Capturing and Organizing Information

I like to stay informed on various topics:  Some examples are RSS and Website planning, design, construction, promotion, and maintenance.

These are the steps I use.

I create a Blog to hold the information for each topic.  I have a blog for

• RSS
• Website Planning
• Website Design
• Website Construction
• Website Promotion
• Website Maintenance

• I use Blogger because I like to use certain tools, but most blog services have comparable tools.
• I do not write the blogs, these are where I store references.  They are link blogs.

I subscribe to information sources about the topics.

• Google Alerts
• RSS Feeds
• Twitter

When I read the sources and want to remember a source, I add the source to the appropriate blog.

• I use the Google Toolbar “Send to Blogger”
• I add my comments
• It is immediately added to the appropriate blog.

• I think about it as creating index cards for a term paper in the days before we used the Internet.
• It captures the link, a summary, and my comments.
• It takes the same amount of effort as bookmarking, but it has more benefits.

Periodically, I go through the blogs, summarize the information, and update my website.

• The RSS Material becomes part of the RSS Tutorial
• The Website information becomes part of the Wizard Creek Website.

Some side benefits

• The Blogs have RSS Feeds that I send to twitter which sometimes elicits comments
• I put Adsense on the blogs and make a little bit of money.
• I add a custom Google search so I can search all the blogs when I am trying to find something.