About a year ago, I set up a blog for my family. I thought it would be a great way for all of us to keep in touch with each other. We could post our latest news, upload photos, share videos and the rest. I was really excited, until I realized that I was the only one who was making any entries. Try as I might, I couldn't get anyone else onto the computer. I had to call mom and dad every time I posted, and even then there was a lag of time before they finally read what I had to say.
Why? My parents, bless their hearts, are seriously pre-internet. In fact, they're seriously pre-computer. My mother remembers the day when typewriters had two carriages: one for upper case and one for lower case. My dad served in WWII, as a Navy bombadier. In those days, you used a phone - if you had one. Otherwise, you walked over to your friend's house and caught up over tea on the front porch.
Alas, those days are long gone. Americans are scattered around the country now. We shop in supermarkets and malls instead of the corner store where the owners knew every customer. That may still be the case in some instances, but I'll bet the corner store owner's kids are in a different city these days. My parents still live in a little time warp, blissfully ignorant of the internet, despite my many attempts to introduce them to it. For one thing, my mom's vision just isn't what it used to be. She has difficulty seeing the screen. My dad will occasionally turn on the computer, although most of the time it stays off and forgotten. It's just not part of their thinking, and who can blame them? I still can't figure out how to program a VCR and mostly ignore it unless I'm playing a video.
So, what's a far-away and internet-loving daughter to do? Simple: find a way of enabling internet access without actually using a computer. And, yes, it's possible! Not only that, it's also mostly free, like so many things on the web these days.
As they say, necessity is the mother of invention. Actually, this little exploration began with a quest to find audio access for my blind friends. They have screen readers, or magnifiers, of course, but I thought it would be a lot easier for them to hear posts rather than read them (well, I was wrong, but that's for another blog posting). I searched for ways of leaving voice messages via email and on blogs. I didn't have a microphone at the time, but I soon discovered ways of leaving voices messages via my telephone. That's right - a telephone! The service would take my voice message and put it on an audio player. It would then send it as an email or post it to a blog of my choosing. Since I'm pretty internet-savvy, I could set this up from my end and just have them call a number, enter a pass code, talk and then hang up.
I've since become a great fan of voice posting. I don't need an internet connection to speak my mind, and neither do my friends or family. I just dial and talk. The service provider takes care of the rest, and all for free (with one exception). It doesn't get much better than that.
Of course, it's nice to read posts and see pictures as well, but if that's not a viable option, then a voice posting might be a better way to go. An entry of this type also introduces your audience to the sound of your voice. I think that's a nice way of personalizing an otherwise impersonal medium, don't you agree?
Let me talk about a few of the voice blogging/emailing options I've been able to find. They're all quite simple to set up and use, although it might take a few tries to get it right:
1. Gabcast. This was the very first service I was able to find on the internet. It's a telephone voice messaging system, designed for blogs and for email. You can also leave a message right on the Gabcast website and have your friends find you there. Gabcast is free, at least for the base configuration. A paid option gives you a bit more privacy. Gabcast also lets you send voice emails, which none of these other options so. This service can be found at www.gabcast.com.
2. Hipcast. Hipcast costs a bit of money, not much, and for the bucks you get some really nice formatting options. You can call in your message by phone or via a microphone which is built right into the site (cool, huh?). If you're really feeling ambitious, you can also upload videos to Hipcast and automatically post them to your blog. You can find hipcast at: www.hipcast.com.
3. Live Journal Voice Posting. This is probably the easiest way to go, since you have a grand total of one option: call in a posting and it will automatically be posted to your Live Journal blog. It will be a bit more confusing to set up, but once you're there you have absolutely nothing else to do except enter a PIN number. Of course, you're stuck with Live Journal, but that's okay. By the way, Live Journal is a blogging service and the one I set up for my parents. Visit Live Journal for more information about this option. Like I said, it's a bit more complicated at the beginning, but once you're set up you're home free. Live Journal, like most blogs, is free although it does have paid options as well.
4. Utterz. This service is kind of new, and incorporates voice along with photos. You don't need the photos, though. You can just call the number and it'll post an audio message to your blog. Their address is (you guessed it) www.utterz.com.
Try these out on your parents, or have a more knowledgeable friend set something up for you. No computer necessary. Just talk! Check out some examples below:
