I realize I’m a little behind the press on this, but I fell out of the loop and just came across this post today: Diigo Blog » Diigo ~ Open Web Awards winner!.

The award is given by Mashable, and Diigo was not the only winner.  There are 2 different awards for each of 26 distinct categories.  The two awards are “People’s Choice” and “Blogger’s Choice”.  In fact, the award that Diigo won was the “People’s Choice” in the “Social Bookmarking” category.

What is most interesting (and suspicious) to me is that neither of the two “most popular” (read: largest user base) social bookmarking sites — Delicious and StumbleUpon, even made runner-up, when in fact they were ranked #1 and #2 respectively in the “Blogger’s Choice” award.

So what does this award actually mean?

There was no critical analysis or comparison done for the “People’s Choice” award, it was simply a popularity contest.  Each user was allowed to vote once per day over the course of two weeks.  So basically, it means that Diigo’s user base is more dedicated and motivated than are either Delicious’ or StumbleUpon’s.  It could also mean that Diigo did a better job of getting the award [word] out to it’s users than did the other two.

That’s it.

I would really like to know what the estimated user base for both Diigo and Delicious is.  It still amazes me that neither StumbleUpon nor Delicious was able to crack the top two in the popularity contest.  #2 was ShareThis.  Never heard of it.

Two and a half years ago, I blogged about a new bookmarking service that I had started using call Diigo.  Well, I’m still using it.  You can view my profile and my bookmarks, if you want.  What I really love about this service is not all of the “social” aspects of it.  I love being able to mark pages that are interesting to me but that I don’t have time to read at the time.

Along those same lines, I just recently discovered a Firefox Add-on called Read It Later.  You can add links to this specialized bookmark tool, sort of a holding place for links you want to visit later.  It has some interesting features like being able to click multiple links on a page to add to your “read it later” list, without having to following those links.  You can then “check off” the links as you read them.

There’s a danger in storing your bookmarks in too many locations.  Diigo also allows you to mark bookmarks as “unread”.  But I could see this tool being useful for articles that I want to read sometime, but don’t necessarily ever want to come back to.  Who knows?

Have you noticed this icon in the address bar of your web browser?

If you’re not using the Firefox browser, you may not be familiar with that icon.  But if you do, you’ve probably noticed it once or twice, perhaps with more frequency, and may be wondering what it means.

“RSS” stands for “Really Simple Syndication“, and basically refers to a live feed of article headlines which can be published by the owner of a particular website.  If you “subscribe” to a syndication, you will recieve a constantly updated list of headlines that are available on that website.

RSS is non-intrusive – you don’t see the list unless you want to, it doesn’t involve pop-ups or tickers or any such annoyances.  If you use Firefox, you simply save the syndication as a “Live Bookmark” that sits in your “Bookmarks” menu, and when you select the bookmark the menu  expands to show you individual bookmarks to each of the (usually 10) latest stories or articles on that website.

I provide an RSS feed on this blog of my latest entries.  If you have subscribed to my “feed” by clicking on the RSS icon and creating a “Live Bookmark”, you can see (usually within minutes) when I have posted a new entry just by checking your Bookmarks menu.

This is a great way to get news from websites you visit regularly.  Now you don’t actually have to go to the website to check the latest news, you can just see a list of headlines.  If something interests you, then you can click the headline to go read the article.

I have several feeds that I monitor regularly.  Maybe some of  you might be interested in these as well.  By visiting these websites and clicking on the RSS icon pictured above, you can save a live bookmark yourself.

I, Cringely – Inside insight from the tech industry – new article once every Friday.
John C. Dvorak – Often amusing, sometimes off-the-wall opinions from another IT industry expert.
I4U News – Tech Gadgets and stuff
Slashdot – Geek-related news stories
AnandTech – Hardware news and reviews
Tom’s Hardware – More hardware news and reviews

There are RSS feeds for ALL different topics and subject matter.  Pay attention next time you’re on your favorite websites, and look for that RSS icon.

How do you keep track of interesting sites on the Internet? Personally, I’m a memory guy. I have never kept a bookmark list in a browser. I remember keywords and find pages by Googling. My reasoning was always that if I relied on a bookmark list, at some point I would be without the list and then I’d be out of luck.

For awhile I kept a personal link list on my website, but it was not stupidly simple to maintain and update and eventually the links fell out of date. I had thought of trying one of those online bookmarking services, but my system of keyword memorization worked so well I didn’t think I needed it.

The Problem Memorization works fine as long as you remember that you want to remember something. If you forget about something that you wanted to remember, then it doesn’t matter if you remember keywords or not – it’s already forgotten.

I suppose an example is in order. One day at work I’m googling for “Advanced CSS techniques” and find a great article that I just don’t have time to read right now. So I file it away in memory. The problem is, I later forget that there was something that I had wanted to read. If I could remember that, then I could easily find the article again. Got it?

The Solution Recently I came across this online bookmarking service called Diigo, which stands for “Digest of Internet Information, Groups and Other stuff”. It actually let’s you highlight pages with your own comments, and even mark links as “Read” or “Unread” so you can quickly mark something of interest and go back and read it later.

So I’m no longer a memory guy, I’m a Diigo guy. And I feel so much more organized!

Do you use an online bookmarking service? If so, which one, and what do you like/dislike about it?

Wow, two days, two posts. What’s wrong with me!!?