I bookmark tons of stuff every day: technical articles, tutorials, news, and more. Some of these bookmarks go right into my toolbar, while others end up in folders.
But I often can't find what I'm looking for because I forget where I put it. The limited space in the bookmark toolbar doesn't help, and I end up searching for the same information over and over again.
Bookmarks are a great way to quickly get to important sites. But using them to remember everything you come across on the web can be hard---especially when you need to dig up the same site in a giant list of bookmarks you've built over time.
A Simple Example
I was reading about a cool feature in Netlify called Visual Editor, which lets you use a WYSIWYG editor to work with Markdown content in Next.js apps and other frameworks. This concept is often called ContentOps.
Anyway, I bookmarked it and later tried to find the article. I forgot how I saved it, but I did remember one framework mentioned in it: Stackbit (not sure why I remembered that). When I searched my bookmarks, nothing came up.
That's just one example. I know I could have put in some tags or keywords to help me find it, but honestly, I'm too lazy to do that for every bookmark. It would be way easier if I could just search by the text or something close to what I saw on the site.
There are plenty of tools that try to tackle this, but I'm wary of installing (and trusting) new apps for something as important as my bookmarks.
How I Solved It
I'm a big fan of modern tools that make life easier, especially for saving and searching information. I often talk about Obsidian and Readwise, so I thought, "Why not use them for this messy bookmark situation?" After some back-and-forth, I settled on a simple approach using Readwise highlights and tags. Here's how it works:
When I find a site worth saving, instead of adding it to my bookmarks, I add it to Readwise by hitting that button. This button does more than just save the link---it also:
- Grabs the page's metadata
- Gives me a summary of the content
- Saves any highlights I make
- Lets me add tags and notes if I want
Now searching for anything on that page is super easy.
I go to the Readwise Reader and simply search based on what I remember (in the earlier example, it was "Stackbit"). It pops up right away.
Even better, it doesn't just show the URL---it provides more details, so a lot of the time, I don't even need to reopen the site.
Powerful Search
And if I made any highlights, I can see them too.
Highlights
One of the coolest features is the AI-powered summary of the page.
Website Summary
Zero Lock-In
I'm a fan of open-source and open technologies, so I like software with little or no lock-in. This means:
- They don't use proprietary formats for my data
- Exporting my data is as simple as one click
Readwise does exactly that. I can export everything in my account as Markdown and use it wherever I want.
I've mentioned in previous posts how I sync all my Readwise articles to Obsidian and even NotebookLM, where I can run all sorts of analysis.
https://read.readwise.io/profile
Is It a Replacement for Bookmarks?
For most of the information I collect online---like whole articles and any highlights---I now rely on Readwise alone. I only use bookmarks for the sites I visit most often. After all, that's what bookmarks were made for in the first place!
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