del.icio.us

Well, I found it.

del.icio.us is the service I really wanted when I started this blog. This "social bookmarking" network is nothing but a system whereby I can share the pages I've found interesting enough to mark for later review. You can go to http://del.icio.us/herr_theoretiker at any time to see the latest things I've bookmarked (this means that the number of posts to this blog, which has been low lately anyway, will diminish).

del.icio.us bookmarks are collected according to tags, much like gmail's labels. This "flat hierarchy" (described in detail on beelerspace) allows each item to have any number of individual "tags," instead of the more traditional organizational method of placing each item in only one category or folder. For example, I can have a site about Windows freeware that is attached to the labels "windows," "free," and "software." The single item is accessible through any of the tags applied to it. You can view the contents of any of my tags through the URL http://del.icio.us/herr_theoretiker/[tagname], inserting the name of the desired tag in the appropriate spot.

The *best* part of del.icio.us, though, is the integrated RSS feature. Using your favorite RSS aggregator, you can use the URL http://del.icio.us/rss/herr_theoretiker to see my latest bookmarks, or http://del.icio.us/rss/herr_theoretiker/[tagname] to see the latest entries in any of my tags. You can even see *all* of the latest entries in any common tag, added by any user, at the URL http://del.icio.us/tag/[tagname]. I'm following the entries about music software people have been posting to http://del.icio.us/tag/music+software (adding a plus sign between tags brings up only the items that have been tagged by posters with both of the specified tags).

Add that to the ability to have access to my bookmarks from any computer I happen to be sitting in front of, and I'm sold. del.icio.us users can even send bookmarks to each other through an "inbox" system... all in all, one of the best Internet services I've seen.