Easy, Web-Based Note Capture with Catch.Com

Although I am a huge fan of pen-and-paper or plain text when it comes to capturing everyday thoughts and notes, sometimes you need to grab a picture or sound, or just type something out really fast. You need to do that on your mobile phone, and you need to access it in your web browser...or you need to grab some text from that online article and view it on your phone or tablet. Enter Catch.com, the web-based, simple, useful note taking application.

There's a lot to love about many different web-based note-taking tools, and I've tried most of the major ones. Nevertheless, I keep coming back to Catch, for several compelling reasons:

A dead simple web interface. The user interface is minimal, elegant, and super easy to use. I didn't have to learn how to use Catch.com...I just started capturing notes! Tagging is done by simply prefacing any term with the hash(#) symbol--just like Twitter. You can do this anywhere in your text notes, so you don't have to worry about dropdown boxes or tag clouds. The color scheme is pleasant, the layout is intuitive, and right now there are no ads. Just you and your notes.

Equally brilliant mobile apps. Catch comes for Android and iOS (iPhone, iPad) devices. The mobile apps not only look great, but allow for quick capture via photo, sound, or text. Notes can be automatically tagged with the location and shared straight from the app. My experience is with the Android app, and it has quickly become my go-to note capture application on my phone, totally replacing Simplenote. I love that I can capture notes in multiple mediums, and access everything offline...and it's just as easy to use as the website.

Organization made simple. Tagging Twitter-style is so easy, it quickly becomes second nature. Catch automatically creates a list of your tags for easy sorting, and will also display your notes by date created, date modified, or alphabetically. Of course, you can search your notes as well. No need for complicated folders or clumsy lists--Catch makes all your notes easy to find.

Easy sharing. Of course, no modern web application is complete without the ability to easily share your thoughts via email, Twitter, or Facebook. Catch is no exception. Direct sharing to the most popular services only takes a couple mouse clicks, and each note can also be published via a unique URL.

Security matters. Unlike some other services, security seems like a genuine concern for the people at Catch. The mobile apps can all be secured with a passcode, and you are always connected to Catch via SSL, the industry standard for secure connections. Although nothing is ever one hundred percent secure, Catch is taking some serious steps to protect your data from prying eyes, even when connected over wireless networks with your Android device, iPhone, or iPad.

Although I am obviously a fan of the Catch.com application for taking digital notes, there is still room for improvement. I'd really like to see some data export options, for instance. Right now, there's no easy way to back up my data from Catch, which means it cannot be a serious "data silo" or storage place for me. Right now it's handy mostly for temporary notes, not for anything I really want to keep. Despite this (admittedly serious) drawback, the ease-of-use and universal availibilty has sold me on Catch as the best mobile/digital capture solution for me.