[LINK] "Google Unveils Delicious Bookmark Importer"

[rfmcdonald]

Various of my del.icio.us-using friends glad to hear of this news given its problems with its own Yahoo.

Google has just rolled out a convenient new tool for importing your Delicious bookmarks to Google Bookmarks.

The simple importer takes your Delicious login credentials (or lets you use a one-click OAuth button) and imports all your bookmarks, preserving labels or tags.

Considering Google’s rather broad reach as a company, the importer is likely more than just a friendly bid for more Google Bookmarks users.

Bookmarks was launched in 2005, but it’s never been a huge hit — or a money maker — for the company. Last year, Google launched Lists for Bookmarks, a more social feature for bookmarking that put the product into direct competition with Yahoo’s Delicious. At the time, Delicious founder Joshua Schachter was still a Google employee.

However, what makes the Delicious importer timing so interesting is Yahoo’s recent decision to “sunset,” i.e., to sell, Delicious. As more startups and other web companies have promoted their own Delicious importers, a successful sale of the once relatively popular web service grows ever more unlikely. Google’s importer may be the nail in the coffin, in fact.

This could also affect Flickr, too. At least there's a way to import pictures easily to Google Picasa.