Microsoft Word and notebooks are two staples for students pursuing their degrees in higher education.

Two problems: 1. The notebooks weigh two pounds too much for your walk from the Arbor Grill to Manzanita Hall. 2. Microsoft Word, with its thousands of features you never use, is almost as cumbersome. Time to ditch both for a new way of taking notes.

Evernote is an free note-taking tool that stores data in what tech-geeks call “the cloud.” Notes can be typed and uploaded from just about any Internet-enabled device including a Blackberry or iPhone. Besides text, Evernote users can also upload pictures and video to their accounts, all of which can be viewed from your private account on their Website.

One warning: Evernote offers two versions of its app. The free version only allows users to upload up to 40 megabytes (MB) each month. It also doesn’t support Secured Sockets Layer (SSL) encryption for uploads, an Internet security standard. For $5 per month or $45 per year, users can upgrade to the premium version that raises the limit to 500 MB and enables SSL uploads