Some people collect coins, some collect butterflies. I work on the Internet, so I collect bookmarks. I don’t know about you, but I have far too many of them.
The sheer number of hyperlinks gets extremely unwieldy quite quickly. Before you know it, there are bookmarks everywhere, and you don’t know what’s where anymore. Basically, I had to sort out my bookmarks PDQ (Pretty Damn Quick) before I was inundated like a Mumbai alley during the monsoon.
What I quickly realised was that not all bookmarks are created equal. On some pages, I just wanted to save the images; on others, I just wanted to highlight some text and I wanted to easily remember others when I needed them later.
This clarity on what I actually wanted each bookmark for helped me choose the right tools for me and my browser.
Here’s what I use... And, I hope, you’ll find them useful too.
PocketMy go-to tool for everyday bookmarking and reading offline. By installing a Pocket button (a bookmarklet) on my browser’s toolbar, I can save any webpage I’m on with one click.
When I save a bookmark, Pocket also lets me ‘tag’ it. These tags are a great way to remember why I saved the link and search for it later. ‘Italian recipes’ might be a tag, or ‘Ladakh holiday’.
Pocket also syncs all my saved links to my smartphone (using the Pocket app) and I can access them anywhere I want. It’s also integrated in Twitter, Flipboard and over 1,500 apps, so you can save links from any of them directly to your Pocket.
PinterestThis is what I use to save images. Cool furniture, weird vegetables, website design, posters, all go on Pinterest.
One click on my Pinterest browser button and I can save an image to a specific folder (or Board as Pinterest calls them). I can also tag and search through my images, plus easily access them at the supermarket, or wherever, using the mobile app.
PushbulletThis is currently my favourite syncing tool, simply because it’s available across every smartphone and web browser.
It’s an extremely easy way to transfer links between your devices, as well as collate them in a central repository to sort at your leisure.
For instance, if I don’t finish reading something on my mobile, I can push it to my laptop browser and finish reading it there. Pushbullet lets you send links, images and notes from one of your devices to any linked device, or even to a friend.
Choosing the best tool for youI have used many, many bookmarking tools over the years. There are some others like Delicious, Instapaper, Historious and Bundlr that I really like, and they all work really well.
The main thing though (as with all technology) is to decide how you need your bookmarks to work for you. Then you can choose the tool(s) that best suits your needs.
If you have any questions about bookmarking, send me a tweet – @anshuman.
