So, who takes the kind of notes Comey did?
Lots of people do that, and for many reasons. As a journalist, such notes were a contract requirement at one of the magazines where I was a freelance contributing editor, for example. Whenever I had a conversation with a software company regarding a product I was reviewing, I had to take detailed notes of all conversations with corporate people and PR reps. That way, I had a record of those conversations in case they complained about anything in the published review. From time to time, those notes came in very handy.
Many people also create memos to themselves about important telephone conversations, so they're sure they remember anything that was important. I often have lengthy conversations with clients on the phone. I use a headset for such calls, and have a document open during them. I take live notes on the conversation whenever a point of fact is discussed.
In many corporations and in the military, such memos and notes are actually a requirement, and for good reasons. I suspect Comey made a habit of such note-taking, just to make sure he could accurately remember what was said. Writing it down immediately is a solid, good practice in many situations.
As for what to do with those notes, if they're really important, I email them to myself with an email header that clearly identifies them and save them on my desktop PCs hard drive. Since my emails are stored in the cloud, I have a backup that way. I imagine Comey did something similar to ensure that the notes would be available under any likely circumstance.
= new reply since forum marked as read
My post is not about whether notes are standard practice or good protocol. I'm a prodigious note-taker myself. My post is about Comey and how his focus is completely on protecting himself. I am utterly disgusted with him, and with the fact that his kind of self-interest is what this country values these days over other qualities like empathy. You can choose to lionioze him if you wish, but to me, he is a typical Republican: someone who cares more about his own self-interest than about anything else. And it disturbs me that so many people, including Democrats, admire him. If he were a woman, DUers would be disgusted with him, but because he's a man, everyone's first instinct is to come to his defense.
This is a guy, who:
1. wrote e-mails to GWB's attorney-general about how torture is a bad idea in 2005. He then waited four years to leak them, when Obama was president and torture was generally discredited.
2. wrote a letter to Congress, 11 days before the 2016 presidential election, letting them know he was investigating HRC, in order to defend himself against Republican attacks that he was biased in favor of HRC. He knew that letter could get out and influence the outcome of the election. But it was more important to him to ingratiate himself to the Republicans by showing that he was being tough on HRC. Of course, he didn't mention anything about the ongoing investigation of the Trump administration's possible involvement in the Russian hacking of the DNC. That wouldn't have been appropriate. 
3. carefully made a memo detailing how Trump tried to bully him to drop the investigation of Flynn. And he quietly held on to that memo, leaking it only after he had been fired by Trump.
There is no question that note-taking is a good idea. That, to me, is obvious and not very interesting. What is interesting to me about Comey's note-taking, e-mailing, and letter-writing is that it's always focused on protecting Comey, or making Comey look good. In my mind, he is clearly someone who looks out for one person and one person only: himself. He couldn't care less about the good of the country. In this case, what he did (i.e., leaking the memo) happened to be good for the country. But that's not why he did it. He did it to get back at Trump for firing him.
I'm so glad somebody finally got my point. 
it is especially important in business or dealing with government. not a bad thing to do when you have an asshole neighbor as well. 
back when a group of us were fighting for the "life" of a local community radio station that had been taken over by fascist assholes we cc'd all emails and phone notes to a public forum to document their bullshit.
transparency. I am almost always in favor of it.
If Comey didn't know he was talking to a criminal beforehand, he left the room with sufficient suspicion to add Trump to his list of criminals.
Trump's New Impeachable Offenses: Obstruction of Justice, Conspiracy, Abuse of Power
EXCLUSIVE: Sealed Indictment granted against Donald Trump
