Social bookmarking is a great way for the millions of Internet users to share their set of bookmarks of all the web resources that they have amassed over time. When people set out to share bookmarks, they will have to register themselves with a service provider. There are several out there that have become popular.

Those who use these services will be able to see a small description of the resource linked to the bookmark. This helps people understand what the resource is about without actually having to open or download it. These descriptions can be a combination of a whole lot of things. For example, they can be comments from other users who have found the bookmark useful, or they could be votes from those who have used them favorably; they can also be tags that when put together are called a folksonomy.

This is a simple process, which forms a part of sharing bookmarks. A number of people add to the metadata or the description of the keywords and all this content is shared. In a regular social bookmarking set up, this is how it works. A person registers and then saves links to websites or pages that he may have found pertinent to his set of keywords. Making them public is what will help share them. People looking for similar information will then be able to go through this set of tags to see if it is of any use to them.

The sharing here too can happen at different levels. Just like a social networking site, you can choose to make your links public only to a closed group of friends, library resource sharing or you could opt to have a completely public profile. You can even choose to share these on other domains or networks in a number of ways. There are several bookmarking sites that allow live streaming of all the lists of bookmarks created by their users. You could choose to be a part of this stream or stay away from it.

There are several benefits to being able to share bookmarks. For serious research students, this could be an easier way of sourcing information on their subjects without having to spend hours of time searching for it. There may be someone who has shared a link that might interest you and you can use it. Similarly just as in any networking site, you can increase you social interaction levels as well. Those in the public domain will be more than willing to interact with people who share their thoughts. Such peer interaction can result in meaningful exchange.

There are several sites that can be looked into to help share your bookmarks safely. A popular one that has everybody from celebrities to ordinary folk on it is Twitter. Besides promoting micro blogging and social networking, it also allows you to send out and receive small messages of information.

Digg began as a technology sharing site and gradually moved into becoming one that shares information that is socially relevant and pertains to discoveries, developments, research, etc. Just as the name suggests, StumbleUpon allows you to share good sites and links to information that you just happened to stumble upon. These can be for web pages and photos as well as for videos.

Technorati is a social bookmarking site that specifically works on looking through the millions of blogs online and finding useful information to share. Being able to share bookmarks allows you to open yourself up to a whole world of information. What you may have otherwise taken a lifetime to come across may easily be found on another person’s stream and that is what makes sharing bookmarks extremely useful.