aNewDomain.net — Diigo offers better bookmark storage and access with opportunities for shared learning via its social information network. But spend some time with Diigo – pronounced Dee’go – and you’ll find it provides even more than just terrific bookmark storage.
Diigo is an acronym for “Digest of Internet Information, Groups and Other stuff.” Part collaborative research tool and part community knowledge-sharing, Diigo lets users highlight portions of web pages or attach sticky notes to specific parts of web pages. Unlike other tools in the market, Diigo highlights and sticky notes are visible any time you return to the original webpage. Diigo also lets you work collaboratively. Share your research with a team or study group, share specific links and notes with specific people or share them publicly.
Image credit: Flickr Creative Commons
A side benefit of the thousands of users creating online annotations via Diigo is the ability to search through this quality content for more thoughts on whatever you might be researching. Arguably better than a traditional search engine, searching through the Diigo site gives you access to the annotations and research of all viewers who came before you.
The many organizing tools on Diigo include tags and lists, all of which you can keep private, share with specific individuals, or share publicly. The read later feature is one of my favorites. It allows you to visit a webpage and mark it for later with one click, freeing up some of the multiple tabs many of us tend to keep open at all times. Using the “diigolet” bookmarklet lets you bookmark, highlight, sticky note, or share without even logging into your Diigo library. If you use the Diigo sidebar, you can view other notes and bookmarks from Diigo users for any webpage you visit, which gives you access to related content and a parallel social browsing experience.
Credit: Diigo
Diigo also offers several browser add-ons, mobile and desktop apps, and web services. Diigo Power Note for Android is available for devices running Android OS 1.6 or later. Diigo Offline Reader is available for the iPhone, iPod Touch and the iPad, and requires iOS 2.2 or later.
This is not your average social bookmarking site. While the social bookmarking and networking opportunities are part of the fabric of the service, the focus on research and sharing of collective knowledge takes social bookmarking to a more-sophisticated level.
Becket Morgan is an aNewDomain.net contributor and non-profit professional based in central Vermont. She chronicles her adventures living in a 120-square foot tiny home at www.tinyhouseadventures.com. Email her at becketmoorby@gmail.com or follow her on Twitter @becketmoorby, +BecketMoorby on Google+ or www.facebook.com/tinyhouseadventures.
