alt Hacker NewsSomething I’ve noticed in a few friends and family members is that there’s this whole hobby of setting up to be productive but not actually being productive. One person has a brilliantly laid out workshop with so many custom built shelves and cleats and jigs and tables, but about 90% of the woodworking they’ve done is the workshop itself. Another spends ton of time figuring out the absolute best way to organize her recipes and todo lists and desk and organizers and pens and finding the right foot rest, but that’s about it.
And I can see her being really into this device as an idea, but I would bet all the money in my pockets that she’d never actually use it.
None of this is a critique on these individuals, or how well this PDA performs at being a productivity device. It’s just this meta layer of productivity I’m noticing around me more and more.
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> Something I’ve noticed in a few friends and family members is that there’s this whole hobby of setting up to be productive but not actually being productive
This is also most programmers. Lots of time spent picking languages, configuring tools, switching frameworks, updating dependencies, etc. Very little time making useful code.
I notice this a lot too, and try to avoid falling into this trap. But also, if it’s a hobby, maybe it’s ok? Maybe the organisation is the fun part for some people.
It's a matter of goals and perspective then, eh?
Maybe the workshop is what brings them the most joy about the hobby.
Maybe the recipe person appreciates their collection this way.
Maybe they don't frame things in terms of productivity, like you do (even if they do use that word).
I have the same feeling about a lot of productivity tooling in the software world. At one point I had been convinced by several people that I needed to be taking notes, either handwritten or have some kind of note taking system. I tried for a good amount of time (2 years) before concluding that it's not for me. I'm more productive without notes, my mind seems fairly well organised. My biggest enemy is procrastination, not disorganisation.
So that's all well and good. I don't believe that my way is the one true way, I think each to their own. What I don't like is that people won't stop telling you about their note taking systems and that you should take notes. Well, things have calmed down a bit now, but a few years ago it felt like people would actively hunt you down and force their note taking opinion on you if they suspected you didn't keep your own knowledge base.
As a person who easily falls for "preparing" over doing the work, I committed to the hipster PDA [1] as an antidote to this for many years: "the Hipster PDA comprises a sheaf of index cards held together with a binder clip."
My pocket index cards haven't run out of VC money or instituted a new subscription model yet!
Sounds similar to a lot of discussion around note taking and other productivity software.
The workshop hits home. One of the decisions I made was to let my workshop grow organically around me based on what I'm doing. I started with a pile of junk tools on an Ikea table in an empty basement. By focusing on just what I needed at the time I ended up with fully equipped metal, wood and coating shops without ever consciously building them. They just sort of happened based on the needs of the next project.
That's because yak shaving is fun. The stuff that follows maybe not.
Procrastination is a huge market. HN should charge.
Lots of music producers fall into this trap too. So much so that I'm convinced nearly the entire synthesizer industry is setup to exploit this.