All sorts of social software sites are popping up on the web, trying in various ways to link people up with others who share their interests. Here are a few sites that I think have a lot to offer. And so far they’re all free.
- Furl: This site lets you save, share, and recall web pages. It “caches” those page, too, so even if they are removed from the original site, you can still access them. For more information about Furl, see Amy Gahran’s excellent article, 10 Cool Things To Do with Furl.
- Simpy: This one is very similar to Furl, with the added feature of uploading all of your Internet Explorer favorites or Mozilla Firefox bookmarks. That way, you can access them from any computer with a web connection.
- del.icio.us: This social bookmark site doesn’t cache web pages, but it’s so simple and easy that I find myself posting bookmarks to it all the time. In fact, the “Noteworthy Articles” that I link to in the left column are generated through a del.icio.us RSS feed based on my bookmarks that I tagged with the keyword “noteworthy.” Eashy, huh? Check out my complete list of bookmarks, and see where the related tags will take you, within del.icio.us and beyond.
- 43Things: I’m not sure how to explain this one, so I’ll pull some snippets from the site’s FAQ.
Make a list on 43 Things and see what changes happen in your life. Best of all it’s a way of connecting with other enthusiasts interested in everything from watching a space shuttle launch to growing my own vegetables.…Other people often have great ideas. You can get inspiration from others. Adopt a goal as your own or set up your own goals from scratch. Either way, 43 Things can help you document your success, share information, and make progress on what matters to you most.
- Audioscrobbler: This site lets people share their music lists and listen in on personalized music streams. It integrates with your computer’s music jukebox, sending information about each song that you play. Then it finds others who share similar tastes in music. These folks are still working out some bugs in the program, but it’s very promising, especially for those who listen to a lot of music on their computers.
- Flickr: Here you can do with photos what you can do on del.icio.us with web pages. Very cool way to share images with friends and make friends by sharing images.
- Friendster: This is the mother of all social networking web applications. It links people according to interests and spawns of web of “friends” (how’s that for a mixed metaphor?).