Information organization tools

Recently, I discovered a strange, but understandable, phenomenon. People are going nuts about a pocket notebook! I give you, the Moleskine. A little bigger than 3x5" index card, acid-free paper, an accordion pocket in the back, a faux-leather oilskin-on-stiff cardboard cover, and an elastic band to hold it closed. All for about US$11, give or take a few pennies.

Eleven bucks for a fancy notepad! Granted, it is fancy... and it's created a crowd of fans who just can't say enough about it, like the folks at the Moleskinerie blog.

I won't go into the maker's dubious claims about the history of their product (which seems to drive a lot of its popularity). All claims of ties to famous writers and artists aside, it looks to be a nifty little notebook. I don't own one yet, but it and the Hipster PDA (a pack of 3x5" index cards in a binder clip; try Levenger.com for a fancy leather PageID=1659|Level=2-3|Pocket Briefcase that serves the exact same function for about $30 more) got me thinking about how I store and manage information, especially for my games.

I own a PDA. I mostly use it to play games. It doesn't play nice with the Outlook calendar at work, it doesn't play at all with 'remind' (a little reminder utility I wrote in Perl that runs every time I fire up my mail client). So I have calendar information here and there, and getting all that info into my Palm is too much trouble. I don't even look at my Palm because the information is never up to date, so I never bother to bring it up to date. The Palm is just too clumsy for data entry, and too slow for data retrieval of anything more trivial than a phone number.

And when it comes down to it, it's not "sexy" in the way a nice journal and ink pen are. I think that's why the Moleskine is so popular. I've bought a nice journal or two in the past, and it's nice to have something fancy dedicated to a writing project... makes it seem more important somehow. It's just a tool, but a leather-bound journal with fine paper is somehow "better" than a college composition book, even though they serve the same basic function.

Off and on for gaming notes, I've used index cards of various sizes, mostly 3x5". I really like index cards because they're physically relocatable. I'm very "spatially" oriented, and I like to spread cards out, sort them into categories, etc. I can display a lot of information, create an "information web" and physically move information around to suit my mental state far faster with index cards than I can on a computer, even using one of those "mind web" tools. Index cards work better than keeping notes on a pad of paper, because I can write about Detective Sorensen on a card and then file it in the right place, instead of the Detective's notes being kept along side a damage track for some thugs, a note about the clue I just invented, etc. I can pull out cards from various categories as they apply to a particular adventure.

The problem with index cards is that they're an analog medium in a digital world. I keep so much of my work on the computer, but I want the index cards at the game table (where I dislike the distraction of the computer). Even if my printer would gracefully handle printing inexpensive index cards, it still means formatting my information (which I write in TWiki notation, even outside the Wiki) specifically for printing. What I end up doing is writing down key bits of info on the index cards I want for the game. Then after taking notes away from the computer, I transfer the new info into the computer. It's a lot like the same problem I have with the Palm, except I can write faster, an I can access information a heck of a lot faster. PDA's have a bandwidth problem all around... can't input information very fast, can't display much information at a given time. And when I'm running a game, I want as much information in front of me as I can get.

To bring this back around to Moleskine, they come in several formats, one of which doesn't have paper at all... it's an accordion folder in the same format with six pocket dividers, just the right size to hold 3x5" index cards. I usually keep my index cards in a card box, but I've kept them bound up with rubber bands. Neither of which makes them pocket-portable. But the Moleskine is a little hard-back pocket accordion file for index cards. Sweet, I say. (Unfortunately, I realized this after I ordered a couple Moleskines to give as Christmas presents and a basic ruled one for myself. I'll have to consider getting one after I evaluate how the basic Moleskine notebook fits into my life.)

One of the things I dislike about notepads is the inability to move pages around. No such problem with index cards. And I like to use cards to pass notes during the game. I can write meta-information on them afterward and file them if I like. And out in the real world, I can selectively choose what information to carry around (as opposed to carrying a notebook with pages of stale information), I can organize cards, archive cards, give cards away, etc. I'm actually thinking that the Moleskine file pocket might be more useful to me than the original notepad version. I could carry one around with note cards to record or develop gaming ideas, calendar and todo information, etc. We'll have to see how things develop.