Diigo, which is opening its private alpha site during DEMOfall, is yet another iteration of annotation. More so than some of its competitors, the site attempts to build communities of users interested in specific subjects. The idea is to create social networks of engaged users, whether they are university researchers or fans of a TV show. By contrast, Clipmarks has few social aspects, only allowing users to pick out specific people whose content they enjoy.
The central feature, though, is still “clipping” webpages. For Diigo, this revolves around the notion of highlighting, just as a student might do to important passages in a textbook. After hightlighting a block of text, the user can comment on the importance of what they chose to point out.
Subsequent Diigo users visiting the same page will see the highlighting and comments. The content is also aggregated on the user’s profile, found through the main website.
On the Diigo website, the further dimension of community is offered. Users can gather themselves into subject-oriented groups, like stock investing or horseback riding, or instead join a group centered around a specific website, a concept Diigo calls SiteCommunities. For example, fans of obscure Wikipedia entries could start their community around that site, clipping out interesting tidbits.
Finally, the site also features a service called WebSlides, which allows users to mash the content they’ve discovered together into slide shows for others.
