are a few fundamental principles:
The quality of a paper depends on what has already been written. In an ideal world, the thoughts in the Zettelkasten are already formulated well enough to be directly incorporated. The goal of the Zettelkasten, therefore, is to generate insights that are worth publishing.
Everything you read is processed and placed into the Zettelkasten. Rather than following a strict plan (as is often recommended when writing academic papers), everything goes into the Zettelkasten and is, if possible, linked together right away. Luhmann himself always wrote his slips with the thought in mind of how they would fit into the existing notes. But new ideas can also emerge from the Zettelkasten at any time.
Writing about everything instead of starting directly with a hypothesis also has the advantage of reducing exposure to confirmation bias, which causes one to ignore anything that might challenge the hypothesis.
Highlighting in a text is useless, the learning effect is zero. According to Luhmann, thinking cannot happen without writing. Handwritten notes are preferable to those typed on a computer, as they tend to capture the essence better, thus facilitating understanding.
The Zettelkasten is not an archive, nor is it an idea graveyard like Moleskine notebooks.
There is no information hierarchy; thoughts can simply be inserted into Luhmann’s system wherever they fit. For example, if you have a note numbered “1,2,1” and another “1,2,2,” you can just insert a “1,2,1,a” if a thought is missing here. There’s no need to pre-think endlessly about what the best structure is.
Self-discipline is more important than IQ. A smart working environment ensures that you don’t face resistance from the start.
Daily work with the Zettelkasten leads to a new KPI for knowledge workers: How many notes are created each day!
How exactly does the Zettelkasten work?
When reading a text, “Literature Notes” are created, which contain only your own thoughts about the text, written in your own words.
These then lead to “Permanent Notes,” which are added to the Zettelkasten. The Literature Notes are discarded (this is also why I sent back my Scribe, since the Literature Notes could not be created with it).
Additionally, there are “Fleeting Notes,” which contain all the ideas you have.
The Zettelkasten system is highly minimalist, with no fancy notebooks or software tools. The reduction, or even restriction, to what is essential also stimulates creativity and thinking (see Stokes 2001 and Rheinberger 1997). Of course, there are software solutions like The Archive, and they would have advantages for me: I don’t always have my Zettelkasten with me. On the other hand, I’ve learned that when I’m sitting in front of a computer or iPad, I tend to get distracted. Therefore, I now carry index cards with me.
Here is an interesting video about Luhmann’s Zettelkasten, where he explains it himself starting at minute 37:26:
And here is the researcher who is now delving into the Zettelkasten:
I was actually really excited about the Kindle Scribe I ordered, because it seemed to solve two problems I have with using my reMarkable:
I don’t like writing my notes at the edge of a PDF, if there is even enough margin, because my work notes are the preliminary version of the final notes that go into my Zettelkasten. Simply highlighting something is not very useful, as some studies also suggest. I need to be able to write my own thoughts on a text, and that’s something the reMarkable 2 doesn’t allow me to do.
Light 🙂
Light is available, but otherwise, the Kindle Scribe has been a very disappointing experience for me. Of course, I don’t really want to throw money into Amazon’s pockets or store my data in their cloud, but the topics of “working through paper” and “reading” are of great importance to me. Since I don’t jot down anything confidential… one must choose the lesser evil. Perhaps someday there will be a solution that works without the cloud. But how good is the Scribe really?
Update: I have now tested the Kindle Scribe, and you can find the full report here!
I had one of the first Kindles in Germany and even wrote an app for it. I also had one of the first reMarkables and now own a reMarkable 2. Apparently, I’m susceptible to tech gadgets, especially when I hope they could potentially boost my productivity. Now, Amazon is entering this market with the Kindle Scribe, directly competing with companies like reMarkable. Here’s the introduction video from an Amazon event:
With the reMarkable, I became critical when they suddenly introduced a subscription model. While this didn’t affect me, since early buyers could keep the Connect subscription “for free” for life, reMarkable clearly realized that they weren’t getting good karma points for this move and changed their model. With the Kindle, I got one of the devices that had a built-in SIM card for which you didn’t have to pay any fees worldwide. That was really convenient, being able to read my newspaper every day no matter where I was in the world.
Will the new Kindle Scribe replace the reMarkable? I haven’t yet received a Kindle Scribe for testing, but already a few interesting aspects are noticeable. Both devices offer a tremendous advantage: focusing on the essentials. I’m not familiar with the current Kindle devices, but my old Kindle displayed books wonderfully, and it only had a web browser for Wikipedia—pure focus. Annotating texts was easier on my Kindle since it had a keyboard. But, of course, it wasn’t as simple as writing a note with a pen. However, I could easily export these notes using my tool.
Let’s take a closer look at the specs:
Price: The Amazon Kindle Scribe is cheaper. While the reMarkable “only” costs 349 euros, that’s the price without the pen. The cheapest pen variant costs 79 euros, so under 400 euros you can’t get anything. The Kindle, on the other hand, currently costs 369 euros for the cheapest version with the pen.
Storage: The Scribe is available with 16, 32, and 64 GB. The reMarkable only has 8 GB. The 32-GB version of the Kindle automatically includes the premium pen, which is the version I ordered.
Pen: Both systems use pens that require nibs. Not much is known yet about the Amazon Scribe pen, but I suspect it works similarly to the reMarkable pen. It doesn’t need power, and there is a premium version that offers a virtual eraser. Unlike the colleague here, I don’t expect the pen to need charging.
Dimensions: The reMarkable measures 187 × 246 × 4.7 mm, while the dimensions of the Scribe are not yet known. The Scribe appears to be larger despite the smaller screen, as its bezel is wider, especially on the left. We do know that the Scribe weighs 433 grams, which is 30 grams more than the reMarkable 2.
Display: The reMarkable has a 10.3-inch screen with a resolution of 1872 x 1404 (226 DPI), while the Scribe has a 10.2-inch screen with a resolution of 300 dpi. The reMarkable uses an E Ink Carta display, although they say their Canvas technology is only partially based on it. The Scribe has a glare-free Paperwhite display. The Scribe also has a light that adjusts to the ambient brightness, whereas the reMarkable does not. I’m not sure if I would like the light, as I bought the reMarkable partly because I wouldn’t get more awake in the evening. But sometimes it’s annoying to have to find a light source.
Charging: Both devices charge via USB-C.
Battery Life: Initially, Amazon claimed the Scribe’s battery life was “months,” whereas the reMarkable lasts about a week for me. Amazon has since walked back that claim.
Document Storage: Documents are stored in the cloud, and there is no software available yet for the Scribe.
Document Editing: On the Scribe, it will be possible to edit Word documents. However, I don’t expect integration with Dropbox and Google Drive, as with the reMarkable. Overall, managing documents with the reMarkable is a bit cumbersome. You can send files via email, but otherwise, you always need the app.
What interests me about the Scribe? Over the last few months, I’ve been exploring Luhmann’s Zettelkasten method and now have such a system at home. With the reMarkable, it bothers me that I couldn’t get the notes I wanted to make, not the permanent notes, but my working notes. So I always carry index cards with me, which is pretty unwieldy with the reMarkable. Writing on virtual index cards would be possible with the Scribe, as you can attach a note to a text snippet and export it later. For me, that’s the killer app. I also hope that importing and exporting documents will be easier. I’ll test it and report back here.
For reMarkable, Amazon’s entry into the market means this technology will reach the masses, but reMarkable won’t benefit from that. Quite the opposite. Because Amazon offers a convenient way to access content through its store, and its awareness campaign will convert potential reMarkable customers.
The question for power users will be how convenient it will be to manage notes and books on the Kindle Scribe. reMarkable offers folders that can also be created and managed on the desktop. The tags functionality, which reMarkable recently introduced, is really good, but unfortunately, it only works on the device itself. On the Kindle, the software on the Mac is, at least, a disaster; there’s no recognizable organization.
In 1945 publiceerde Vannevar Bush zijn artikel “As We May Think“, waarin hij schreef over een systeem genaamd Memex. Memex voorzag systemen en benaderingen zoals HyperText en stelde voor om verschillende soorten materiaal te koppelen en doorzoekbaar te maken op basis van trefwoorden, “als een vergrote intieme aanvulling op zijn geheugen”. Gezien de technische mogelijkheden van die tijd zouden de gegevens nog op microfilm opgeslagen moeten worden, maar verder was het een vrij coole constructie.
Bush’s gedachten hadden een grote invloed op de ontwikkeling van het World Wide Web, en zeker heeft Wikipedia vandaag de dag veel van het idee achter Memex. Maar hoe zit het met ons eigen kennismanagement? Hoe slaat u uw gedachten, materialen, ideeën en notities op? Een probleem is dat niet alleen kenniswerkers worden blootgesteld aan enorme hoeveelheden informatie, die gefilterd, gesorteerd en doorgenomen moet worden.
In de jaren ’80 had Apple HyperCard, een propriëtair multimedia-hypertextsysteem dat ook populair was in het onderwijs. Tegenwoordig komt waarschijnlijk notion.so het dichtst in de buurt van zo’n systeem, en ik weet dat sommige van mijn studenten deze app gebruiken. Vroeger was het Evernote, vandaag Notion, morgen weer iets anders. En elke paar jaar zet je je gegevens over naar een ander systeem, of niet, omdat het veel te veel moeite is. Wie heeft notities uit oude Moleskines (die in de jaren 2000 populair waren) omgezet en gebruikt die nog steeds? Ik ben geen fan van constant nieuwe apps installeren, maar probeer ook hier niet meer te installeren dan nodig is, want gelukkig wordt de bijgeleverde software van Apple steeds krachtiger.
Met de nieuwe versie van macOS X, Monterey, introduceert Apple eindelijk tags in de notities op de Mac, na iOS en iPadOS. In plaats van de weinig flexibele mappen, die je natuurlijk nog steeds kunt behouden, is het nu mogelijk om een notitie meerdere tags toe te voegen en daarna naar meerdere tags tegelijk te zoeken. Dit komt veel dichter bij mijn manier van werken, want niet alles hoort altijd maar in één categorie. Gedachten die ik heb over een R-script, kan ik later ook in mijn blog gebruiken, enzovoorts.
But this is not the only new feature that Apple Monterey brings. The Quick Notes, already known from portable devices, now offer the ability to save text from websites and then refer to it. When you visit a website again later, the extracted text is highlighted. I haven’t tested what happens if the text on the website has been changed. Overall, this feature greatly helps in organizing a collection of saved URLs, bookmarks, reading lists, quotes, etc. (The following screenshot is from a Monterey beta:)
The fact that you can now extract text from images and screenshots on the Mac without any additional software—and actually even better than with third-party tools—makes my workflow much easier. If I find a passage in a physical book that I find interesting but don’t have a pen to mark it, I often take a photo of it with my phone. I’m not sure how many of these photos I have on my hard drive, always with the guilty feeling that I really should clean this up soon. In the new macOS version, the cursor in Photos automatically turns into a text cursor when you move it over text, and you can select and extract it right away. However, you have to be careful to hold the book in a way that this works, unlike in the photo below:
Unfortunately, this feature still doesn’t work in Notes, but I’m sure it will come eventually. You also can’t yet extract text from highlighted passages in Preview for Instant Notes with a reference; you can only copy the text, which, of course, is still very useful.
Despite all the criticism, Apple’s Notes, with its many links to other software on macOS, is getting very close to the concept of Memex. The question is increasingly whether users understand how to leverage all these features for their own use, and how to create a symbiosis between their workflows and such software. But Apple is definitely making notion.so a competitor, especially because of the team functions now available as well. Much like with Apple Reminders, there are fewer and fewer reasons to pay for a subscription to other software, which, in the worst case, is also less well-integrated with other Apple services.
As a student, I once had my professor’s laptop in my hands because I was supposed to configure something. This was around 1998, and he had a cool Wallstreet PowerBook from Apple. I was shocked by what he had installed. Almost nothing. Just what came with the operating system, and that wasn’t much. All of his texts were written with TextEdit, the MacOS editor. No WordPerfect (which was still popular at the time), no Microsoft Word, nothing. Back then, I didn’t understand it. How could he not install more programs that would make his work easier? Today, that professor is my role model, at least in terms of his simple approach to using his computer.
Since then, I’ve seen countless tools that were supposed to help with productivity or organizing oneself and one’s knowledge. Some of them I’ve tried or even used for a longer period. Hardly any of them proved themselves over time, whether because the developers gave up due to declining demand (like with Life Balance), or because an app became obsolete with newer technologies (like Apple’s HyperCard being replaced by the World Wide Web), or because the buyer of a startup product like Wunderlist preferred to replace it with their own Microsoft “To Do” and simply shut down the acquired software. In the 2000s, Omni Group’s tools like OmniFocus, OmniOutliner, etc., and Evernote were the hot stuff. Today, it’s things like Notion and similar tools.
The more tools I’ve seen, the less I believe in them. Or rather, I no longer believe that there’s an app for everything, or that there should be. Competence is more important than a tool. A tool can’t compensate for incompetence. It hardly matters which tool you use if you know what you’re doing. The reverse doesn’t work. A fool with a tool is still a fool.
Just as one should question the added value a new app might bring in the realm of digital minimalism, one can also simply ask whether a program already installed with the operating system can’t do the job just as well. Apple’s Reminders app, for instance, is now quite decent and syncs across all devices, just like Apple Notes. I have no idea about Microsoft Windows, maybe it works just as well there. The Google universe also offers a cross-device experience with all kinds of tools. Of course, one can and should also ask whether it makes sense to entrust one’s data to any company. If you want something more complicated, you can find plenty of built-in tools on Linux systems.
The approach of working almost entirely with built-in tools has many advantages. No FOMO. Simply ignore everything that’s being sold to you as the latest productivity hack. No more cluttering up the hard drive. Instead of productively procrastinating by searching for and learning new tools to make the upcoming work faster, just do the work that needs to be done. The few software tools I now use in addition can be counted on two hands, e.g., R, RStudio, TexShop, Ableton Live… and maybe I could have done the latter with GarageBand as well. My dock has remained unchanged since the initial installation of the computer.
Next, I’ll be discussing the organization of my files. More on that later.
I’ve been blogging about minimalism for 15 years. Digital minimalism is another form of conscious consumption. And apparently, the topic strikes a chord, because otherwise, Der Spiegel wouldn’t have locked an interview about it behind their paywall (“How to Break Free from Your Smartphone”):
Cal Newport’s Digital Minimalism contrasts with his other bestseller Deep Work in that it doesn’t focus on work and productivity, but rather on our entire lives and the impact technology has on them.
Daniel Levitin’s The Organized Mindshowed how easily our brains can be distracted, while Newport presents the opposite side: the attention economy, which primarily benefits those who can successfully market our time to advertisers. Those who think this is a modern phenomenon are mistaken—this started with the introduction of penny newspapers in 1830, where the readers were no longer the customers, but the advertisers in a newspaper.
According to Newport, the unconscious use of social media leads to exhaustion, anxiety, depression, and, above all, a waste of life’s time. Arguments such as social media helping us stay in touch with friends and family are countered by the point that this is not high-quality interaction—more “connection” than “conversation,” as Sherry Turkle distinguishes. When relationships are less digital (or when digital communication is used only to facilitate traditional communication), they are actually strengthened. The time we spend on Facebook and similar platforms is not only spent on lower-quality conversations but also on mindless scrolling through updates that give us the illusion of connection while leaving us feeling lonely.
However, Newport doesn’t advocate for completely abandoning technology. Instead, he encourages us to adopt a different attitude toward it, and he even paraphrases Dieter Rams’ phrase “Less, but better.” This leads to what he calls a digital declutter. Ironically, it was Steve Jobs, who was focused on mindfulness, who ensured that we carry around with us the symbol of constant connectivity in the form of the iPhone. His original goal was simply to have one device for both phone and iPod. The fact that the iPhone could also access the internet wasn’t even mentioned until late in the original keynote. We weren’t prepared for it. And suddenly, there was an app for everything:
We didn’t have time to think about what we truly wanted to get out of these new technologies (and even if we did think about it, like I did back then when I didn’t want a Blackberry, we later found too many reasons why a Blackberry might actually be a good idea). And since then, the door has been wide open for those who want to shape new habits in us:
Nir Eyal’s bestseller Hookeddescribes this mechanism in great detail. Fairly, Eyal also wrote the antidote to it. However, Eyal’s approach is not as elegant as Newport’s; it deals more with the symptoms, even though it sometimes touches on the causes. Where Eyal says that you can take back your time, Newport suggests you first consider what you want to fill it with. The mechanisms both describe, however, are the same.
Every post for which we might get a like or retweet is, for us, the same as using a slot machine—it triggers a dopamine release. The goal is to regain our autonomy and join the attention resistance, as Newport puts it. Digital minimalism, for him, is:
A philosophy of technology use where you focus your online time on a small number of carefully selected and optimized activities that strongly support what matters to you, while ignoring everything else. (my translation)
To this, he quotes Thoreau in Walden:
The cost of a thing is the amount of what I will call life which is required to be exchanged for it, immediately or in the long run.
This, of course, applies not only to social media & co. When someone buys a new sports car, they also need to consider how much life energy goes into working for that car and whether it’s worth it to drive a sports car in exchange for that time. The profit gained from something must be weighed against the cost of the life energy needed to obtain it. Conversely, technology should be considered optional, as long as its temporary absence doesn’t cause the collapse of one’s (work) life. Can I no longer live a meaningful life without an app, or does the app simply provide some added value that I could get elsewhere? This is in stark contrast to FOMO. To truly understand which technologies are genuinely valuable, Newport suggests a 30-day break.
As I write this, I am on the 8th day of my digital break. Newport really makes this break seem appealing, and I even started it before I had finished reading the book. During the reading, I paused my Facebook profile and deactivated my Twitter account (dangerous, because after 30 days, it is permanently lost). Instagram is deleted, as are Telegram and WhatsApp. These many ways people could contact me had already been annoying. Then, I even uninstalled email. These exact steps were already suggested in Make Time, but for Newport, it’s not about dogmatically banning all these apps, but rather about understanding what you truly miss.
In fact, I only bought my last phone because I wanted the best camera and didn’t want to carry around another camera. I enjoy listening to music. And occasionally, I like to make calls. So, here’s what my home screen looks like now:
Of the slot machines, only Signal, Apple Messages, and Safari as a browser are installed. Everything else is either essential (for example, banking—no longer possible without a phone) or helpful (e.g., the Corona app). Additionally, I’ve now set the Do Not Disturb mode as the default. Only my favorites can still call me, but their messages won’t come through either. However, this isn’t just about distraction.
Solitude (better translated here as seclusion and not as loneliness) requires the ability to be undisturbed and not have to react to everything, or the freedom from input from others. Seclusion demands that we come to terms with ourselves when we are alone, allowing for deep thinking. Our desire for social interaction must therefore be complemented by periods of solitude. How much this already occupied me 14 years ago is shown in this blog post from 2007.
But Newport goes even further. It’s not just about stopping certain activities; as mentioned earlier, you must also consider what to do with the time and attention you’ve gained, so you don’t fall into a void. The smartphone allows us to quickly escape such moments. Most systems already track how often that happens:
(On that day, I made several changes to the configuration, which is why the value was so high.)
Newport suggests writing letters to oneself, engaging in real conversations (instead of chatting, liking, or commenting), joining an offline group, or doing something non-digital with your hands. I’m out when it comes to crafting, but at least I can play instruments. The point is to deliver your best, quoting Rogowiski:
Leave good evidence of yourself. Do good work.
Not using Facebook and the like should therefore not be seen as a sign that you’ve become some kind of eccentric. It should be viewed as a bold act of resistance against the attention economy. This has become increasingly difficult, as we now carry a full-fledged computer with us at all times and actively have to seek ways to limit its possibilities. Still, my reMarkable is one of my favorite work tools. I can’t check emails on it or quickly look something up. And more and more, I’m only using that device when I sit on the couch in the evening.
Furthermore, Newport’s approach means that you need to carefully examine where you still want to gather information. I reactivated Twitter after a week, but unfollowed almost everyone because I only want to follow those who truly provide valuable content. And that’s a very small number. A kind of information diet, so to speak.
I’m not at the point yet where I want to have a Light Phone or leave my smartphone at home most of the time (the Light Phone isn’t available in Germany yet). For now, the camera in my phone is still too important to me (I used to always carry a Fujifilm X100, whose battery was always dead at the critical moments). But after just a few days of digital break, I can already hardly imagine going back to Facebook or spending the first minutes of my day reading through feeds.
