I want an Instapaper for everything
by Josh Kimball
They other day on Twitter, I plaintively (well, kinda) begged the cosmos for something: Maybe this already exists, but I’d like a Tivo queue for cultural events. I want a media-agnostic way to “stack” stuff than I want to see/do.
I make lame jokes about a lot of things on that Twitter account, but here I was starting to articulate a real need I’ve been feeling. Having thought more about it over the past couple of days, I think a better way to say what I think I need is in this headline: I want an Instapaper for everything.
What does that mean? It means I’d like a tool that’s NOT first and foremost about sharing or displaying things (like Pinterest is, and like some dozens of social shopping sites are), but is instead a stripped-down tool focused on and optimized for ME. I want it to allow me to save and sort any kind of media – from granular articles like Instagram does now – to TV shows on Hulu, specific podcasts through the iTunes store, books through Amazon, to even live shows by bands playing at the Turf Club down the road.
I don’t even care if it recommends anything for me (though I assume someday, after this thing exists in a sufficiently usable format, people will want recommendations like that). Right now, I finish my podcast-informed commute and have half a dozen things I WANT to remember to look at: An album by Allen Toussaint. Some dumb fitness app. An old television series starring Alec Guinness.
But I am not one to make spreadsheets. And I don’t want to send myself dozens of disconnected emails of movies to remember to watch or albums to buy when I get the chance. And I don’t want to set up dead to-do lists where buying some milk sits next to seeking out, evaluating and purchasing (or not!) an app or an e-book.
Does this service exist already? Am I being dense? If anyone gets where I’m coming from, and if this does not exist, is there any way you can PLEASE wield your vast powers to make this happen? Please? Can you, for once, use your authority for GOOD?
the boxee bookmarklet is good for being the instapaper of video – saving videos you see but don’t have time to watch but can watch on the ipad later.
Well, it’s a start, I guess? Instapaper + Boxee + Amazon Wishlist. To be clear, I don’t ever care if I can watch/listen to/read the thing through the tool that I’m talking about. I’m just looking for a better, easier way to bookmark.
I want this too, I have a list of books “to read” (or not) in Pinboard. I stack of podcasts to listen to stared in Google Reader, a years worth of articles to read in Instapaper, netflix instaque, redbox reminders, scraps of paper with cool things written down, etc etc
Oh and I want to be able to read this list “offline” so that I can pull it up when I’m wondering around the library or best buy or where ever
That is two votes for an Instapaper for Everything. Obviously, the people have spoken!
It certainly doesn’t cover everything, but if you want to take some different kinds of content on the go Spool is like Instapaper for video and has an mobile apps that makes the videos watchable: https://getspool.com/
I’m checking it out! I should clarify that I barely even need access to the thing in question. What I want is practically just a glorified list! (But OH the glory!)