The rash of "no way" responses makes me wonder: what note taking system(s) have you encountered that actually work for you? (And why, if known.)

From someone who episodically takes notes in haphazard fashion and very rarely looks at them again, and thinks he's probably woefully working harder than he should as a result.

I type moderately fast (can hit 150 wpm, average 110wpm on typing tests) so one of my favorite methods is transcription. I just verbatim type out what the speaker is saying. I can keep up if I leave out filler words, blow past typos and ignore punctuation.

If I need to recall I just go back and read it again.

Edit: Why not record? Because people get weird about it, I’m not allowed to, or literally illegal. Also, playback at 3x speeds still too slow vs reading. Scanning skipping and repeat also too much friction.