Earlier this week, as I was looking for some cool places to hang out on the Internet, I came across a unique site that I mistook for a time management site. The site was called Listography, and the name itself implies that it would be a tool you use to create and manage your to-do lists.

We've covered a very wide range of such tools on MUO, like Tim's 5 printable grocery list sites, or Kaly's comprehensive list of all of the To-Do services out there. However, a to-do list maker Listography is not.

I came across the site while searching for comments about movies, and stumbled upon someone's list of the top movies they loved. I noticed that other Listography users were commenting on the list, and the list actually served as the catalyst for some interesting conversation. That's when I "got" Listography.

Listography is where you can publish your list online including your likes, dislikes, fears, desires, worries - whatever makes up the psychology and personality that is you. When you check out someone's Listography, you can quickly get a sense of what type of person they are - and striking up a conversation on one of their lists is really fun.

Starting Your Own Listography

Your Listography page can be as plain or as creative as you like. Setup reminded me of Twitter - you basically upload a profile image, set the background and you're done.  It is also like Twitter in that the method of expression is very focused. You aren't writing entire blog updates, you're writing lists.

It's yet another format of social expression that lets you share a bit about yourself without the need to share too much, and without the time requirement of writing a whole lot. Reading other peoples' lists is very addictive, and I have to admit I got a few great movie and book ideas out of doing so!

Your profile has four default folders. The Main folder is the public one, but you can organize lists into subfolders as well. Most importantly, there's also a private area where you can store lists that are either in-progress or you simply want them for yourself and no one else.

The settings area is where you can configure your profile and background image, as well as configure the public page name for your lists - for example, mine is now listography.com/RyanLists.

Remember, this site is intended as a method to express yourself publicly. I would not recommend it as a personal to-do list tool, because that's not what it's programmed to do. Instead of integrating calendars and due dates, your lists have comment areas and RSS feeds. It's about sharing a bit of yourself with everyone else - letting them know what drives you, what you're passionate about, and what you love and hate.

When you click "create list", you get a default list screen (with a putrid green background - yuck).  The first order of business is to click on a new background color on the color bar at the bottom, and select a category and title for your list. The first list I wanted to create was a list of upcoming movies that I'm dying to see.

So, you create your list using the wiki code for a bullet point "*", then upload an image for the list if you like (I highly recommend it, it makes your list page look much more professional), select the list type (bullets or numbers) and then click save. This will immediately publish a public list online that gets placed on your main list page as a list box.

If you want to organize and tidy things up, there are four options available at the bottom next to the "save" button - design, folder, abc or guide.

Design is the last window I showed you with the background color and image upload. Folder lets you categorize your list into subfolders if you want, rather than keeping them all in "main." Clicking on "abc" lets you automatically alphabetize your list. "Guide" takes you to a helpful formatting page that gives you some wiki formatting tips for creating good-l0oking lists.

Here is my main profile page featuring my first two lists - movies I'm dying to see, and actors that I absolutely can't stand.  There are other uses for Listography than just creating blog-like posts of your lists for people to review and comment on, and I'll get to one idea below, but the social aspect of this site is worth a mention.

At the bottom of every post, whether you're looking at your own listography or someone else's, is a "tools" option and a "comment" option. Commenting is self-explanatory, but the tools area is where you can do some other cool things with the lists that you discover. If someone has created a huge, comprehensive list of very valuable information that you really want to save, just click on tools->send and you can email the list to yourself or to a friend. You also have the option to subscribe to the RSS feed for that list, which can be very useful in some cases.

When can RSS be useful for lists? Well, consider this example: You're working on organizing a family reunion with two or three other family members. The reunion is a huge event, and the three or four of you have to maintain a common group "to-do" list. Or maybe you're the person in charge, and other family members just want to follow the progress of your planning as the event date approaches. You can create your public to-do list that family members can check out whenever they like, on your Listography page.

When your family members or team members view your list, they can go to the bottom of the displayed list and click on tools -> RSS list feed. Every one of your Listography lists has its own dedicated RSS feed so that people can follow along with every update that you make to the list.

You can imagine the possible uses for such a cool technology where a list that you update immediately gets distributed to all of your subscribers. Teachers could use it to maintain a classroom assignment list that automatically distributes to students every time it's updated. Blogs and websites could maintain "writer lists" that contain writing assignments - every time a new assignment is added, the writer receives a feed update. The possibilities are endless.

As I mentioned earlier, the social aspect of Listography.com is also fun - reviewing the lists of other people on the site, you'll come across some useful (and of course some not-so-useful) comments. It's fun to read the feedback people offer for various lists, and it's also very fun to offer your own feedback as well.

I view Listography as a neat site for social expression - where you can share your thoughts and ideas much like Twitter. Just like Twitter the format is a bit limiting, but this format also makes your lists fast and easy to update, and the RSS feed feature makes it just as easy for people to subscribe to your lists as it is for them to follow you on Twitter or Facebook.

Have you ever tried Listography? Do you like the idea of publishing your own lists online, and what would be the first list that you would publish - movies, music or something else? Share your opinions in the comments section below.