[krisfris]

Interesting article! I agree that mnemonics don't help you much with long-term retention, that's why it makes sense to combine it with a spaced-repetition strategy such as rote learning. However, mnemonics help you translate information into a form that's easier to process for the brain. Even if you don't actively use mnemonic techniques when memorizing meaningless information, you will likely end up applying such techniques intuitively.