Need a good way to quickly reorganize the way content is seen on the web?  That is what Pearltrees is trying to do, and it is getting a lot of good press in delivering one of the best representations of this age old idea.  The idea of bookmarking pages is really outdated.  Shouldn’t there be a better way by now to save, discover and share the stuff you like?

Pearltrees defines itself as a social curation tool.  How does it work?  Here is what the developers have to say about it:

• Pearl the stuff you like on the Web. A pearl is like a bookmark. It holds anything you find interesting on the Web. Click it to open it, drag and drop it to move it… or put your pearl into the trash to delete it.
• Organize your pearls by moving them to pearltrees. A pearltree is a curation of web pages. It works like a folder for pearls. Unlike social bookmarking, no need to tag and re-tag. You can open it, close it, browse it, move it into an other pearltree or send it anywhere to share some of your interests.
• Discover others’ pearltrees in your areas of interest. First take a look at your connections! If you want to explore more widely you can see the pearltrees most connected to one of your own pearltrees or you can search any topic.

Also this video does a good idea at pitching the basic ideas of pearltrees in a way that we can all understand.

Overall, I am really excited to see what they do with this project and how it moves forward.  It might not be the next best thing yet, but it does have a lot of possibilities.    You can download Pearltrees for yourself to play with over at the Firefox Add-ons web site.

Using this bookmarklet is easy.  All you have to do is visit the web site, drag the bookmarklet to your bookmark toolbar and then click it when you see something you like.  When you do, all your buddies, friends, and family members will be notified that you think that page, article or domain is absolutely awesome.

Go grab the bookmarklet at http://likeomatic.heroku.com/ then come like me!

Using what is called “user styles” the Stylish add-on for Firefox can empower your browsing experience by letting you personalize or fix the features of Firefox or the Web in general that bug you the most.

How do I get started with Stylish?

Once installed, all you have to do is right-click the status bar icon, select “Write Style” and then choose if you want to write a style for the URL you are on right now, or create an empty style not related to any web site, for now at least.  You can also tag your style, giving it a few descriptive words. 

Now how do you know what to put into the window, to customize Firefox (as I have done in the screenshot above) or your favorite web site?  I suggest checking out userstyles.org. 

Where can I find and learn to create user styles?

Not only is userstyles.org a great repository of scripts others have written that you can use, it is also a place where you can view the code they used, so you can try it out when you create your own user style.

Here are a few resources to get you started finding the user style that you need or want to use:

• Highest Rated User Styles
• Popular User Styles
• Newest User Styles
• Recently Updated User Styles

There is also a user styles blog and set of forums for you to follow too.  If I had a top 10 list of my favorite Firefox add-ons, Stylish would be in the top 5, at least.  Anything that helps the users of Firefox customize the Web or Firefox to meet their needs better is a winner in my book.

Security Zone Policy Errors – This seems to be more of a problem than most people realize.  From this one blog post, I see people coming in every day having issues with it.  So, should Firefox be relying on Windows security settings for downloading applications and other potentially unsafe files from the Internet?

Descriptions for Bookmarks – Have you ever right-clicked a bookmark, Went down to properties and typed in a description about a page you had saved?  No, I haven’t either – so this might be another Firefox feature ready for the junk yard.  Name, Location, and Keyword is good enough for me.

Now it is your turn, what Firefox feature could you live without?

Firefox Facts Bonus!  This morning I installed Intense Debate for FirefoxFacts.com.  I am really excited to see how much better this makes the commenting system here on the web site.  No registration in necessary, but if you do – there are some cool extra features you will get, such as reputation points, comment voting, and tons of other cool things.  (Learn More!)