Blog Bookmarking Made Easy
Finally! A tool that’s easy to set-up and works as advertised. One of the battles I’ve dabbled in the past was finding an easy way to include Digg and Del.icio.us tags to the end of my blogs. Well, I just came across a tool that does that and then some.
AddThis.com offers widgets/codes for different blogging platforms so it’s an absolute no-brainer. As a Wordpress user, I had this plugin up and running in less than 5 minutes.
For those of you wondering what use this has - basically, these are some of the tried-and-true methods to get your content seen by more people than would otherwise come across what you may have to offer.
[ AddThis.com ]
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Podcasting and Disc-Free Living
In the last Connection issue, I discussed the power of RSS (“Real Simple Syndication”) and it’s usefulness. That discussion leads to another technology buzzword that you should all be aware of … “Podcasting”.
To give a brief background on the term itself, it was derived from the combination of the name of Apple’s MP3 player called “iPod” and the word “broadcasting”. Just to clarify, the use of “pod” in the word does not mean that you must own an iPod to use this medium. In fact, you don’t even need an MP3 player at all but I’ll explain this as we look at what podcasting is and it’s practical applications in a church setting.
So what is podcasting? Podcasting is the dissemination of audio or video files over the Internet utilizing the features of RSS to allow listeners to subscribe to their chosen podcast. If you remember from my article in the last issue about RSS, the power of RSS is that when you subscribe to an RSS feed, your news reader can be configured to check your feeds automatically or manually and will notify you of any new items that have been posted. With podcasts, once you subscribe to a feed, whenever your podcast manager refreshes it’s feeds, it will find new additions and, if you have it configured to do so, will automatically download the latest addition for your listening pleasure.
Software? Podcast manager? The best software manager out there for podcasts is iTunes by Apple. It’s a free download and they have versions for both PC’s and Mac’s. There are other software choices out there but iTunes is by far the easiest and most effective way to manage not just your podcasts, but your entire audio collections. They also offer a large searchable database of thousands of podcasts that you can find through their Music Store. Don’t worry about the term “Store”. In iTunes, you pay for copyrighted music and video downloads but podcasts are all free subscriptions.
Now let’s discuss the practical application of this technology in a church environment. For those that don’t know, as well as being the Oregon Ministry Network webmaster, I also serve at Portland Christian Center under Pastor Bill Wilson as Music/Media Associate. A big part of the “Media” role in that title involves the web development at PCC so I have lot’s of opportunity to apply technology in Portland to meet the varying needs of our congregation.
We implemented podcasting here at the end of 2005 and have received plenty of positive feedback on this new online resource. Now, with weekly podcasts, church members near and far can receive the weekly sermons automatically and either listen again or, for those away on any given Sunday, can still stay connected to our fellowship. And all this from a simple subscription. For those with portable MP3 players, they can receive their weekly podcast, synchronize it to their MP3 player and hit the road with the words of their church ringing in their ears and hearts.
To see it in use and get an idea for how it works, I suggest that you visit our church site (www.PCCToday.com) and see it in use. I’ve put together more extensive how-to guides regarding the use of this technology on our website so visit our Podcast Feature. You can subscribe yourself and see just how it works.
The cost for this technology? All you need is a computer, an internet connection, iTunes (go to www.apple.com to download this free software) and either computer speakers or a portable MP3 player.
If you are a pastor or church leader and would like to know how you can implement this technology in your church, please contact me and I’ll provide you with the needed information on how to get this set-up. You can contact me at jonh@jhaasdesign.com
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