fishee - Thanks for explaining that to others. Funny is that I don't even see you "bookmarking" much, if any at all. You're definitely not one of those who're abusing the system.

>So, I'd rather have loose threads organized under my screenname and keep it off my computer -- call it selfish but this seems practical to me. <

It is selfish. It is inconsiderate. It is rude. It clogs up the system. It takes up our time.

If the few Mbytes that you aren't putting on your hard drive makes a difference, perhaps you need a new computer.

I also don't see how it can be helpful to pull up a list of hundreds of threads that one has "bookmarked" in order to find some info.

I should think it would be much more practical to copy the URLs and titles for a particular topic into a Word document, print that out and bring it with you.

((I))

I carry my bookmarks in a thumb drive. I can plug it into any internet cafe and have instant access to all my on-line goodies.

So, just after I wrote that tirade. I'm browsing through the threads and I come across "Helpful Information: Italy 2" (in which I have an interest) with a new post.

And just guess what the new post turned out to be?

((I))

Good grief! The less computer savy of us, that would be me, never realized that there was a more "considerate" way to store threads with valuable info. In fact when I first started researching an upcoming trip I asked what the "bookmarking" post meant. Someone replied that it was a way to retrieve threads by clicking on your own name. No one mentioned then that it was considered rude or inconsiderate. Now I know. That said, frankly, I've never understood why some people get bent out of shape over things as simple as this. There are more inportant things in life to get bent about. JMO

I, sorry, Ira, but the only thing that takes up anyone's time here is their own decision to look at a post or not and to respond to it.

I agree it can be annoying to see the "bookmarking" response especially when there are other ways to do it but, realistically, don't give it any more significance than it already doesn't have.

Look under 'help"

"How do I save the URL of a thread so I can find it at a later date?
Once the thread is visible in the left-hand frame, right click on the thread title and choose "copy shortcut, " which copies the exact URL of the thread. You can paste the URL into another document or in your browser's address field. Or, right click on the thread title in the left frame and choose "open in new window," which opens the message in a new window; you will then see the URL in your browser's address window." ((*))

Robespierre is the only one so far to address the following situation:

You end up wandering into an area you hadn't anticipated due to a sudden museum closure, last minute decision to walk to next destination, etc. You realize you may be just a few blocks away from a great thrift store or a wonderful restaurant featuring an 8 Euro prix fixe lunch that several posters have raved about.

You don't have the name or address since your plan for the day was thrown off. People are beginning to whine, "I'm hungry but I only have 10 E" or "It would be my dream if we could only find that fabric store". You dart into the internet cafe across the street, log-on to fodors.com and scan threads under your name, jot down the address -- this has taken 6 minutes and your friends have barely noticed that you've disappeared as they're scanning their guide books and smoking cigarettes.

If I hadn't bookmarked, the horrible search function would have taken forever likely I could not have found it at all.

Now, Robespierre suggests we carry a flash drive with all our links -- this is possible. But I maintain that it's very useful to have threads organized under our screen names while traveling for easy and quick retrieval while we're on the road.

I don't carry all 40 pgs of printed material with me -- just the 2 pgs I think we'll need for the day, but plans often change.

Or much simpler (and infinitely less annoying) cut & paste the URL into an email which you send to yourself

You don't even have to cut and paste. The "email this page" link at the bottom of every threadndoes just that.

> You realize you may be just a few blocks away from....You don't have the name or address...<

Yet you found it in a few minutes by looking up your name?

Some people, an example taken at random might be, say, fishee, who has 300 posts in the past 12 months.

How would one find that one post with the missing name and address in only a few minutes?

((I))
I recognize that some luck might be involved.

The whole bookmarking thing doesn't make any sense to me at all, I can't comprehend why people do that or how it is useful. The explanation of how wonderful it would work versus the search function doesn't make any sense to me. Obviously, anybody who wants to pull up every single thread on Fodor's with their name on them can have hundreds of threads to wade through, so how is that such a great idea. The search function works a lot better than that would.

Or why don't people just save the URL or something, as noted. Fodors puts this right in your face at the bottom by saying you can email the thread (although the first time you do that, you realize it is only the URL, not the text). It would obviously be better for people to save the information of some really important place they wanted to visit in a folder or one document of their own, or to print that out and save it in a folder or something. "bookmarking" doesn't organize anything in any way whatsoever or filter anything.

Ira - it's really happened to me a couple of times, and I only purchased 5 minutes of internet time each time.

Generally, my relevant threads have been within the first 50 posts right before my trip (since I often had last minute questions, etc). But I didn't used to get involved in discussions like this -- I generally only responded or bookmarked threads directly relevant to my trip. Now that I've cluttered up my screen name by sticking my nose into any manner of topic, I suppose this might be more difficult now.

That's my punishment for spending too much time on here when I should be writing...

O.K. -- I'm willing to start emailing threads to myself since I can check that on my blackberry (although I frequently forget and leave this behind at the hotel or apt).

Robes, Ira, rkwan, et al you've convinced me to change my ways.

What's a thumb drive & how do you use it?

They're also called USB Flash Drives - they're internally a small-capacity memory (typically 64mb to 1gb) that can be plugged into a computer's USB port. The operating system regards them as a pseudo-disk drive (it actually assigns a letter, like E:), so the user can copy files to and from them.

There are a couple of disadvantages of using flash drives like - http://tinyurl.com/2h3k33 -

1) They are susceptible to catching viruses (virii?), spyware, trojans & all other scumware when you plug them in at a cybercafe

2) not all cybercafes have USB ports enabled on their computers

3) They are too easy to lose