5 simple ways to share articles online

One of the best ways to stay connected to people or to stay on their radar is to send clippings. If you just want to send something to one person, nothing beats old-fashioned snail mail. But if you want to share articles with a wide group of people, there are some fantastic and easy ways to do that online. Each of these lets you easily share articles widely with just a few clicks.

Delicious: Delicious is a service that lets you bookmark articles you've read, add a description or editorial observation, and tag them by subject matter. That makes it a useful way to keep track of articles and blog posts you don't want to lose, in a addition to a way to share what you're reading with anyone who sees your Delicious tags. Ben Casnocha, one of my favorite bloggers, posts his Delicious Bookmarks and tags on the home page of his blog, creating a public record of what he's recently read and what he's thinking about what he's read. Handy both for him and for anyone who wants to know what's in his head. Facebook also has an application for Delicious so that every time you bookmark new articles on Delicious, those links can show up on your Facebook profile.

Twitter: Though people think of Twitter as a place where people answer the prompt "What are you doing," much of the action on Twitter answers the question, "What are you reading?" If you read something you like anywhere on the Web, posting it on Twitter is a two-step process. First, you'll need to shorten the URL because if you leave it long, it will use up the 140-characters Twitter allows for a message. (See URL shorteners below). Then you can add some observation about the piece: "Brilliant post from Yahoo! Shine on how to share articles online." Then you plop in the shrunken URL and hit send. Anyone who follows you will see your articles and because Twitter is public, your posts will also appear in the public timeline. Which means you might even get into conversations with people you don't know because they are interested in an article you posted. Like Delicious, you can share your recent Tweets on a website or blog (Check out the right-hand column of Jennette Fulda's blog, PastaQueen, to see how Twitter updates look on a blog. You can also have your Twitter updates show up on Facebook. (Caveat: some people find this annoying.)

Facebook: Facebook just might be the easiest place to share articles, and to get a conversation started with your friends about articles you post. All you have to do is add the URL from an article to wall posting. Or, if you're reading an article and the publication offers a way to "share" articles (like Yahoo! does if you scroll down to the bottom of this post), simply choose the Facebook icon and post the article to your profile. Once you post it, your friends can start a conversation about the article right below and you can chime in. They can also easily share it on their own profiles.

Status updates: If you're on an instant message service like Yahoo!, gmail or AIM, your status update can mention something you've recently read. Again, you'll need to shrink the URL so as not to take up too much room. This is also a perfect use for the LinkedIn update section which asks the question "What are you working on now?" and shows up at the top of your profile. Thought the rules will vary, these kinds of updates will generally only be seen by people who are also on the service and are connected to you.

URL shortners:If you're going to share an article online, you will likely want to shorten its URL. A fast growing group of services, like TinyURL, can quickly shrink the URLs for you. They also allow you to name the link so that it doesn't just look like a jumble of characters. Some, like Bit.ly, also let you see how many people visited the article you sent. Here's a good discussion, with visuals, on Fried Beef's Tech on how 5 different URL shorteners work.