Notes and Mind Maps

If someone hasn't preached the gospel of mind maps to you yet, don't worrry--they will. I'm not going to delve into them in any depth here, except to note that a lot of people are big devotees of them for note taking. Personally, I've fiddled with them a bit for organizing thoughts for presentations but I haven't found them as useful for taking notes. Perhaps it's because I don't use a tablet or Tablet PC--which is useful if not required. Perhaps it's because I tend to take down a lot of "data" when I'm note taking rather than a "sparse array" of connecting threads and thoughts. I suspect an editor is better for the former; a mind map may be good for the latter. This was brought to mind by a particularly interesting discussion on the subject over at Creating Passionate Users. For a free taste of what mind maps are about, you may want to give FreeMind a look.