The Pros of Using Social Bookmarking

Bookmarks are one of the most useful things on the internet and for good reason. People use them to keep track of websites that have interesting information; it's easier to make a bookmark than it is to memorize or write down the address of the website. For most people, bookmarks are private things and it never crosses their mind to share these bookmarks with others. As people do more research on social bookmarking, it becomes apparent that using social bookmarking sites is one of the best ways to share information - and to obtain information as well.

Passing along information is becoming increasingly easy in today's technology driven world and social bookmarking is part of the reason why. For instance, when a social bookmark is made on a social bookmarking site, the person who actually bookmarked the page can add a unique summary to tell others why the page should be used as a reference point. These social bookmarking sites also allow something called “tagging” - you can apply a word or phrase to a page, such as “recipe” or “video”, so that it's easier to narrow down amongst other bookmarks. These sites also use a special “tagging” system where, one word or one phrase labels can be added to the bookmark like “recipe” or “review”; this is a way of categorizing the bookmarks so that they are grouped together if they are about the same subject, which makes them easier to sort through and find.

The concept of social bookmarking isn't new - the seeds were planted in 1996, when the website known as iList was first launched. Over the course of the three years after that, more and more companies started cropping up, each focused around social bookmarking and each one added a little extra something to the mix. However, it was the founding of Delicious in 2003 that truly kicked off the “social bookmarking” trend - they even invented the actual term. Their tagging system now only allows the use of normal tags but also of something called “tag clouds” - categories that related tags can be filed under to make seeing using them easier.

There are many advantages to using social bookmarking. They can be searched for keywords so people can find bookmarks saved by total strangers, which cuts down the amount of time people spend searching for the perfect website. And the tagging system itself allows people to easily navigate these sites by clicking on generic tags like “dessert” or “appetizer” and someone will still get many results. Social bookmarking allows people to share their favorite websites without even speaking the same language.