Here is another reason for learning a good style of shorthand--and learning it properly. A careful researcher found that bad shorthand skills wrecked the historical record surrounding the drafting of the Constitution. Because shorthand reporters unreliably recorded the Constitutional debates in the state conventions, historians' ability to reconstruct the Constitution's rationale has been impaired.
The researcher had to learn several outdated shorthand systems to proceed with his work. His name is James Hutson, Chief of Manuscripts at the Library of Congress, and his article is titled "The Creation of the Constitution," Texas Law Review (1986).
(by tansen for everyone)