Sweat, Tears and Digital Ink

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An excellent yet simple idea. If you’re a writer you undoubtedly need to brainstorm. The problem is that you usually end up with a mass of paper that gets less coherent the more you add. Lots of scribbling, crossing out, rewriting and before you know it you’re sat in a heap on the floor surround by confetti that was once your writing notes and sobbing uncontrollably.

Okay that was an exaggeration but brainstorming has never been easy. Some bright spark though has come up with FreeMind, a computerised version with a comprehensive list of features that aims to make the process of brainstorming easier and broader than piles of paper and incoherent scribblings that were once spider diagrams.

It is an effective academic tool; use it to sort your research, group and link data together. Colour code bits of information or move them around in order to make sense of otherwise random bits of data.