#ELTChat January Blog Challenge: How do you manage your bookmarks?

I've been meaning to write on something like this for some time, but like a lot of my ideas, it was gradually heading towards oblivion - when one tries to juggle too many balls, some of them are bound to fall, aren't they? - until I saw @tarabenwell's tweet on an #ELTChat blog challenge: What are the best methods for organising bookmarks?

Seeing that it was Tara who proposed the challenge, she was the first to take it on, and her favourite is Scoop.It. You can read about her ten reasons here.

Unfortunately, I'd missed the chat on the advantages and disadvantages of social networking for language teachers, but I saw some of the chatters' favourite bookmarkers here.

If you're reading this, you are probably one of those who finds it increasingly challenging to be able to read everything you would like to, and, no doubt, you spend more time skimming than reading, and if you're quite organised, you might bookmark some for archiving or for reading later.

Well, that's what I do. I used to use the browser's bookmark feature until I had just so many bookmarks that I hardly looked at them unless I was trying to find a website I'd forgotten.

I'd also used Google Reader, but I found I stopped going through the list after a while. I'd also dipped my fingers in Delicious, Diigo, Livebinders, but none of them lasted very long for me.

I like Scoop.it, and I can understand Tara's choice, but, unfortunately, it only allows five topics for the free version. Scoop.it is fabulous, and I use it, but not for day-to-day bookmarking, not for sifting through all the stuff I want or may want to read.

So, what do I use? Which are my current favourites?

For indexing useful ELT resources, apart from Scoop.it, I use my Useful Resources page; I categorise them under meaningful headings, its weakness being I have to do it manually. Still, I think it's a good place to have them for myself and to share with others.

I'm scratching the surface with Evernote, but it has so many possibilities that I'm afraid it may get so overwhelming and may follow the footsteps of the others I've used. I'm trying not to put too much stuff on it, but just my to-do list alone threatens to fill up pages, and what I don't see I tend to forget!

I still use my Chrome bookmarks, especially the bar, where I put things I'd like to get to easily. When they are no longer required as frequently, and if I remember, I remove them. I also use the option where Chrome reopens all previous unclosed tabs upon reboot, but this gets cluttered up pretty quickly, so I put it all in a folder called 'Pending' until...

A few weeks ago, I discovered this new tool, which is just perfect as a complement to the others I'm using. I tweeted about it, but none of my followers seemed to have pick up on it.

It's called Read It Later, and claims to work in your tablets, mobiles, browsers, and more. I've only been using it on my Chrome browser. It offers the all-important one-click button on your bookmark bar: click it and that page gets filed on your read-later list. When you've finished, tick it off and it disappears from the list. The tool's getting a facelift, and below I've included two different ways of looking at your list.

So, there you have it. Yes, I cheated - I didn't choose one, but these are what I'm using at this moment. To sum up:

1. Read it Later: used mainly for pages I intend to read in the short term. However, I noticed that the list has extended to two pages, which means I've slacked!

2. Evernote: I pile up my things-to-do here. I'm starting to bookmark some web pages here, too, so it could very well be where I 'archive' them after I ticked them off #1.

3. Chrome bookmarks: I don't close the tabs of pages I haven't "finished with" so that they reopen automatically the following day. When they stay too long, they get moved to #1.

4. Scoop.It: The five topics only means that it is the first to go if I had to make a choice, much as I love it. I've used up the five topics - I didn't know about the limit when I started. Perhaps I might have done it differently had I known, but I don't feel like changing now. These are pages I share with others.

5. The other place where I can readily share my bookmarks is my Useful Resources page. Added 22/01/2012: I'd forgotten to mention that I follow so many blogs that it does get out of hand, so I created a blog to follow their feeds; when I have some spare time, or I'm looking for a person's blog and can't remember what it's called, I go to http://chiewpang.blogspot.com/ Take a look!

So, what are the tools you use for bookmarking? How do you organise the information bombarding us from all angles?