(Archived) Google Reader, Stared Items, InstaPaper, and EverNote

[rick@rickwsmith.com 0]

I use all of the above items, and I am just curious if there is anyone who has found a good flow for managing things you want to archive, or look at later?

I subscribe to about 100 feeds on reader and update it all day. I want to quickly go through the junk to get to the good stuff. So I will skim the titles and either star, or send to instapaper things that I want to come back to.

Then I will send the keepers to evernote. The problem is I end up with somethings on stared items, and others on instapaper. Just curious if anyone out there has a good system for keeping up with the rapid rss feeds we subscribe to. Just just keeping up, but keeping relevant information you may want to use, or send to someone at a later date.

Also up into this point I've been a very low-level evernote user, and I've pretty much just put everything into one notebook. I have tagged some things (golf articles, tech, items of interest, etc) but I'm curious if anyone can help me understand a good system of using tags/notebooks.

Thanks!

[Lougoose 0]

It seems like you aren't really sure what you are using each service for. From your description, it sounds like you use them for a lot of overlapping purposes.

I would figure out 3 different purposes (or all of your different purposes, however many there are), and make a deliberate effort to send the appropriate Reader items to that service (starred, Evernote, Instapaper). Perhaps it would have to do with the category of article, perhaps what your interest in the story is. Or perhaps what you intend to do with it later.

Both Evernote and Instapaper are great for reading things later…admittedly I don't have much experience with Instapaper, but I know Evernote is great for tagging, using location info, etc.

As for the tags/notebooks question, that is a very personal subject. In order to really get into Evernote, I believe you need to just jump in. Tag EVERYTHING - you can always delete tags later. Give things multiple tags, perhaps even seemingly unnecessary tags (remember, they are easy to delete later). Additionally, send everything to Evernote. Anything you may want to use later, anything you read that you found interesting, anything. As a college student, I scan/save everything into Evernote…consequently I have a very neat desk and very little paper lying around. I have a notebook for each class, a General notebook and a Receipts notebook. I also have a few dozen tags that I've taken some time to filter through and deleted unnecessary ones. I also have those tags nested, keeping the list as tidy as possible.

Alternatively, you can ease into it. Make an effort to keep certain types of articles in Evernote. Perhaps force yourself to scan all receipts into Evernote. The possibilities are endless.

Either way, you should make a conscious effort to stay organized. That is what Evernote is all about, and once you get yourself into a rhythm, it is awesome.