Every now and then I come across a Firefox plug-in that I just have to tell people about. This time it’s one called Read It Later. This nifty add-on allows you to temporarily bookmark a web page with just one-click to a list of sites you want to visit at a later time.
Whenever I would stumble upon some page that did not quite have the information I was looking for, but I wanted very much to come back and look at it later, I would bookmark it. As a result, my list of bookmarks is a bottomless pit. It takes about a minute for me to scroll down the whole length of it, and that’s not even getting started on the folders I have created in it. There are pages upon pages of links I wanted to go and follow later, but never got around to it, because finding that one page later on would have been too overwhelming a task.
Read It Later helps with that by keeping these temporary bookmarks in their own list. Not only does it take just one click to add a page to the list, but it’s just as easy to remove it once you’re done checking it out later.
After installing the add-on, a small check mark will appear on the Firefox address bar, after the URL and the star button that’s used for quickly bookmarking a page. As you happen on a page you know you want to come back to and visit later, but don’t want to add to your bookmarks just yet, you can click on the check mark once. This turns the icon red, and the page you’re on is saved in your Read It Later list.
Once you have time to read those pages you wanted to go back to, you can click on the brown book icon in your browser, which presents a list of those links you’ve saved. You can visit pages by clicking on the link, or you can remove them from the list by clicking the red check mark after each one, either in this drop-down list, or in the address bar as you visit them. It could not be more simple.
What if you are browsing the web at home and see something you want to take a look at once you’re back at your desk at work the next day? You could write down the URL… Or email it to yourself. Better yet, you can sign up for a free account at Read It Later’s list synchronization web site, enabling you to synchronize the Read It Later list on your home computer with that of your work PC. Nice!
Supposedly Read It Later also works on any other browser, as well as the iPhone, but I have no personal experience with those alternatives.
Mika Salakka is a Finn living in the United States. He is a nursing assistant, a creative writer, a devoted husband, and an observer of the human condition. His interests range from music and literature to psychology, sociology, medicine, technology, and spirituality.
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Thanks for this!!! I do most of my web browsing (and saving) through my Google Reader feeds, but occasionally I get off the reservation and bookmark some random page to read later. It usually disappears into my bookmarks and is not seen again until about six months after it is no longer relevant.