Here are some tips about how del.icio.us is structured, to help you find your way around the site.

Navigation

• Every user has his or her own page for bookmarks: del.icio.us/minn23
• Every tag has its own page: del.icio.us/tag/politics
• You can view bookmarks by user and tag: del.icio.us/kareneidem/literature
• View bookmarks tagged both france and politics: del.icio.us/tag/france+politics
• View bookmarks tagged both france and politics by username: del.icio.us/kareneidem/france+politics
• View popular bookmarks for a certain tag: del.icio.us/popular/recipes

• Adding Bookmarks without Buttons . When using a computer without the buttons or extensions, you can still add bookmarks. Click on "post" at the top of the page, paste in the URL of the page you'd like to save, click save, and then describe and tag the page like you normally would.
• Arrange your Tag List. At the bottom of your tag list, there are several options for displaying your tags. 
• URL History Pages. On a bookmark that you or somebody else has saved, you will notice a note saying "saved by x
  other people." Visiting that link gives you a page with the history of that URL on del.icio.us.  

Posted by Ann WS & Karen Eidem

These Web 2.0 tools make it even easier for it to be "all about you." Digg, Reddit, Mixx, Newsvine and other social media sites invite users to add content they have found on the Web. Everyone is invited to vote on the content and/or leave comments about what others have added or on others' comments.

These sites make us part of the big picture in a way we never could be with "old media" like newspapers, magazines, piles of photos, CDs, or radio/TV. Sure you could write a letter to the editor and hope it got published, hand around your vacation snaps at the office, or try to be heard on Talk of the Nation or Rush. But, now with the expansive nature of the Internet, everyone's "letter to editor" is published, your comments are available to all who care to read them, and those vacation photos have a worldwide audience on Flickr. Empowering and overwhelming.

The mainstream media-the old guard of the New York Times and others-has added credibility to social media and every person participation by adding the buttons for Digg, Mixx, and other sites to their Web sites. They encourage you to Digg & Mixx or use Reddit or Newsvine to share and promote their stories. The more recommendations, the more readers.

Take a look the four sites in Thing 12. Each has its own personality and focus. Digg, Reddit, and Mixx tend to be anything goes from news stories to odd photos to weird news. Newsvine is more for the newshound who wants national and international news. Or local news-when I clicked on the local news tab, it brought up Minneapolis/St. Paul and Minnesota stories.

All content on these sites is in English. Terms of Service at Digg, Mixx & Newsvine do not allow obscene or other "inappropriate" content. Digg offers a profanity filter. Newsvine has a Code of Honor.   You are more likely to run into profanity and nsfw content on reddit's front page.

More features:

• Digg is the biggest of these services with 25 million users.  A mix of YouTube videos, blog posts, mainstream media stories, and other more offbeat recommendations, it has good navigational tabs by topic and format that can narrow down a search. You can customize what you receive. Digg lets users "bury" stories they don't like or for other reasons. It will be one of the first places to find entertainment news and movie trailer links. Browse content without an account, but you must register to participate.  
• Newsvine includes the entire Associated Press wire as it is available. Register for Newsvine to recommend stories and create your own column with your original writing or recommendations from other sites. By "seeding" sites/stories you create a trail of things you've read (rather like than bookmarking) and opens a conversation with others.
• Mixx requires an account to vote and comment on any of the content you see. You can set up Your Mixx page that will deliver content customized to your interests-including text, photos and videos-a handy feature to filter only what you want to see.  
• Reddit is the most barebones of the four. Lists of recommended stories (the usual mix of news, videos, photos) show up on the home page. Your votes on the content train a filter that lets reddit know what you liked and disliked. You will begin to be receive links filtered to your tastes. Recent additions include restricted reddit where anyone to view the content, but only invited members may submit, comment, or vote and private reddit which is like a restricted reddit, but with the additional restriction that only members can view the content as well. Moderators of a reddit will be able to remove posts and ban users from their reddits.

The content of all of these sites depends on active users, so these social media sites promote competition among members by rewarding prolific recommenders with shoutouts, a mysterious system of "karma points," leaderboards, or other ways.

These sites are a good way to keep up with popular culture, find unusual news stories, and expand your sources of information. And, for those information addicts out there, an endless source to feed the addiction! Try them out!

Posted by Ann WS

Customizing your homepage using iGoogle, Netvibes, PageFlakes or another tool can be a great productivity enhancer. The page becomes a one-stop shop for services you use regularly-email, RSS, De.li.cious, and others-plus calendars, to do list, date/time, and the Minnesota favorite, weather. These gadgets are for iGoogle, but search for widgets for Netvibes or PageFlakes to find similar tools.

To find Google gadgets, click on "Add stuff" which is located part-way down on the right-hand side of the page. Search or browse for those that interest you. Here are some ideas:

• iReminder. This is an insanely useful gadget from Todoist (maker of the useful to-do list service) that allows you to set reminders that can be sent to your email or mobile device.
• Google Analytics. If you have a blog or website, you may want to keep track of your stats. Instead of opening Analytics every 5 minutes, just leave the gadget on your home page.
• Compound gadget. Clean up your iGoogle page by combining several gadgets into one tabbed gadget. It makes things much more organized.
• Google services. If you're like me and use a lot of Google services, get their gadgets (or put them in the compound gadget): Gmail, Google Reader, GCal, Google Docs, Google Talk.
• Document to PDF. Need to create PDFs often? Add the toolthat makes this quick.
• Web stickies. Add stickies to your home page for quick little notes on anything. Very useful.
• Activity tracker. An extremely useful gadget that allows you to track how much time you spend on multiple activities.
• Weather. There are multiple choices for weather from Doppler radar to Google Map-based displays. This one is simple.
  
• Today list. This isn't actually a specific gadget, but an idea for how to use one. Choose from among the many to-do list gadgets available(whichever works best for you) and call it your "Today list". Now only write down the 3-4 most important things you need to do today.