Xmarks
| Developer(s) | Mitchell Kapor, Todd Agulnick, Penny Campbell, David Loftesness |
|---|---|
| Initial release | 2006 |
| Stable release |
Firefox: 4.0.2 (August 15, 2011) |
| Platform | Internet Explorer, Google Chrome, Mozilla Firefox and Safari |
| Type | Browser synchronizer and Browser extension |
| License | Proprietary commercial software |
| Website | www.xmarks.com |
Xmarks, formerly Foxmarks, was a San Francisco-based company which produces an add-on to web browsers, which is also entitled Xmarks. The company was founded in 2006 by Mitch Kapor[1] and was acquired by LastPass in December 2010.[2]
Contents |
[edit] Overview
The Xmarks bookmark synchronizer is an extension for Mozilla Firefox, Internet Explorer, Google Chrome and Apple Safari (on OS X 10.5 and 10.6)[3] that synchronizes bookmarks between computers, can also synchronize passwords, open tabs, and browsing history (Firefox only).[4] Opera support is highly anticipated, but has not been implemented at this time due to a lack of API functionality. It is one of the most popular Firefox add-ons, attaining over one hundred and fifty thousand downloads per week and almost fifteen million total downloads as of April, 2009.[5]
[edit] Company history
In March 2009, Foxmarks was relaunched under a new name and service called Xmarks. Since Xmarks is a superset of Foxmarks, Xmarks includes many new features like suggested tagging bookmarks.[6]
On September 27, 2010 it was announced that, due to the company's current financial projections resulting from its purely voluntary-donations funding-basis, in January 2011, Xmarks would be entirely discontinuing its service.[7] On Sept. 30th, Xmarks CEO, James Joaquin, noted that he had been "pleasantly surprised by the volume of interest" that has been expressed since his initial "closing-announcement". This interest has been shown by both potential buyers of the company, and by those who have thus far pledged to subscribe to the service at the site's "pledge page". At their donations page, Xmarks attempted to acquire pledges from 100,000 of their users to pay $10–20 per year for a proposed "premium Xmarks service" which launched on 9 December 2010.[8][9] To date, Xmarks investors have invested $9 million dollars into the Xmarks project, but with a return on this investment not yet clearly in sight, unless sufficient pledges are received by Oct. 15th, apparently these initial investment funds are reaching an end-point.[9]
On December 2, 2010, the password management service LastPass acquired Xmarks.[2]
[edit] Privacy
Xmarks provides an option to encrypt bookmarks while they are in transit between the browser and the Xmarks server. Individual users' bookmarks are kept private from other users. However, there are clearly issues of privacy and trust in sending bookmarks to a third party. To address these issues Xmarks provides an option for the user to avoid the Xmarks server, by using their own WebDAV or FTP server to store their bookmarks.
Bookmarks are analysed to provide public services such as "Site Suggestions" and "Smarter Search" (Xmarks enhancements to Google web search). The privacy policy states that the results of this analysis are published without providing any information about individual users.[10]
[edit] See also
[edit] References
- ^ "Mitch Kapor on Foxmarks". Mozillalinks.org. http://mozillalinks.org/wp/2006/01/mitch-kapor-on-foxmarks/. Retrieved 2010-10-07.
- ^ a b "LastPass Acquires Xmarks!". Xmarks Official Blog. http://blog.xmarks.com/2010/12/lastpass-acquires-xmarks_3493.html. Retrieved 2010-12-31.
- ^ "Xmarks download page for all supported browsers". Download.xmarks.com. http://download.xmarks.com/download/all/. Retrieved 2010-10-07.
- ^ "Xmarks for Firefox, now with History Sync". Blog.xmarks.com. http://blog.xmarks.com/2010/08/xmarks-for-firefox-now-with-history_3925.html. Retrieved 2010-10-07.
- ^ Xmarks (formerly Foxmarks) stats on addons.mozilla.org
- ^ "Foxmarks is becoming Xmarks". Blog.xmarks.com. 2009-03-02. http://blog.xmarks.com/2009/03/foxmarks-is-becoming-xmarks_460.html. Retrieved 2010-10-07.
- ^ "End of the Road for Xmarks". Blog.xmarks.com. 2010-09-27. http://blog.xmarks.com/?p=1886. Retrieved 2010-10-07.
- ^ Lowensohn, Josh (2010-09-30). "Xmarks may live on, in paid form". News.cnet.com. http://news.cnet.com/8301-27076_3-20018209-248.html. Retrieved 2010-10-07.
- ^ Xmarks privacy policy.
