Chris Aldrich

@nicolas_gatien @ArtemKRSV @lanewatson @ChrisAldrich @ScottScheper @NickMilo @AllossoDan @iameddyhood @ArchLeucoryx

Nicolas, I broadly agree with you that many of these factors of reading and writing for understanding and retention are at play and the research in memory and spaced repetition underlines a lot of this. However in practice, one needs to be revisiting and actively using their notes for some particular project to remember them better. The card search may help to create both visual and physical paths that assist in memory too.

Reliance solely on a physical zettelkasten however may not be enough without active use over time, particularly for the majority of users. It's unlikely that all or even many may undertake this long term practice. Saying that this is either the "best", "optimum", or "only" way would be disingenuous to the diversity of learners and thinkers.

Those who want to add additional strength to these effects might also use mnemonic methods from indigenous cultures that rely on primary orality. These could include color, images, doodles (drolleries anyone?), sketchnotes, or other associative methods, many of which could be easily built into an (antinet) zettelkasten or other note taking platforms. Lynne Kelly's work in this area can be highly illuminating. For pure practical application and diversity of potential methods, I recommend her book "Memory Craft" (https://amzn.to/3zdqqGp), but she's got much more academic and in depth work that is highly illustrative.

With this background on orality and memory in mind we might all broadly view wood and stone circles (Stonehenge), menhir, standing stones, songlines, and other mnemonic devices in the archaeological and sociological records as zettelkasten which one keeps entirely in their memory rather than writing them down. We might also consider, based on this and the historical record concerning Druids and their association with trees that the trees served a zettelkasten-like function for those ancient societies. This continues to extend to lots of other cultural and societal practices throughout history. Knowledge from Duane Hamacher et al's book *[The First Astronomers](https://amzn.to/3IIHAPp )* and Karlie Noone and Krystal De Napoli's *[Astronomy: Sky Country](https://amzn.to/3o8DNBc)* will underline these theories and practices in modern indigenous settings.

@chuckfrey Primarily for note taking (90%) to feed both a WordPress site and an Obsidian database presently, but also for some social annotation (10%) with respect to things I see via https://annotations.lindylearn.io/new/ or individuals' feeds

My Obsidian store serves variously as a zettelkasten, commonplace book, and wiki simultaneously though each of these are discretely fragmented. Of course I could do most of the work via Hypothesis really without any other tools at all, presuming that the data would always be there.

Large swaths of Hypothes.is use is hiding within LMSs or is geared more toward social annotation in classrooms. I'm more interested in people using that content for their future selves or their creative endeavors.

You can find my publicly available material here: https://hypothes.is/users/chrisaldrich