The Battle of the Bookmarks

Chaos
In the past, bookmarks have been more of my enemy than my friend.  I find something interesting, hit the bookmark button and click done without even really paying attention to the title that the computer has arbitrarily chosen for my "something interesting."  Even though the sites that I bookmark are valuable and worthwhile to look back at, they become a needle in the haystack.  At this point I have bookmarks on my iMac, my MacBook Pro, my iPhone, my iPad, my iPod, and my work iMac.  Six separate devices with six separate lists of valuable information that never gets looked at.  I can never remember which device I used to save the bookmark, let alone what title I should be looking for.  Finding a tool to keep these in order will add so much more organization into my cluttered life.

Social Bookmarking Tools
In steps the two competitors...Diigo vs. Delicious.

                                      VS.

Diigo

Delicious

The idea of social bookmarking is a relatively new concept for me.  I had heard briefly about it but I could not understand why people would want to look at my bookmarks or why I would want to look at others' bookmarks seeing as I have an abundance of my own that rarely get used.  According to Berger and Trexler (2010),"social bookmarking opens the door to new ways of organizing, classifying, and sharing Web content while also encouraging student and faculty collaboration and higher order thinking" (pg.45).  Wait now!  My bookmarks can make me think on a new level?  Clearly I have been doing something wrong all of these years.

Pros and Cons
In order to fully understand the benefits and shortfalls of each, I signed up for an account with both and spent a few days bookmarking to each (which means I have bookmarks in even more locations!)  Signing up for both was relatively easy except Diigo allowed me to sign up using my Google account which was convenient and one less password to remember! (Diigo: 1, Delicious: 0)

Although both were easy to sign up for, I was surprised by Diigo's plans and pricing options.  I hoped that it wouldn't be one of those situations where I have to give my Visa number online just to get the free trial and hopefully remember to cancel before I got charged.  Thankfully, Diigo has a free version with less features, which is what I signed up for.  Delicious, on the other hand, had no mention of any costs involved. (Diigo: 1, Delicious: 1)

Once I was signed in I initially noticed the clean, basic look of Delicious.  The basic layout gave a less intimidating feeling, which is important when I am facing the overwhelming years of bookmarks that need to be reorganized.  I was a bit disappointed when I signed into Diigo and noticed the advertisements right away at the top of the page.   Of course when I tried to close the advertisements, it took me to the plans and pricing page again.  (Diigo: 1, Delicious: 2)

Once I got started, both were relatively easy to use.  Both had links that I could save on my bookmark bar so I would only have to press the Diigolet or Save to Delicious button from any web page that I had open.  Each gave me the option of Lists (Diigo) or Stacks (Delicious) that I could create to help organize my bookmarks into folders.  Both allow tags to be created to further classify saved pages.  I really liked that I could stay on the page that I was viewing in order to create a bookmark, send it to the specific List or Stack and add the tags all in one simple step.  I could also choose from the pop-up boxes whether the bookmark should be shared or private.  The one advantage that I noticed with Diigo was that when I used the Diigolet, it also gave me the option to "Twitter This" so that I could immediately share the link with the Twitter World without have to leave my current page.  (Diigo: 2, Delicious: 2)

It is at this point that I noticed the similarities in features of the Diigolet and the Save to Delicious buttons ventured in different directions.  The features of the Save to Delicious button basically stopped there.  With Diigolet, I noticed further buttons labeled Highlight, Sticky Note, Share and Diigo.  These were features that I couldn't wait to explore.

With highlight, I could select a portion of a page, choose from four different highlighter colors and highlight a portion of the text.  When I am researching, my highlighter is my best friend and so I could see how this would help when researching or reading online.  It also would help for when I bookmark a page so that I can remember why it is that I highlighted it in the first place! (Diigo: 3, Delicious: 2)

Highlighting in Wikipedia

Upon testing the highlighting feature and returning my My Library in Diigo, I noticed an incredible added feature!  Not only could I highlight on the page, but the highlighted parts saved right into My Library list so that I can see the important parts of multiple pages all at once!  (Diigo: 4, Delicious: 2)

Highlighted Sections in My Library

The excitement continued when I began using the Sticky Note feature.  I could highlight a section of text and choose to highlight and sticky note or just highlight.  This could further help with my research because I could add my own personal notes into the text and just like before, both the highlighting and the sticky note appeared in My Library on the Diigo site! (Diigo: 5, Delicious: 2)

Sticky Note is Highlighted

Next was the share feature.  Since I am so focused on Web 2.0 lately, this is a very important feature.  Share gave me option of sharing to Twitter, Facebook or e-mail.  Again, the Diigolet allowed me to do this from the convenience of the page that I was currently viewing.  I could even edit the message that would appear in Twitter, Facebook or the e-mail right from the pop-up box.  Now I can update my Twitter when I'm not even on Twitter all the while sharing valuable resources on the web! (Diigo: 6, Delicious: 2)

Sharing with Twitter

The last share feature was an annotated link.  I didn't really understand what that meant but clicking on it gave me my answer right away.  It allowed me to copy a link to the page that I was on but it also saved the highlighting and sticky notes that I added to the page.  Then I could paste the link anywhere I wanted (ex. my blog).  How exciting that I can not only share links that I am interested in but I can share them with others and point them to what I think are the important sections of the page! (Diigo: 7, Delicious: 2)

And the winner is...
Clearly I am leaning in a certain direction as I begin my journey down the Diigo vs. Delicious path.  Although Diigo has the advertisements and extra features that need to be paid for, I am a big fan of the extra features that Diigo's basic version provides.  The highlighting and sticky notes really sold me thus far on this tool.  Before I make my decision, there are two aspects that I would still like to explore that will also weigh on my decision.  I need to know how Diigo and Delicious will stack up when I attempt to use them on my iPad and iPhone.  If I am going to use a Social Bookmarking site, I need to be able to use it on the go, as I do quite a bit of reading and research while I am on the road, away from home or waiting in lineups.  Also, I need to look further into the social aspects of these tools.  There is more to social bookmarking than simply sharing to Twitter or Facebook so these require more investigation.  More on these features later.

Next steps:
-  Explore portability of Diigo and Delicious
-  Explore the social aspects of my chosen tool
-  Cleanup and organize bookmarks

Do you have a preference for Diigo or Delicious?  Any great features that I am missing?

References:

Berger, P., & Trexler, S. (2010). Choosing web 2.0 tools for learning and teaching in a digital world. Santa Barbara, CA: Libraries Unlimited Inc.