ScrnShots - Free Screen Shot Hosting

LewisC's An Expert's Guide To Oracle Technology

This ain't no Flickr! Every blogger needs a place to host screen shots. Flickr is the best place for photos (IMHO) but they ask that all the images you post be photos (not that they're rabid about that). But now there's SCRNSHOTS.com. Unlimited screen shot uploads. You can tag them for easy searching. The photo below is a screen shot of scrnshots.com and it is hosted on scrnshots.com. How recursive is that!

It works pretty much like flickr. Take a screen shot and save it on your computer. Upload it, add a description and tags. Embed it using the provided html. They do ask that you link back to them which is the same thing flickr asks.

On the social side, I've found that people frequently comment on shots. It's fun to browse around and look at the shots other people are taking. I'm going to try to post at least one interesting shot per day and I'll try to comment on any interesting ones that I find.

I am very happy to have this available. I'm not sure what the financial model is for this. I'm hoping they don't disappear anytime soon. Flickr seems to be going strong, especially now that they got bought. Maybe google will buy this one.

LewisC

Blog Directories

What is a blog directory? A blog directory is basically a catalog of blogs. Some give you a direct link and most will allow you to enter some kind of descriptive text and a category for the blog. Many directories will also track statistics and may even offer ranking based on visitors. Of course, many directories offer a community where you can join groups and leave comments.




I don't spend a lot of time registering for directories. 1) it takes a lot of time that I could be writing, 2) different directories have various rules for inclusion, 3) I think the search engines are aware that directories are a type of link exchange and discount them, 4) I have participated in several directories on various blogs and none of them ever sent me much in the way of visitors.




There are a few directories that I have registered with that have sent me some traffic. A few of those are blogrush (which is more of a widget thingie than a directory), blogflux, blogcatalog and blogarama. Most of these I registered for a long time ago. I know some people who swear by directories and spend a small part of each day registering with them.




Regardless of that, I found a list of directories that seems to include most of the main sites. That would be RSS - Blog Directories.




Do you use directories? If you do, which ones have been successful for you?




LewisC

blog blogging

What if someone already wrote it?

A question I have been asked, and a concern I have thought of myself, is the question, "What if it's already been said?" Have you wanted to post on a blog topic and then thought about how many people may have blogged in that topic before you? How many people may have been more original on the topic? Did that make you stop and walk away from the keyboard?




To digress for a second, I get quite a few writer newsletters. I usually let them accumulate in my inbox and then read a bunch all at one time. One of the newsletters that I really like is WrteSuccess. Maybe one day I will write up a list of newsletters that I like but that's not the topic today.




Today's WriteSuccess had a very good quote from a master writer, CS Lewis.




"Even in literature and art, no man who bothers about originality will ever be original: whereas if you simply try to tell the truth (without caring twopence how often it has been told before) you will, nine times out of ten, become original without ever having noticed it." --C. S. Lewis (1898 - 1963)




Add blogging to literature and art and that answers the question. What if someone already wrote it? So what, give it your spin. Be honest. Write.

blog blogging

Should I Move to my own Domain?

I am writing quite a few different blogs now, on very different topics. I've had several people tell me that should move to my own domains and dump blogger.com.




When I ask why, no one has any really good reasons. "You'll make more money!" Really, where are the statistics for that? "People don't trust blogspot.com blogs!" Really, who doesn't? I read plenty of blogspot blogs. I know a lot of people who read blogspot blogs.




The only argument that I can give some credence to is that if blogger shuts down for some reason, I would be in trouble. That part is true. I don't think google is going to shut down blogger in the near future and I am not sure that blogging is what I plan to do in the long term.




What do you think? Are you afraid to use blogger as a blog platform? Why? If you are using blogger, are you nervous about it at all?

blog blogging

Getting hits on your blog

Everyone wants to get more hits on their blog. I am trying a new service as an experiment. You may have heard of it, Blogrush.




With Blogrush, you sign up and add your blog. They give you some javascript to add to your blog. The widget will display 5 links related to the subject of your blog. Each time someone views your blog, you get a "credit". That means that for each page view, your blog will show up in someone else's widget.




I've already gotten a few hits from the service. I plan to give it some time and see if it's worth the real estate it takes up.




If you want to sign up, do me a favor and please use my referral link. You will still get your credits but I will get additional credits each time your page is loaded. My referral link is http://www.blogrush.com/r32050784




Thanks,




LewisC

blog blogging

AnswerTips Are Enabled

I'm trying an experiment. I have enabled Answers.com's AnswerTips. Do you have a question about a word on this blog? Just double click the word and see what happens.




You should get a pop up like the image to the left. You can click on any word on the blog (any word at all) and get a definition and some information about that word.




Is this something you find useful? The goal of something like this is to keep your readers on your site as long as possible. If someone can get information without ever leaving the site, you meet your goal.




The downside to a tool like this, and it's not really a downside per se, is that if people don't know it's available, they aren't likely to try double clicking on random blogs.




But, if it does become popular, you'll be supporting a neat feature. I call this an experiment because I am seeing if it slows my page down at all. If it doesn't, I would have to call it a winner.

blog blogging

The Ultimate List of Freebies on the Web

If you haven't heard of Mashable, here is the blurb from the site:

With in excess of 5 million monthly pageviews, Mashable is the world's largest blog on social networking.




What does that mean? It means sites like MySpace, Facebook, Friendster, hi5, Piczo, Bebo and YouTube.




If you're launching a new social network, or a tool that plugs into MySpace and the rest, Mashable wants to know!




Mashable is written by Pete Cashmore, a new media expert. It ranks among the Top 100 blogs worldwide.

Anyway, beyond that, it is a site that makes lists. The top 40 this, the top 10 that, etc. Today I stopped by for a look and I got the ultimate time waster, 5000+ Resources to Do Just About Anything Online. There goes the rest of the weekend.




This post has just about everything you can imagine. Keeping in the spirit of this blog, here are a few of the topics covered:

• 6 Key Ways to Measure Your Blog's Success


• 30+ AJAX-Powered WordPress Plugins


• 50+ Ways to Track Website Traffic


• 120+ Resources for Bloggers


• 40+ Firefox Add-ons for High Speed Blogging


• 40+ Free Blog Hosts


• 70+ Podcasting Tools and Resources


• 50 Great Widgets For Your Blog


• 120+ RSS Resources


• 30+ Tools For Working With Wordpress Posts


• 30+ 1-Column WordPress Themes


• 30+ WordPress 2-Column Themes


• 30+ WordPress 3-Column Themes


• 50+ Tools For The WordPress Admin


• 50+ WordPress Plugins for Multimedia


• 30+ WordPress Plugins To Get More Blog Readers


• 30+ Tools to Turn WordPress into a Personal Hub


• 17 WordPress Plugins For AdSense


• 30+ WordPress Plugins for Statistics

And that's just the first section. It also has sections for Communications tools, photo & video editing, productivity tools, web browsing and development, search and bookmarking. Come to think of it, this post at mashable has just about put me out of business. I guess I'll have to do some hard thinking to come up with topics that haven't already been covered.




Thanks Mashable.




LewisC

blog blogging