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rsolva 4y ago
I first checked out Hypothesis back sometime in the early 2010's and it really captured my imagination for a time. Unfortunately, like with all other bookmark-like services I have tried over the years, I did not use it regularly and it faded out of my habits rather quickly. I did attempt to pick it up again a year ago to make use of shared annotations while learning together with a friend, but we only used it for a short while before forgetting about it. I think Hypothesis is really great for those who make heavily use of it's core features on a regular basis – but I don't. For me, the simplicity offered by the built-in bookmark system in Firefox is what makes me use it regularly. The moment I decide I have found an URL I might want to look up later, I hit ctrl + d, add a few quick tags, close the site and move on. It takes me less than 10 seconds and has lowered the bar significantly for adding a bookmark. No cognitive overhead is incurred by choosing an existing folder from a (deep) hierarchy, or trying to come up with yet another category in a sub-folder somewhere. That said, I might move on to a self-hosted bookmark solution in the future that adds the the option to locally archive a webpage, but until then I'll keep doing what I'm doing, because it really works for me :)
- cxr 4y ago
  > Unfortunately, like with all other bookmark-like services I have tried over the years, I did not use it regularly and it faded out of my habits rather quickly. I think the key is not trying to use it to replace bookmarks. That takes deliberate work and commitment. I began using Hypothesis to write "replies" where the comment mechanism was non-existent/unreliable/cumbersome (e.g. on very old content or HN threads, or blogs where the author is likely to not tolerate dissenting opinions, or forums where I don't already have an account, etc.), or instances where I couldn't resist jotting down a response that I had no intention of actually posting publicly (because e.g. being heavy on snark). Eventually you gradually build up a personalized data source that is richer than just the bookmark tagging system (and also includes pages things that you would never think to bookmark deliberately but have later discover some need to revisit it despite that—ever fished something out of your past without having bookmarked it, but were able to relocate it years later because you could recall something about an HN thread that you participated in?). I continue using bookmarks and tags—which, like you, I treat it as as close to a zero-friction act as possible rather than meticulously filing it away in a hierarchy. Using Hypothesis, though, is a supplement to ordinary bookmark usage—an additional resource. > I might move on to a self-hosted bookmark solution in the future that adds the the option to locally archive a webpage I recommend using Zotero to capture snapshots but otherwise continuing to use browser-based bookmarks. My relationship with Zotero is similar to Hypothesis—having known about it for years, I only started using it recently (ca. 2020). But it's great. I should've been using it all along.