Thanks Robert, glad to hear that you have found that useful!
David,
Exactly as Robert says, I don't rework the back and what I'm driving at is a goal of not reworking the back ever. The only thing that happens with the back is that I will take a few strokes on the final finish stone to remove any hint of burr. The burr being untouched during this process will actually wear to a very very small amount on a good finish stone.
Using compound on a strop on the back of the blade makes this process more difficult, if not impossible, because it rounds the back ever so slightly. Doing so makes it so that the back won't contact the stone at the extreme edge.
So long as the wear pattern remains consistent on the back of my irons and chisels it tells me two things; one that they're flat to the degree that my final stone is capable of, and that my final stone is very flat. If you get an inconsistent pattern on the backs of your irons/chisels it means that either the back isn't flat, the stone isn't flat or both.
On western tools I use a plain strop to work the blade lightly before putting it back to work, on Japanese tools I won't do that.
Bumbling forward into the unknown.