The Joys of Social Bookmarking

I have recently discovered the joy of delicious. I had heard about the whole social bookmarking thing but always thought, "I like my bookmarks just fine the way they are, thank you very much, and I don't need one more thing to do." Then I actually tried it, and guess what? I liked it! I know that I have just barely stuck my foot in the door of social bookmarking but have quickly come to realize the tremendous wealth of information available with just a few quick clicks of the mouse. For those of you new to the idea, here is an excerpt from the Social Bookmarking page on Wikipedia: "In a social bookmarking system, users save links to web pages that they want to remember and/or share. These bookmarks are usually public, and can be saved privately, shared only with specified people or groups, shared only inside certain networks, or another combination of public and private domains. The allowed people can usually view these bookmarks chronologically, by category or tags, or via a search engine."

The feature I thought I would like best is that my bookmarks could be accessed from any computer with Internet access. In the past, I would bookmark something wonderful on my MacBook at home, but when I got to school, I would have to go back and forth between two computers to get the URL or send myself links. Not a good use of time. Being able to access my bookmarks from any computer is a tremendously wonderful feature, but I've discovered that what I like best is checking out what sites other people have bookmarked. Looking for information about technology integration? You can see bookmarks that every delicious user has tagged "technology integration" or check out bookmarks for a specific user. Many bloggers are now putting links on their blog that allow you to add that person to your network. If this all sounds like a foreign language, take heart - the whole thing is very intuitive.

While this may save you time when you are doing research, you still have to evaluate each bookmarked site. Just because someone else likes it doesn't mean it's good, but it certainly provides a narrower search than typing your search terms into the Google searchbar.

Did I peak your interest? Here is a link to a website that lists what they say are the Top 30 Social Bookmarking Sites.