About Annotated

Annotated is a place to say what you think about anything on the web. You clip a short passage from an article, or a moment from a video or podcast, add your own take, and publish it on a page of its own that links back to the original.

How it works

• Clip. Up to 100 words of text, or up to 90 seconds of video or audio. Video excerpts are kept at 240p.
• Add your take. Every clip is published with commentary, written or recorded. A clip on its own can’t be published.
• Link back. Every annotation names its source and sends readers to it, at the exact moment for video and audio.

The quickest way to clip is the sidebar for Chrome, which works beside the page you’re reading or watching. You can also write an annotation here.

Why the limits

Short excerpts, required commentary and a link to the source are what make quoting someone else’s work fair. The limits are enforced in the sidebar, on the server and in the database, and every annotation page has a visible way for a rights holder to file a claim, which a person reviews.

Where it came from

Annotated was built by Kristin Dahl in response to a public bounty from Jason Calacanis for a tool to annotate the web from a browser sidebar. The spec page lists each requirement and how it’s met.

Follow along

There’s an RSS feed of everything new, and one for every topic and every person: add /feed.xml to the end of their page’s address.