Take a peek into the occasionally-updated public notebook of Scott Nesbitt — a collection of thoughts, ideas, advice, and whatever has caught my interest.

2024

My Watch is Smart Enough

My Prized Possessions

It’s Not a Competition

Use Plain Text Email?

On TV as Repertory Cinema

On this Blog as a Numbers Station

Learning to Say I Don’t Know

Writing Should be Uncomfortable

On Flying Solo

Speed Versus Reflection

On Short-Short Blogging

Writing, AI, and Me

Does It Advance My Goals?

What Would Your 14-Year-Old Self Think of You Now?

A Message for Someone Now Gone

Short Review - A City is Not a Computer: Other Urban Intelligences

My Obsessions

Stay Humble, Stay Hungry

2023

Before You Go and Investigate ...

Giving ChatGPT Another Go

On an (Aborted) Gear Refresh

On Simple Things

My Clock is Ticking Down

Welcome to the New Home of Random Notes

On Writing with ChatGPT

Busy-ness Versus Productivity

On Reading Gibbon

Cast Your Own Shadow

Regrets

Announcing My New ebook: Random Thoughts

Tools versus Systems

The Importance of Having Fun

Do You Need a System For Taking Notes?

A Little Piece of Wisdom

On Reading More Books

Fearing Success

Escape

It's All About What You Want to Do

Guidelines are Just a Guide

Short Review - How to Run a City Like Amazon, and Other Fables

The Difference Between Information and Knowledge

Finding the Balance Between Simple and Complex

Beyond Getting Stuff Done

You Need to Do More Than Just Show Up

On the Text Playlist (Again)

See Deeper

Complex versus Simple

An Idea I Can Get Behind

On the Text Playlist

Finding Interesting (Personal) Blogs

Opportunities, Fear, Failure, and Taking Chances

Thoughts About Note Taking Tools

2022

A Reminder for All of Us

Do the Blurbs on Books Influence You to Buy Those Books?

Lessons in (Writing) Brevity from Borges

Something to Consider ...

What Makes You Productive?

Dealing with Acronyms and Jargon

Trying Hard to Like Something

The Fallacy of Doing More

Would You Rather Have a Blank Page or a Bad First Draft?

The Joys of Turning Off

Dealing With Your Ideas

A Thought About Technology

I Can't Understand Why ...

Writers and Envy

Some Wise Words

Choices

Avoiding the Trap of "More"

On Not Pushing Your Tools

My PKM Setup

Crushing the Domination

Impulse Buys

Too Busy Organizing to Be Productive

Being Yourself

Home

On Thinking in Bullet Points

Email Is My Social Media

The Value of Paying Attention

Chains

The Joys of Small and Simple

Sometimes, It's a Game of Millimeters

Ways of Blogging

On Using Plain Text

Pen and Paper are My Friends

The Most Powerful Tool For Productivity

Infinite Layaway

On Doing Things 'Like a Pro'

Methods and Goals

2021

Eliminate What's Not Essential

On Thinking and Acting in Increments

The Goal Behind Using Technology

Form Versus Function

Shavings of Time

Focus On One Thing at a Time

On Slower, Quieter Blogs

What's The Best Device For Writing?

Randomly Discovering the Web

On /uses Pages

A Home Page, Not a Website

512KB Club

On Being a More Productive Writer

Rewiring My Systems

A Letter, Not a Newsletter

It's Not the Path, It's the Destination

Don't Blame Your Tools

Doing a Periodic Purge

The Most Difficult Question

Do I Really Need To?

How to Deal With Frustration and Bitterness

There Are More Than Two Paths

Beauty Is Where You Find It

On Not Achieving Everything

There Is No One Way

Appreciation

Stop Fooling Yourself

When Will Your Writing Be Perfect?

A Thought About Education and Self Improvement

2021: My Year of Rereading

It's Not a Waste of Time

What's the Point?

On Being Constantly Connected

Thoughts About Feature Parity

It's Better

2020

Tools are Not Skills

Seth Godin on the Most Important Blog Post

Being Pigeonholed

Never Justify Your Choices

You Should Use an Outliner

The Need to Be Selfish

Thoughts About Choosing the Right Paper Notebook

Do You Write to Get Attention, or to Help?

The Writer You Were, the Writer You Are

The Fastest, Most Effective Way to Discourage Someone

How to Write Useful List Posts

Versus

On Content

What If?

The Urge to Create

Picking Nits

Honesty is Not Modesty

The Long Haul

Taking Sides

Should You Simplify Your Blog's Language for Non-Native Readers?

Passion Isn't Enough

Unhappiness

Time, Time, Time Look What It's Done to Me

Experiments

Bringing Blogs Back - Really?

Awesome

The Rain

Missing That Buffer

Do You Salvage or Abandon a Piece of Writing?

Gaining More Confidence in Your Writing

How My Reading Habits Have Changed

The Life That You Want to Lead

That One Song

Learn to Say "I Don't Know"

Going Fallow

My Opinion Shouldn't Matter to You

Finding Good Notebooks in Unexpected Places

If I Had More Time ...

Dealing with Other Peoples' Writing

The 21st Century Isn't What I Thought It Would Be

2019

New Year, New Notebook

Small, Mobile, Self Contained

Not Pushing Your Tools

Deciding What You Want to Be When You Grow Up

It's a Long Road

Small is a Force Multiplier

It's OK to Take a Break

Houses of the Holy

On Selling Out

In the Shadow of the Mushroom Cloud

Dealing with the Doubters

Be Boring

Morning Pages

The Perfect World

Crossroads

In Praise of the Unadorned

Presumptions of Fear

Stop Being a Draft Blogger

Why Longer-Form Writing Still Matters

The Joy of the Notebook

Going Gray

Sometimes, It's the Simple Things

The Persistence of Memory

Confessions of a Lapsed Essayist

Smart Devices Aren't Smart

Speaking in Tongues

The Magical Place

Dreams

Music for Movies

Change

A Contrarian's Guide to Blogging

When a Place Has Its Greatest Impact

Some Opportunity Necessary, No Experience Needed

Rain

You Don't Have to Like Everything

Public Notebooks and Blogging

Journeys and Destinations

2018

Reading

Woolgathering

Making Choices

The Perfect Notebook

On Amassing Information

On Being Good Enough

Reading Between Lines That Aren't There

Watching Kurosawa

No, I'm Not Doing It Wrong

Numbers Stations

On Books, Electronic and Physical

On Exalting the Mundane

On the Price of Change

Some Days ...

On Not Letting Go