There are thousands (millions?) of new Web tools coming online every day it seems, and thanks to TechCrunch and Tim Lauer, I think I do a fair job of keeping up with the most interesting ones. MyStickies is one of those tools that I think has some cool thinking behind it, and one that I can see immediate application to the classroom.
It’s a Firefox extension that basically allows you to create Sticky Notes on the fly, tag them, and archive them with links back to the original page. So say I’m doing some research on the ways in which schools are trying to control this new Web and I find a salient paragraph in that Wall Street Journal article I referenced yesterday. I just highlight the text, ALT-drag a MyStickies notebox over it, and a sticky pops up with the highlighted text already included. At that point, I can add my own notes/reflections, and then tag the sticky under any number of headings. When I go back to my MyStickies dashboard, all of my notes are displayed along with links back to the original page, sortable by tags or the sites themselves. In the near future, I can add friends to the process…the obligatory pinch of social goodness.
The downsides:
Hmmm…maybe it would be better to ask Furl to add a MyStickies feature instead…
Still, I can see this working for collaborative teams of researchers working under the same login collecting relevant stuff in a pretty easy and organized way.
Will,
Based on your recommendation, I tried this out. Nice idea, but it doesn’t work on my system. I can create stickies that last as long as I have the page opened in my browser. They never make it to the MyStickies page.
Does it work for you?
I’ve written the folks at MyStickies, but have not yet received a response.