Two services which aren’t very new, but which I only started using recently, are Tumblr and Posterous. They are basically blogging platforms, but in a different way to, say, WordPress, Blogger or TypePad.
It’s all about how you post to these services.
Posterous, for example, is almost entirely email based. You create your account on the service by sending it an email, and that’s by far the easiest way of posting to it – thought there is a web based interface if you really want one.
It’s brilliant at handling multimedia, especially photos and videos – just attaching one to your email will see it hosted at Posterous and embedded in your blogpost. Including YouTube URLs will embed the video into your post as well – it’s very easy. It’s also very impressive the way Posterous interacts with other social networks, cross posting nicely to Facebook and Twitter, and sending photos to Flickr too.
I use my Posterous as a personal blog, but one to which I post almost exclusively by email, from my iPhone.
Some of the other blogs that use Posterous that I read include:
Tumblr is a blogging system that is probably best described as an online scrapbook. Again, you could use it as a normal text based blog, but Tumblr really comes into its own by acting as a clipping service – you see a link, or a photo, or a video that you like online, and you post it to your Tumblog, perhaps with a bit of commentary added.
I’m using mine to clip videos I find interesting, or will want to save for later viewing. I never bookmark videos in Delicious for some reason, and this will make up for that!
Some other great Tumlr based blogs I follow include:
The key thing about both these services is the easy of use, and the way they speed up posting. I’ve never really kept a personal blog, but by being able to make quick, short posts on my phone, finding the time is a lot easier.
Perhaps if you are finding Twitter’s character limit a bit, well, limiting, but full blown blogging seems a little bit daunting, maybe Posterous or Tumblr can fill that gap for you!
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Cheers for the Tumblr mention Dave. Now following you there too. The rather unique url for yours made me smile!
Heh – I’ve been waiting for an excuse to use it!
Hi Dave, I’m a big fan of posterous as a blog and as scrap book, just lately though I’ve been using it with small community groups with even less IT skills than me as I’ve found it’s a really useful way to get started in blogging if you lack confidence or skills. Sad to say I just can’t get to grips with Tumblr so if anyone has any tips or a quick how to get started guide I’d be grateful?