Progressive summarization is just-in-time only — apply layers when revisiting for specific purposes, never in batch sessions

Why This Is a Rule

The instinct with any note-processing system is to "get ahead" by processing notes in batch: "I'll spend Saturday morning bolding and highlighting all my recent notes." This feels productive but violates the core principle of progressive summarization: investment proportional to demonstrated value. Batch processing invests equal effort in every note, regardless of whether it will ever be useful. Just-in-time processing invests effort only in notes that prove their value through actual revisit.

The difference is between speculative importance (this note might be useful someday, so I'll process it now) and demonstrated importance (I'm revisiting this note for a real purpose, so processing it now adds value). Speculative processing is almost always wasted: studies of PKM systems consistently show that 80-90% of captured notes are never revisited. Processing all of them means 80-90% of your processing effort produces zero return.

Just-in-time processing also produces better quality layers. When you bold passages during a specific revisit, you're filtering through the lens of an actual need — the bold reflects what matters for real use cases. When you bold during a batch session, you're guessing at what might matter someday — the bold reflects speculative importance that may not align with future needs.

When This Fires

• When tempted to spend a block of time "processing" or "organizing" your notes
• When designing your note-processing workflow and scheduling when layers get applied
• When you feel guilty about having many un-processed notes in your system
• The critical timing constraint for Bold 10-20% of a note's text on first revisit — select only core-idea passages, making future scans 5-10x faster (bold), Highlight 10-20% of bolded passages on subsequent revisits — this second compression layer targets your active needs, not generic importance (highlight), and Write a 3-5 sentence executive summary at the top of a note only after 3-4 revisits — proven importance earns the investment (summary)

Common Failure Mode

"Note processing Sundays": dedicating time to batch-process accumulated notes. This feels productive (you're "getting organized!") but wastes time on notes that will never be needed while potentially missing the notes that would benefit most (which surface through use, not through batch scanning).

The Protocol

(1) Capture notes freely without any processing at capture time. Raw capture is fast and should stay fast. (2) When a note naturally resurfaces — through search, browsing, or memory — and you open it for a specific purpose, that's the moment to apply the next progressive summarization layer. (3) First revisit → apply bold (Bold 10-20% of a note's text on first revisit — select only core-idea passages, making future scans 5-10x faster). Second revisit → apply highlight (Highlight 10-20% of bolded passages on subsequent revisits — this second compression layer targets your active needs, not generic importance). Third+ revisit → consider executive summary (Write a 3-5 sentence executive summary at the top of a note only after 3-4 revisits — proven importance earns the investment). (4) Notes that are never revisited receive zero processing effort. This is correct: they haven't demonstrated value and don't deserve investment. (5) Resist the urge to "get ahead." An unprocessed note costs nothing. A note processed for no reason costs your time and attention with no return.