Originally published on July 26, 2011 in our free SmallLaw newsletter. Instead of reading SmallLaw here after the fact, sign up now to receive future issues in realtime.
"Bookmarks are dead."
That's what an MIT-educated, super-nerd friend of mine told me several years ago as I complained about my unhappiness with my browser-based bookmarking system. (A complaint that may owe more to my inherent disorganization than to major deficiencies in browser technology it should be noted.)
"In a world where Google puts everything on the Web a quick search away, why bookmark anything?" my geek-guru asked rhetorically. I thought about that for a while. The logic made sense, but the conclusion didn't work for me.
I research on the Web the way I used to conduct legal research (aimlessly and incompletely, if my 1L legal research professor was to be believed). I roam freely and gather things as I go before I've decided on a connection or categorization for the item, so it is entirely possible I may never cross paths with the site again.
I decided that search only replaces bookmarks if you consistently reuse the same or very similar terms on each search. Maybe that works for those MIT computer brains, but it assuredly doesn't work for me.
Over the years I have tried a variety of improved bookmarking tools with varying degrees of success. In this issue of SmallLaw I discuss my top five.
The Uber-Notebooks: Evernote and Springpad
By now, you have probably heard of (and maybe use) Evernote, the online digital notebook. Evernote can do a lot of things, but one of the most underappreciated is that it's an excellent bookmarking service. With its terrific Web clipper extension for Chrome and Firefox, saving Web pages to Evernote is a snap. Not only do you get a bookmark with a link to the page, you also get the page itself.
Springpad is similar to Evernote, and it must be said, equally excellent. It also functions superbly as a bookmark tool (superior to Evernote in my estimation). I stick with Evernote largely because it hooks into everything I use, from my Fujitsu ScanSnap to my iPhone and inertia makes it hard to leave. If I were choosing between the two today, though, it would be tough call.
The Social Bookmark: Pinboard and Delicious
Social bookmarking sites Pinboard and Delicious offer another alternative to the traditional browser-based bookmarks. They function as a cloud-based service on which you save your bookmarks to a Web site that you log into from anywhere.
These services offer the usual cloud technology benefits of easy accessibility across a range of devices and reduced worry about hardware failures, as well as the usual cloud technology concern of privacy. Both Pinboard and Delicious offer tagging, notes fields and the ability to make a bookmark private. All in all, they are comparable services. Pinboard costs about $10 though, while Delicious is free.
Free was not enough to keep me using Delicious, however. I was a devoted Delicious user for years but switched to Pinboard when it looked like Yahoo (the former owner of Delicious) might shut the service down. Fearful of losing my bookmarks, I forked over the $10. Now that Delicious has been acquired, it again looks enticing, but I've been happy with Pinboard.
The Browser-Based Bookmark 2.0: Xmarks
Despite all of these options, there are still a few bookmarks that I like to keep in my browser (mostly because I use them all day long and that is the quickest way to access them). If you prefer to keep your bookmarks there as well, take a look at a service like Xmarks.
Xmarks will sync your bookmarks (via browser extension) across multiple machines as well as store a backup set of your bookmarks to prevent loss. Your bookmarks stay right in the folders you are used to in your browser, but are securely backed up and synced. It's a functionality that is increasingly being baked in to browser technology (Firefox for example), but for now I still think Xmarks offers a valuable service.
Conclusion
Check out these bookmarking options to see if any work for you. Maybe you'll conclude as I do, that, to paraphrase Mark Twain, reports of the demise of bookmarks have been greatly exaggerated.
Written by Erik Mazzone of Law Practice Matters.
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