Correct me if I am wrong but I believe that Merlin Mann got the name for his site '43 folders' from David Allen's 'Getting things done' book.
I have been trying to implement GTD techniques for some time.
The 43 folder idea appealed to me hugely at first, on a first reading of that book it was the single most seductive technique. I am still using GTD but I've dumped the 43 folders. At the same time I have come to see the value of strategies in the book that at first reading didn't seem all the helpful.
The reason I dumped the 43 folders is that I don't think it's suitable for personal organisation.
The problem was that with a folder (for every day in the current month = 31) and one for every month (12), the daily folders were mostly empty. This meant that there wasn't an incentive to check them every day and then you end up forgetting to do it and then you miss stuff. The technique might work well for a business though.
Now I just store references to 'incubating' items in my phone calendar (which is synced with my google calendar).
Sorry for going off on a tangent.
Minor point, but the 43 folders idea has been around decades longer than David Allen. That said, it wasn't until I read his book that I understood the accordion folder in my Grandpa's office:
Just about everything of David Allen's Getting Things Done concept is taken from somewhere else. He just combined them into one workflow system that seems to work well for most people.
I've been doing some GTD on and off, and to me the whole point is pick and choose. The 43 folders is one idea that I thought of as a good one, but not suitable for me.
I wonder if the 43 folders might work in an e-mail form though for putting e-mails off to a later date and then review them.
One of the points David Allen makes in his book that I didn't 'get' first time round was : "It's important to get reminders of everything big and small recorded in a system outside your head not because everything is equally important but because everything isn't."
And it has to be a system that you trust or you won't be able to let go of those mental reminders. Trust means not just that it won't get lost but that you know that you'll review it regularly enough to deal with the items.
