I use all of the tools below very frequently. And for each tool, I've tried out other tools in the space ultimately picked this one as my favorite.
Software
- Notion
- Mindmeister (for mind maps)
- Brain.fm (for background music that helps you focus)
Chrome Plugins
- OneTab. “Whenever you find yourself with too many tabs, click the OneTab icon to convert all of your tabs into a list. When you need to access the tabs again, you can either restore them individually or all at once.”
- Pocket. “The easiest, fastest way to capture articles, videos, and more”
- AdBlock. Block ads as your surf the web.
- Minimal Twitter. Remove Trending and Newsfeed sections
- Crackbook Revival. Add a delay to distracting websites to prevent mindless reading
- Newsfeed Aggregator. Block newsfeeds on Facebook, Twitter, and other social sites
- Distraction Free YouTube. Eliminates recommended videos to prevent mindless surfing
- Redirector. I use this to redirect the Youtube homepage to my Youtube Watch Later list
- Sci-Hub. Gives you links to academic papers when they’re not on Google.
Media Players And Customizations
- YouTube Premium. Eliminates all ads, allows you to listen to videos on audio-only on mobile, and provides a music app with unlimited songs.
- Castro (podcasts). Allows you to queue podcasts in order of importance rather than always watching newest first.
- Gmail Priority Inbox. Makes it easy to focus on your most important emails and takes everything else out of site.
Academic Research
- Sci-Hub.
- Google Scholar. Easiest and fastest to use.
- Microsoft Academic. Better for going down rabbit holes. It reveals adjacent concepts (authors, keywords, topics)
Equipment
Computer
- Microphone (Shure) with x2u USB Adapter. As a teacher and podcaster, I went for a very high-quality version.
- Webcam (Logitech Brio). Same as above.
- Noise-cancelling headphones (AirPods Max). If you’re considering getting high-end noise-cancelling headphones, which I highly recommend you do, I would very, very highly recommend the AirPods Max if you have Apple devices. I’ve had four different high-end headphones and the AirPods Max is by far the best in my opinion.
