Argh! When I returned from vacation I got so caught up in reading everyone else's blog that I forgot to get my own done!
I investigated different social bookmarking tools for an assignment a few years ago and wound up recommending Furl and Diigo. I had been using
Delicious but liked the additional features of the other two. In the end, Diigo bought out Furl so my decision was simplified! I only wished I had been using Diigo right from the start of my student days as the commenting, archiving, highlighting and sticky note features would have been extremely helpful. As I became more comfortable with it, I started to use it as a search tool by entering tags to see what sites others had bookmarked with those same terms. I would look to see how many people had bookmarked a site and use that as a gauge of its value. I also started to come across the same users over and over again and began to identify some as 'experts'. Instead of using a search engine and sifting through pages of results, I would simply look to see which sites they were identifying. Another use for Diigo that I hadn't anticipated came when our home computer crashed. If my favourite/bookmarked sites had resided only on my browser, they would have been lost to me and I would have had to start collecting them all over again. Thanks to Diigo, I had a 'backup' set!
So, for Library Lady's questions this week...
I bookmarked
Mathematical Fiction and
Mathematics in Movies using the tags
mathematics, fiction, and
numeracy education. And yes, I will definitely continue to use Diigo outside of Betty Blogger summer school.
You make some good points about Diigo that I hadn't thought of...mmmm you have me rethinking my approach to searching.
ReplyDeleteIt is time consuming surfing other blogs...but I am so glad you do take the time to check out my blog, I find I am looking for your thoughts...you add to the excitement! Thanks for making my day better:)
You're making me blush, Craftyone. After years studying online in my basement by myself, I know how easy it is to feel alone and isolated in the electronic world. Just knowing that someone else is out there too can really help, especially for those who find the new technologies to be intimidating and/or frustrating.
ReplyDeleteBy the way, I should mention that when I use Diigo to search for tags and individuals, I have moved beyond 'My Library' and am looking in 'Community' and then can participate in 'Networks' and 'Groups'. However, I didn't start out doing those things--it was only over time that I started to experiment. That's the other great thing about Betty Blogger--you can choose to really delve into certain tools or just skim the surface of others. Although from the looks of your blog, you are digging right in with all of them!