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Some of the initiatives in the area of web browser history have been quietly unfolding over the last few months. The major initiatives are:

(1) Google’s Web History that now uses the Google Toolbar and has expanded beyond search history

(2) Mozilla Weave that pushes browser metadata such as bookmarks, history and customizations into “a cloud”.

What are the other major players doing? Microsoft is developing SearchBar, a system for “proactively and persistently storing query histories, browsing histories, and users’ notes and ratings in an interrelated fashion”.

On the startup front, several services and tools have begun to appear:

(1) Thumbstrips, (surprisingly, from Intuit) a Firefox extension that keeps thumbnails of your browsing history

(2) Trailfire, which creates a sequence based on your browsing which can then be shared

(3) Deja Clicks, a web recording utility for Firefox

There are quite a few Firefox extensions that have their own take on book marking and browser history recording. A quick browse through the Firefox Add-ons bookmarks category show many useful plug-ins.

TechCrunch has recently covered a YCombinator start-up called WebMynd which provides a service Firefox add-on that records every website you visit and saves a virtual copy on your hard drive. Interestingly, this is the first instance of a paid book marking/browser history storing service.

So what does all this mean? It simply points to the fact that browsing and information seeking is more integral to people’s lives today and there are opportunities to make one’s browsing more productive and personal. Remember, browsing history recording is not new—there were some services that were around in 1998-2000 that did just about the same. The key difference is that the world is more ready for these services today and we may well find the tipping point in 2008.