This is the second post in a series detailing some online tools I use on a regular basis that make my life a lot easier. I looked at Google Reader a couple of weeks ago. This time around it is Google Notebook. Just realized that a lot of these may very well be Google sites/tools - not that I'm a big Google fan boy, but just for the fact that they have a lot of useful tools out there, and, well, they're Google - what more can you say.

Google Notebook is an interesting concept. Note-taking is one of those practices that hits everyone at some point in their lives. We may take notes of a lecture when we're in school. We jot down thoughts for that never-ending 'to do' list. We come away from a seminar or meeting with notes scribbled everywhere. We like to take notes. The problem is that, at least for me, I don't like the analog life near as well as I like the digital one. I would much prefer all my thoughts/notes/etc. be accessible wherever I am at, whenever I need them. Thus, the fact that I utilize web tools like Google Reader, Google Notebook, & others.

Think of Google Notebook as just that: an online notebook of sorts. Once you create an account, you are prompted to download & install a browser extension that puts your online notebook at your fingertips whenever you need it. Researching the best price on that new HDTV you've been eyeing? Google Notebook can help keep your thoughts all together. You can grab great deals and copy/paste them to your online notebook for safe keeping & referral later (including links back to where the note was taken from). Add the ability to grab & store user reviews, HDTV 'need to know before you buy' articles, and the like, and you've got your own virtual online assistant!


[Google Notebook - Original Quote Location]


[Google Notebook - New Quote Location]

Here's how I use it...

I primarily use Google Notebook for three purposes: 1) to grab pertinent news links to stories about young adult culture for my weekly Threads enewsletter, 2) to grab quotes and thoughts that I like and that I want to refer back to later, and 3) to grab news stories/site links for things I want to go back & read in more detail later. Let me give you a quick synopsis of what #1 looks like, as this is the one area I use Notebook most heavily.

I have several Google News searches saved within Google Reader to help with my gathering process. These cover news stories with the keywords "young adults," "faith," and "twentysomething." I like gathering news in this way because whenever I'm ready to pour over news from any given week as I'm pulling links for the newsletter I have them all in one quick location. I browse through the headlines quickly, opening potential stories/links in new tabs in my browser. This process takes about 10 minutes or so as I can easily have 300+ news links waiting for me in Reader.

I then click through my 'potential news' tabs, skimming articles to see which might be good to feature. When I find one, I simply highlight the first paragraph or two in the article, right-click and choose "Note This (Google Notebook)" from the menu. The headline, link to the article, & highlighted excerpt are instantly placed into my Notebook. I can then go and copy/paste the approx. four articles I want to feature that week & place them in the newsletter.

The entire process from start to finish (provided that I don't get distracted perusing articles in the middle) takes about 20 minutes or so. Before Google Reader & Notebook, the same process (albeit having to hunt down news on my own and trying to keep track of ones I'd found) took a couple of hours. Thank you, Google!


[Google Notebook - My Current Notebooks]

You can set-up as many notebooks as you like. As you can see, I have these three set-up right now: "Need to Read," "Threads News Links," and "Quotes." You can edit anything you capture very easily. Just click on the headline/link/note and type away - complete with the formatting tools you'd find in your word processor. The "Note This" process will pretty faithfully capture not only text, but images & links as well. You can even export any notebook into Google Docs (another tool for another time) - giving you a way to compile all those HDTV links/reviews/tutorials and print them out for your shopping convenience.