Obsidian, a powerful knowledge database, works on top a local folder of plaintext Markdown files. Human brains are non-linear. We move from one idea to the next all the time. Your second brain should function in the same way. Obsidian makes it easy to make and follow "connections". You can take your notes like a gardener and then, at the end of each day, you can sit back and admire your knowledge graph. Note-taking can be very personal. You've tried every app and there's always something wrong. You deserve better. Obsidian was built to be extensible. You can quickly set up your own toolkit with 22 core plugins or 149 community plugins. Once Obsidian reaches version 1.0, you'll be able install third-party plugins and build your own. The sky is the limit. Cloud services can be shut down, bought or changed privacy policies at any time. The last thing you want are proprietary formats and data lock in. Obsidian stores your data in a local folder.