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Thursday, June 29, 2006
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Thursday, June 29, 2006
June 2006
Journals Editor Joe's Fourth of July Blog Picks for 6/30
The Great Donut Debate? (and Embedded Polls)
6/29 Journals Status Update 2
Try the Moblogging (Mobile Blogging) Beta
6/29 Journals Status (R7 Beta Rolled Back)
Don't Miss These Entries
Journals R7 Release in Beta
Open Issue: Journals Database Errors
Are You 'Missing' Entries in Your Journal?
For the Fourth: Fireworks Photos and Your July 4th Blogs
That Strange Thing in the Sky That Hurts My Eyes
Drama, Manufactured and Historical
About That Moblogging Beta...
eBay Sniping and You
CLEARED: Journals Issues Due to Rostering Problems
6/27: Journals Issues Due to Rostering Problem
6/27 Journals Status: A Bad News, Good News Sort of Thing
Moist Monday
New Guest Editor's Picks for 6/23
Stormy Weather Ahead (Plus, Sidebar Material)
About That Moblogging Entry I Promised...
Jakob Nielsen on Blogs vs. Newsletters
Adding Photos to Your Journal With AOL Pictures Permalinks
This Is Not an Update
Blogging for Fun and Profit (or, "Man [Behind] for the Dixie Chicks")
Blogging for Business & Pleasure
New Guest Editor's Picks for 6/16 (Plus, a Sneak Peek at Next Week)
'Pearls' on Bloggers and Comments
Joe Explains Social Link Sharing Sites (Except Not Boring This Time)
About the Latest Weekend Assignment
Social Link Sharing and The New Netscape Beta
I'm Sorry, Britney...
Flag Day & Some Photo Tips
Fixed: Editing Journals Entries
Workaround for Editing/Deleting Existing Entries
Problems Editing Journals Entries (Plus, a Fix)
Status of R6 Fixes (AOL Pictures and Double Quotes)
Problem With Duplicate Description Text Showing Up in Header
Journals R6 Release Successfully Installed
Journals R6 Release Is "Go" for Launch, 6/13, 4am ET
New Guest Editor's Picks for 6/9
Blog Six-Pack Picks, 2.10
Watch What You Say (Redux)
Blog Six-Pack Picks, 2.9
Journals Release R6 Is Coming
Power to the People (and Serenity Now!)
Blog Six-Pack Picks, 2.8
You Know What Today Is, Right?
Blog Six-Pack Picks, 2.7
Journals Editor Joe's Blog Picks for 6/2
Live Video Stream of Space Station Spacewalk
Leveling Up in HTML Knowledge
Hello, June (and a Little Printable Propaganda)
« June 2006 Archive
Thursday, June 29, 2006
4:36:00 PM EDT
Hearing John Coltrane, Spiritual

Try the Moblogging (Mobile Blogging) Beta

[Update 8/15: Moblogging now works with your regular Journals -- you no longer need to go to the beta version of your Journals. All the instructions are still the same, though. Thanks -- Joe]

Hi folks -- I've been meaning to blog about a feature that went into beta in the Journals R6 release a few weeks back: Moblogging.

Moblogging is just short for "Mobile Blogging" -- the ability to post to your blog using a mobile device, such as a cell phone.

Now, you can already post text entries to your Journal from your phone, if you have AIM on your cell -- just send IMs to the AOLJournals bot.

However, with moblogging, you can also send pictures (and by mid-August, video) to your blog from your cell phone.

Plus, even if you don't have a cell phone that does pictures or video (like me, I have to admit, but it's on my list), you may still find moblogging useful.

This is because moblogging uses e-mail -- you get a special e-mail address for your Journal, and when you send e-mails to it, it posts the content of the e-mail to your blog.

So if you can send e-mail from your cell phone, that's great... but it also works for anything else that can send e-mail.

This also means if you want someone else to be able to post entries to your blog (group blogging), just give them the e-mail address. When they send mail to that special e-mail address, it will post to your blog. (That's what I meant when I said earlier that moblogging was "a back door into multi-author blogging.")

Obviously, this means you want to be careful who you give your blog's e-mail address to. (Though it's really easy to change.)

Here's how moblogging works:
  1. Go to the beta version of your Journal. This means you just add beta. in front of your Journal's address. For example, my blog's address is: http://journals.aol.com/journalseditor/magicsmoke/

    To get to the beta, I would just add beta. to the front:
    http://beta.journals.aol.com/journalseditor/magicsmoke/

  2. Click the blue "Edit Journal" button at the top.

  3. In the section marked "Manage Your Journal Settings," click the link that says: "Moblogging - Post to your Journal on the Go! BETA"

  4. This takes you to the Mobile Blogging settings page. On the page, you'll see a box that says "This is your Journal's e-mail address:"

    AOL Journals Mobile Blogging Settings Page


  5. The e-mail address in the gray box is your Journal's e-mail address: If you send e-mail to it, it will post to your blog. The subject of the e-mail becomes the title of your entry; the body of the message becomes your entry; and any photo that's attached to the e-mail (not embedded in the body) will be in the post. (Note that you can only have one photo per e-mail.)

    Here's what an example e-mail looks like (I'm using AOL Webmail here):

    AOL Journals Mobile Blogging E-Mail


    And here's what it looks like after it posts:

    AOL Journals Entry Posted via Moblogging

    Once your moblogged entry is live, you can edit it just like you would a normal entry. For example, after this one published, I changed the entry title, and took out the text from my sig line and the text banner that Webmail puts on the bottom.

  6. If you need to change your blog's e-mail address (for example, you gave the address to someone and you don't want them to be able to post to your blog anymore), on the Mobile Blogging settings page, click the hyperlink that says "Get a new e-mail address." When you do this, you'll get a new address, and the old one will stop working.
Like I said, this is all a beta test right now, so play around with it and let us know what you think.

[Incidentally, you'll note that your moblogging e-mail address is composed of two short random words, separated by a number. This is to make it easier to remember than a long number, but still be secure enough that spammers orother folks can't post to your blog. If we just used numbers, spammers could just keep sending numbers until they eventually hit a valid combination.]

Thanks -- Joe

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This entry has 5 comments: (Add your own)
  • #5 Comment from hunybea4him 
    9/27/06 3:31 PM Permalink
    has the update that enables you to do MOblogging with video been made yet?? it is almost October : )
  • #4 Comment from lifesabench6 
    9/27/06 3:11 PM Permalink
    Thanks Joe- i might try it.  I like your picture!  Carolyn
  • #3 Comment from hiphopjazz02 
    7/1/06 8:15 PM Permalink
    yea joe i hope u washed that trash can out before u put it on ur head that is sooooo NASTY!!!!!!!!!!
  • #2 Comment from journalseditorEntry Author 
    6/30/06 1:06 PM Permalink
    Andi -- that's actually blogger John under the trashcan; I used his photo from his Weekend Assignment from a few weeks ago (the one about chores): http://journals.aol.com/johnmscalzi/bytheway/entries/6105
    Thanks -- Joe (posted & mailed)
  • #1 Comment from artloner 
    6/30/06 1:03 PM Permalink
    YAY!!

    I hope you washed out that trashcan before you ya' put it on your head, Joe.  And is that Scalzi on the monitor behind you?  LMAOOOO

    Ya'll need something to do...

    :)   TGIF!

    andi