Two Lesser Known Services To Suppliment Your Blog
OK, I swear this time I’m going to write more. If my wife can find time to blog and still has time to be with the baby and do a full time job, then so can I.
Bloggers are a funny lot. They (and I say they because I am [obviously] not a good blogger, as my blog goes for a few days without getting any new content)… well, OK, *we* are always looking for new and exciting ways to take the content we have and enhance it with some other medium, service, or supplimental site. We add photos, music, video, and files to our posts, share them with our friends, and send them out over the interwebs to anyone who will read them. Some are more useful than others, and since most people are using the obvious ones, I thought I’d highlight some of the less well known ones.
I love Qik. I’ve done everything from record myself playing an instrument to taking video at a crime scene, but it always seems to come in handy when I need it. QIK takes video to the next step – live streaming video from your mobile phone. my BlackJackII handles it very well, and I’ve gotten some really nice clips.
The Internet Archive is well known for being one of the major non-profit players in the tech community. Most people know them for the ever-fun-to-use “wayback machine” which looks back at the internet through snapshots of web pages. What people may NOT know, however, is that they allow you to host audio files for free, providing they meet a certain filetype requirement. Otherwise, they’re pretty much OK with whatever you upload.
So, why host audio files there instead of on your own server? Two reasons: Bandwidth and Stability. Hosting the files off of your server saves the data transfer limits, so you don’t run the risk of being “DiggSmacked” and having a sudden spike of traffic shut you down. Also, should your site go down for any reason, your files will remain accessible. (services like FeedBurner can even cache your feed for 30 mins should your site experience a blip – feed and files never go down even if your site does).
I’ve got plenty more, but I’ll save those for another post.