The Novelty Index
Newsletter
Hey friends,
A few weeks ago I watched an absolutely sick writing masterclass byย Julian Shapiro. Julianโs coolest technique has no name, but I think of it asย The Novelty Index.
As we come across new ideas and take notes (in Notion, Roam, Apple Notes, a notebook, etc), we can use the Novelty Index to rank those ideas by how novel or exciting they seemย at the time.ย That way, when we look back at our notes, we can always tell which ideas are most exciting to a total beginner. This is often the stuff thatโs most worth writing about.
Hereโs how the Novelty Index works in practice:
- Take a note when something interests or surprises you, (including when you strongly disagree with something).
- Write down a score (1-5) of how much it surprised or interested you at the time.
- Later on, use this ranking system to decide what ideas you should write about. If something was super-novel and exciting to you a few months ago (4 or 5 points), itโs probably a good topic to write about – even if your future self thinks โthis is old news – why would I write about that?โ.
Using a Novelty Index in our note-taking has a few advantages:
- We always have a curated list of exciting, novel topics to write about.
- We can avoid theย Curse of Knowledgeย – assuming that whatโsย obvious to usย is obvious to everyone else. The Novelty Index reminds us of just how mindblowing an idea was to us as a beginner, and that it could still blowย otherย peopleโs minds – if we write about it.
- The Novelty Index also measures how optimal ourย information dietย is. If we look back and see that everything weโre read over the last months scores between 1-3, we should probably challenge ourselves a bit more.
Have a great week!
xx Ali
๐ข Ship 30 for 30
Iโve enrolled inย ship30for30.comย to help develop more of a writing habit – it’s a cohort-based course that teaches the basics of writing online. It starts up again in January 2022:ย here’s my affiliate linkย if you’re interested.
โฅ๏ธ My Favourite Things
๐ธย Music –ย Zac Brown Band. They play country music – Iโve been a fan for years. Recently started listening to them a bit more.
๐ย Article –ย The Day You Decided to Take the Leap. Another amazing article by More to That, about manageable concerns vs unimaginable benefits, and why taking big leaps in life is just the logical thing to do.
โ๏ธ Quote of the Week
Remember that in most cases, the ideas behind the writing are more important than the quality of the writing itself. Youโd rather have great ideas and pretty good writing than the other way around.
Fromย Mailbag #1 โ Wait but Whyย by Tim Urban. Resurfaced usingย Readwise.