I’ve wanted a general annotation tool for websites (and email messages) that would be private. It would be nice to be able to attach a note to a message in my inbox about why I’m holding onto it, or to be able to have persistent highlights and annotations on webpages. I guess I’ll just keep dreaming.
Google Sidewiki
31–40 of 102 posts
Re: Google Sidewiki
#32I had created a browser extension that does the same thing: https://everycomment.top
The biggest reason why I built it was to be able to get insight from a community on every site. Most web sites don't have comments and some filter a lot so I wanted to have a platform where the website owner can't modify or change the comments from people.
I didn't work on finding users though and it has about 10 people using it.
Re: Google Sidewiki
#33I desperately want some annotation service/standard to succeed. The idea goes as at least far back as 1993! ( https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Web_annotation ) Discussion is too important to be subject to the editorial whims to the host of the content it is discussing. I'd love to take the insight of the Hacker News community (for example) everywhere I go on the web.
There's a chrome extension for that: https://chrome.google.com/webstore/detail/what-hacker-news-s...
Re: Google Sidewiki
#34Didn't Firefox do something similar for a while? In effect it's not that much different from Reddit, being a link aggregator where people can comment on the links. The main difference would be that it works on any website and it doesn't have to be posted to reddit to spark a thread. I've read people's comments on here but I still think this is a great idea. As long as it's properly executed, meaning there should be n…
A couple years ago reddit switched from a link aggregator to full blown content stealer and rehoster service. Including bans for linking to the original picture/video.
Re: Google Sidewiki
#35I remember an extension like this for Firefox called Outfoxed.
Re: Google Sidewiki
#36I remember this, I always found the concept fascinating. But looking back, looking at what the web has become, there was no chance this could have ever worked. At best, it being centralized, it would have become essentially a Google controled social-media-ish space where all the "inconvenient" comments would be removed anyway. Probably Google would even disable the comments on some pages, like disabling sidewiki comm…
Just raising this since people might not know about it, but this is a Web standard now https://www.w3.org/annotation/ . There are a couple of companies which have created browser plugins for this.
Wow that page is mobile unfriendly.. From the w3 none the less
Re: Google Sidewiki
#37I’ve wanted a general annotation tool for websites (and email messages) that would be private. It would be nice to be able to attach a note to a message in my inbox about why I’m holding onto it, or to be able to have persistent highlights and annotations on webpages. I guess I’ll just keep dreaming.
Hypothesis can be used for private annotations.
Re: Google Sidewiki
#38Some small part of this lives on in spirit with https://web.hypothes.is/
This looks great. I wonder why is it not more popular.
I use Hypothesis a lot, and it's underrated, but it's pretty buggy, though. The experience is often not smooth and requires technical understanding to work around roadblocks. E.g. without installing the extension (which is Chrome-only and not available for Firefox) try annotating HN comments.
Re: Google Sidewiki
#39I desperately want some annotation service/standard to succeed. The idea goes as at least far back as 1993! ( https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Web_annotation ) Discussion is too important to be subject to the editorial whims to the host of the content it is discussing. I'd love to take the insight of the Hacker News community (for example) everywhere I go on the web.
I don't think it's for lack of trying. From my understanding, bidirectional links / annotations are the big thing the web is missing compared to Project Xanadu. It seems to be an idea that lots of people get bitten by, never quite goes anywhere in the general sphere, and they end up pivoting to a narrow implementation wholly contained on one website.
Re: Google Sidewiki
#40Didn't a version of this exist where you could collaboratively draw over any website using its contents as the background? (You can also guess the end result.)
I remember this as well from the mid-late 2000s, it was like drawing on the bathroom wall but for the internet.