GMail as a personal note pad?
There is an article out there on that crazy thing called the interweb that discusses the possible benefits of using GMail as a personal library of sorts. The article is written by Adam Boettiger and he states that with a bit of dedication to the task, GMail could be used well as a way to keep track of the interesting things that one finds via email disscussion groups.
Even if you currently have a web email or gmail account, create a new one. If available, try to get an address like “yourfirstname.brain@gmail.com”. This is an account that you will use solely for information storage. Don’t give the address out to anyone and do not use it or list it publicly, but DO add it to your email address book. Call it something like “My Brain”.
When you see a portion of information you want to save from an email discussion list posting or ezine, highlight it, copy it, paste it into an email message and SEND IT TO YOUR BRAIN!
REMEMBER: It isn’t necessary to forward the entire message. If you just forward or store the portion that is relevant or useful to you, when it comes time to review or retrieve it you’ll find it that much faster with less noise.
Its an interesting thought. I however have never been a fan of email discussion groups (a good clean, on topic, group is so hard to find) However I would take his idea a step further…
A GMail account, with their emphasis on searching and not deleting, would be the perfect instrament to be used as a enormous, electronic postit note. Everytime you read something or hear something or think of something just slap it in an email and send it off to your gmail account.
Like Boettiger states in his article, you would have to be strict to make your subject line easily searchable and make your email bodies free of excess for easier data retreival. You could even just put the main thrust of the information in your subject line and then use the RSS feature to have it easily accessible at all of your computers (work and home).
I like this idea so much that went out and got yellowpostit [at] gmail.com (We’ll see how long I can keep this idea up)
Link: Information Management: How to use Gmail as your second brain
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Mike
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danielcole
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Mike
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dz