It’s been a little while since I wrote on this topic, but social (and not-so-social) bookmarking is on the rise again.

Remember Diigo, Blinklist and Magnolia from all of two years ago? No? And at least 122 others who wanted to become the social bookmarking standard. They all lost to delicious and improved services from mainstream providers.

All of the competitors were essentially the same as delicious but with some extra usability features or nicer interfaces.

You can’t really catch up or overtake competitors on the web like that, it seems.

Delicious had the early-mover’s advantage of lots of content and a large user base. Even though some of the others were better, functionally and aesthetically, they couldn’t make up the lost ground.

But here we go again. Because people now have increased expectations of their computers and the Internet; because they are now expecting full-fat Internet content on their phones; because the use-case is slightly altered, we have a new crop of bookmarking apps.

These applications are for people are looking for something different – multi-platform compatibility, privacy, downloaded content – as well as great usability. The emphasis on sharing is exchanged for an emphasis on utility.

Here are brief reviews of five relatively new contenders. All of them have Firefox Extensions available, which was my criteria for inclusion.

Instapaper

Instapaper was one of the first of the new generation of bookmarking applications, and deserves full kudos for that. It was also one of the first to create phone applications to complement its service. Sadly, though, it’s somewhat eclipsed by its competitors below when it comes to functionality and usability. Still maintains the first-mover advantage, though.

+ one of the first of the new breed of bookmarking applications

+ really simple and easy

+ iphone app

- relatively narrow functionality

- no browser integration

ReadItLater

Simple to use, synchronises, downloads for offline use. ReadItLater is best-of-breed if what you want is a means of reading that interesting-but-lengthy article later. It’s simple and elegant. It might be too simple for some, but in that case, you’ve probably got a more sophisticated solution for bookmarking that you can run along-side. I have to say that the user experience from start to finish is excellent.

+ Scads of apps for almost any platform you can mention.

+ Downloads the full text of articles for offline use.

+ Synchronisation between different clients.

- No sharing, tags or so-forth – personal use only.

Zotero

The only open-source solution on this list, I believe, Zotero is simply awesome for academic researchers. It grabs and stores pages for offline use, creates citations for all of the major academic style guides and indexes them. You can also add tags and notes and relationships. This is probably the most powerful nu-style bookmarker on my list, though not the most elegant. It also lacks the mobile and social features of the opposition here.

+ specifically designed for academics

+ synchronisation with web server

+ downloads and parses PDF files as well as web pages.

- no mobile functionality

- specifically designed for academics

- no public sharing (hey — it’s for academics… )

EverNote

An application with fervent followers, EverNote was arguably the first of these applications, debuting as a desktop application, if my memory serves me right.

There’s still a great desktop application, and now there are web and mobile versions as well. However, I fail to understand the fervour that some people demonstrate for EverNote. I think that there are much better options on this page.

+ applications for almost every desktop/mobile/thingy you can mention

+ great usability on the desktop.

- not free for some of the most useful features

- also antisocial

- I find the web application cumbersome.

Feedly

I include Feedly here because it’s got most of what it takes and may well integrate perfectly well with your existing web workstream. Very basically, it’s a skin for Google Reader that makes your RSS feeds look less like a chore and more like an interesting magazine about stuff you’re interested in. Its integration of Google Readers Shared Items and Notes means that it could well serve your needs.

+ full integration with Google Reader, without the pain of facing 4000+ unread items

- no mobile app

- Firefox only

What Should You Install?

I’m currently trying to use Feedly and Zotero, but they (very slightly) conflict with each other at the moment*, which is enormously annoying. I’m also using ReadItLater, which remains nice to use and well-designed, with great mobile functionality.

If you’re a Power-User, I’d go with this setup, and hope the developer of one or the other sort out the conflict soon.

If you just want powerful bookmarking and offline reading – Zotero.

If you just want a reminder to read stuff on your own computer – ReadItLater

If you want social, Feedly or stick to delicious.

*The address bar add-ins for the two won’t both appear. Normally, Feedly wins.