A Dark Day Has Come...

[beboots]

... Incidentally, I wrote my translation exam this morning. Despite my nervousness, my day wasn't made terrible by that exam, which went rather well! The 60 multiple choice/true or false/fill in the blanks ended up being harder than expected, but the essay question and ad analysis weren't anywhere near as difficult as anticipated! Anyway, we got a huge dump of snow yesterday and last night, so the roads were terrible, but I left at like 7am for my 9am exam and managed to make it with plenty of time to procrastinate studying. ;) 

Anyway, I got home, studied a bit for the women's history exam I have tomorrow afternoon, then watched an episode of the Walking Dead, comfortable that my day was going well. 

Then I got a message from avocado_love . Normally I love getting messages from one of my favourite fanfic authors and all-around awesome person, but today she was helpfully giving me a heads-up that one of my favourite web tools in the whole wide world, which I used innumerable times each day to collect and organize and retrieve the huge numbers of websites I visit, Delicious.com, is going to cease to exist. ;_;

Cue panic moment. Take a moment to take in the glory that is my Delicious account, nay, archive. As of writing this (and probably not much longer), I have 9,529 bookmarks, with 1918 tags. I've been using it since May 2008, and I have ceased to use "regular" bookmarks. I have no idea how to survive without tags anymore. 

Here is the link that Avocado sent to me, the news article that ruined my day. 

Here is a list of ways to backup your Delicious bookmarks (I've done so already, and so should you). 

Here is a list of 10 alternatives to Delicious. I was debating between Diigo and Pinboard, and was favouring the latter for its close similarity to Delicious (apparently it was created by people who formerly worked for Delicious back when it was loved?), but it's a paid feature and I am a poor starving student. At the moment, I've created a Diigo account and I've imported my delicious bookmarks. We'll see how it works. Maybe it'll grow on me. 

Visit me on Diigo here if you want to keep following my movements on the internet (YOU KNOW WHO YOU ARE, MY STALKER FRIENDS...)

In conclusion: I'm sorry, Yahoo!, but I will never look at your excitable logo the same way ever again. I am overcome by an uncontrollable fury. If I had a yahoo e-mail account I would stop using it immediately. You have forever lost my business; if I can any way help it, I will avoid your company and its affiliates as much as possible. >:( 

EDIT: I have also managed to sync my Delicious account with my Diigo account, so theoretically I can keep playing with Diigo while continuing to update my Delicious. Delicious could still be with us for months, I suppose, or it could disappear next week (just in time for Christmas! :P ), so I'm keeping my fingers in as many pies as possible. 

Comments

[kuiskata]

Still using my yahoo email, because a) I've been using it since I was 13, seriously, and b) not much of a fan of the alternatives. I don't like hotmail or gmail...

(Still hoping that Yahoo doesn't actually go through with this. Apparently the backlash on Twitter is HUGE... It's like all the stupid every time LJ does something - and Delicious has such a huge fandom following, and we'll all probably scatter to various places, again, much like when LJ does stupid things. *sigh*)

Seriously, though, this news ruined my evening. (Thank god that MLCS final was this morning, because if this news had broken yesterday, my focus for studying? Would so not have been there. And, agreed - I didn't find the multiple choice so bad, but the fill-in-the-blanks? Ughhh.)

I've been tagging every alternative site that I've come across (reading comments and whatnot), though there are certainly some that I wouldn't even really consider.. Still tagged them, though. I'm planning on trying out a few of the free ones and seeing which I like. And import feature is a must, obviously - no way amd I going through my 3000+ bookmarks and retagging!

I'm probably going to make a Diigo, too, and possible a few others to try them out. (Hopefully I can be all consistent with usernames... I had to go with "etincelleux" on DA, because apparently names that are actual words in languages are more likely to be taken. XD)

ETA: I was linked here, which may be useful for finding a good alternative.

ETA the second: People are checking the usefulness/compatibility/whatever you want to call it of various sites over here.

[beboots.livejournal.com]

"Thank god that MLCS final was this morning, because if this news had broken yesterday, my focus for studying." I second that motion. :(

I'm seriously hoping that the backlash will be big enough for Yahoo to go "oh, oops! Uh, we didn't mean it, clientelle, here, nothing's wrong, there there, don't kill us". :(

Also, thanks for the link, m'dear! I'm still debating on Pinboard - it looks promising, but I think I'll see how Diigo works out for me. :P

[kuiskata]

And the thing is - delicious is free. If Yahoo charged for delicious, such as using different account levels like, oh, most sites in existence, they'd probably make some good money there. (I'd certainly pay for delicious. I already pay for flickr...)

Yeah, I think ther general consensus is that Diigo and Pinboard are the top two contenders, though there is discussion of a fan-made "fork" (but not really a fork because delicious isn't open source).

[beboots.livejournal.com]

I would totally pay for Delicious. I'd pay like $5/month or more for it. :P

[kuiskata]

Oh, easily. (That being said, the 7$ for Pinboard, which I think is a one-time fee?, doesn't seem so much. XD Maybe I'm just cheap - I don't want to pay for something I haven't had a chance to test/take a look at.)

Personally, I'd be interested in seeing what the people over on the second ETA link say about historious - I only briefly looked at it, though, so I don't know if it'd suit our needs. (It just kind of "feels" delicious-ish.)

I've been feeling this way for a bit, but is it just me, or does it feel like we're slowly approaching the end of the "golden age of the internet"? You hear about people trying to regulate it more and more, stupid things like the delicious thing, and things like Strikethrough, etc., etc. I don't know if I'm being paranoid or if anyone else is getting this feeling, too.

ETA: Finally managed to add you! :)

[beboots.livejournal.com]

I know what you feel about the golden age of the internet thing. I listened to a BBC podcast recently on the internet called "the Price of Free" or something, and now I feel like it's some kind of foreshadowing... I think that it will be interesting as a historian to look back upon this period in fifty years or so (maybe they'll interview me! ;) ) and see the bigger trends. Which I hope are for good, of course.

[beckyh2112.livejournal.com]

Has your import through Diigo gone through? Mine still hasn't. Makes me want to try to import again.

[beboots.livejournal.com]

I have nearly 10,000 bookmarks. I'll be worried if it doesn't go through by tomorrow morning when I wake up. I think that their servers are just overloaded by the number of people jumping ship from Delicious. (SAD FACE) I still feel the urge to put really sad faces on the end of every sentence even if they're not expressing negative statements. It's just how I feel about this whole situation at the moment. ;_;

[beckyh2112.livejournal.com]

Wow. I've only got 200 something, but I've found I need some sort of bookmarking service so I can keep track of "things what I need to comment on when I have more energy".

Am not entirely pleased with diigo's interface, though I am hoping the highlighting feature will make research easier for me on future projects. But I need my bookmarks available to play around with this thing's features.

[beboots.livejournal.com]

I know what you mean. I'm just anxious about the whole thing. :( If I don't like Diigo in the end I think I may switch to Pinboard, which is paid but apparently a better clone of Delicious. At the moment, I'm just researching my free options... ;)

[beboots.livejournal.com]

Hey, have your tags gone through yet? It's been all night for me and mine haven't yet, but I'm still not THAT anxious, yet, just annoyed, so we'll see...

[beckyh2112.livejournal.com]

My tags haven't gone through yet, no. My bookmarks have, at least. And wow, looking through them, I really need to reorganize what tags I use.

Project time! (For in between the writing. It'll be a nice downshift.)

[beboots.livejournal.com]

Oh, good! Because if yours hadn't gone through yet that I would have absolutely NO clue how long it would take for mine to do so... WILL the tags go through, though? That would be a massive unmanageable project for me to retag everything. D:

If you don't mind my asking, how long did it take for them to process your bookmarks, from the time you clicked "import" to the time you got the confirmation e-mail? So I can guestimate the ETA of mine?

[beckyh2112.livejournal.com]

They do say the tag cloud will take longer than the bookmarks themselves.

I cannot rightly provide a guestimate, as I do not remember whenabouts I hit the import button last night. Also, I do know I got impatient and did a second import, so no idea how that affected anything.

[beboots.livejournal.com]

I have an exam this afternoon, and I'm hoping that when I get back it'll all be wonderful and everything will be working... Although I'm still hoping that this is all one big nightmare and that the negative outcry from users will change Yahoo!'s mind. :P

[beckyh2112.livejournal.com]

I have my doubts about Yahoo listening to anything, really. But we'll see how that goes.

[beboots.livejournal.com]

Yeah, they are one big conglomerate and they've apparently already fired all of their Delicious staff... :( Still, we'll see.

[beckyh2112.livejournal.com]

Hm. Well, at least the del.ici.ous team is trying to save it by selling it to someone else. So we'll see.

(I still need to reorganize my tags.)

[beboots.livejournal.com]

"Well, at least the del.ici.ous team is trying to save it by selling it to someone else. So we'll see."

!!! Really? That gives me hope. :) (I am an eternal optimist.)

[beckyh2112.livejournal.com]

Really.

And since delicious has more basic usability for me than diigo does at present... (tags with /s in them, the toolbar lets me pull up a list of my tags as well as most recent bookmarks)

I am very hopeful delicious keeps working, because then I can just keep diigo as the eternal backup.

[beboots.livejournal.com]

I really really hope so too! Thank you for making my day much more bright. :)

[beckyh2112.livejournal.com]

I thought you'd seen it already! Avocado linked to it already in the comments. <3

[beboots.livejournal.com]

I just got back from my exam today. It's all so new! Things move quickly in the electronic age. :)

[beckyh2112.livejournal.com]

Hee! *tickles*

[beboots.livejournal.com]

:)

I feel I'm too old-fashioned at heart (must be all of this history nonsense I've been into) and my brain doesn't move fast enough for my era. ;)

[beckyh2112.livejournal.com]

Does anyone's? I know I slide into the speed of the internets fairly well, but I also have to do some serious managing to keep the information down to tolerable levels.

[beboots.livejournal.com]

That's why I depend so much on Delicious, because it means that I can cross-reference something really, really quickly. ;) I also rely on others, mostly on LJ and facebook, in some sort of hive mind process. ;)

[beckyh2112.livejournal.com]

Twitter and LJ are my hive-mind. So useful!

[beboots.livejournal.com]

I've never gotten into Twitter. Should I? I trust your opinion. :) I don't quite understand it.

[beckyh2112.livejournal.com]

Well, I tend to enjoy it. It's a good news-feed and a good way to quickly get in touch with people/leave short messages. I can dig up some articles I have on Twitter if you think that'd help. I can also point you at various atla people already on Twitter.

[beboots.livejournal.com]

That would be enormously helpful! I'm still debating about whether or not I should sign up... but then again, I was a hard sell on Facebook at first, too... ;)

[beckyh2112.livejournal.com]

This is my favorite thing for explaining Twitter.

And there's an etiquette post I can throw in later if you decide to sign up. At least you don't stumble around with going "RT? @reply? What?" like I did.

People in AtLA fandom on Twitter:
- sailorv983 aka moonys_autumn; hers is locked
- sharkflip
- gargoylekitty
- Floranna2
- reginleif4a aka flowerflute
- Avocado_Wuv
- lucolite aka luco_millian
- spyridonaa; she hardly uses hers
- neldluva; she hardly uses hers
- Dark_Puck
- the_white_city aka suzukiblu
- beckyh2112

Random other people I think are cool:
- catvalente
- JJONAHJAMESON
- FakeAPStylebook
- VictoriaDahl
- neilhimself
- warrenellis
- seananmcguire
- cleolinda
- scalzi
- wilw
-

[beboots.livejournal.com]

Thank you! If this doesn't convince me, nothing will. ;)

[beboots.livejournal.com]

I may sign up, so I may need that etiquette post. ;) However, apparently someone already has my username - the name I use for everything, and I've hit a roadblock. ;) I can't even think of any other usernames that I've ever used in recent memory except the gibberish that is my university internet ID... Hmm... You see, it would mostly be fannish and history nonsense, I think, so it makes sense for me to use my fandom name, and not my RL one.

[beckyh2112.livejournal.com]

Stick a significant-to-you number on the end?

Twitter etiquette stuffs.

[beboots.livejournal.com]

Good idea. (Speaking of which, are the numbers after your username significant to YOU?)

[beboots.livejournal.com]

Also, sadface, a broken link. :(

[beckyh2112.livejournal.com]

Weird, it loads fine for me.

And yeah, they're significant to me. It is both an album and a song.

[beboots.livejournal.com]

(Both Google Chrome and Safari can't find it... Hmm... My Luddite computer skills have failed me! D: )

Also, nice significant number! :D

[beckyh2112.livejournal.com]

Try Firefox? What I can't figure out is why neither of those would load it.

It pleases me. I was tempted to upload the song, but I am not going to sit around half an hour to upload things right now.

[beboots.livejournal.com]

I should definitely download firefox at some point. Apparently all the cool kids are doing it. ;)

[kuiskata]

Yes, yes you should. (I converted to Firefox years ago, and never going back.) XD

[avocado-love.livejournal.com]

*sigh* It sucks. It sucks big donkey dick. (I'm ever eloquent.)

I had the bright idea of moving my list to LJ and... I'm a quarter of the way through after working steadily for 2 hours. Gah. This will have to be a couple-day project.

But I'm with you on Yahoo: This practice of buying up the competition just to fail with it has become unacceptable to me. I only used it for minimal things -- Delicious and old Yahoogroups sites. Now I will make an effort not to use any of their services in the future, not even web searching.

I know you're switching to Diigo (not Dingo, as I first read it. haha), but I was wondering... how big is your file? Would you mind terribly about sending a copy to me? Your delicious account is extensive, and we seem to have similar taste in fic.

[beboots.livejournal.com]

Sure! Send me a personal message with your e-mail address and I'll send you my file as an attachment. It's just over 3MB in size, and you can read it on Google Chrome and, presumably, other web browsers. You can't view the tags like this, but you can see the summaries and the link titles. I'm still waiting on Diigo's importing to go through, and then I'll see how I like Diigo's interface...

[kuiskata]

...Could I get a copy of your links file, too? (I mean, I know I've already saved a good half of what's relevant to me, i.e., fandoms that we share, but still! XD)

[avocado-love.livejournal.com]

YAY! Send to voodoo.weasel@gmail.com ?

AND MORE YAY!!!!!
http://blog.delicious.com/index.htm <----- Read it!!!!

(I don't know how truthful this is -- I have experience in the corporate world, and who the hell knows because the leaked information definitely confirmed it was being "sunsetted" but it looks like it's not going to dissapper off the face of the planet anytime soon.)

[beboots.livejournal.com]

But it's a positive sign! :D Thanks for the link. :)