Zemanta: Sliced Bread for Bloggers

Sorry for using the oft-repeated comparison of some new product or idea to the rise in popularity of sliced bread. Most people use this comparison without thinking about its meaning or why sliced bread was is even considered a big deal. Sure you can bake your own loaf of bread and slice it yourself, but it is much more efficient to buy a loaf that is pre-sliced. This does not mean you cannot still bake some homemade bread and sliced it yourself if you are in the mood. Of course if you want to and have the time you are more than welcome to do so, but most people do not have the time or the patience to bake their own bread and slice it. Instead they just pick up a loaf of already sliced bread at the supermarket or a convenience store. It is the sort of thing that in retrospect we take for granted. Such as being able to go to the market and pick up a few pounds of ground beef without having to slaughter a cow and do all the cutting and grinding ourselves.

Being relatively new to the profession of blogging I am still in the process of learning what software, third-party add-ons and other resources are the best and most efficient to use. I recently switched to a Wordpress self-hosted solution from a Blogger.com hosted site. It is still too early to tell, but so far it appears to be a wise decision. It is much more customizable. Also while in the process of this transition, I began using Windows Live Writer instead of the native editor built into Blogger so I would be able to post to my old site and the new one if need be without having to switch between the two editors. So far I am really impressed with Windows Live Writer. I know Microsoft gets a bad rap in general and sometimes it is deserved, but Windows Live Writer is much better than the native editors I have used so far.

One of the best parts of using Wordpress are the many third party add-ons or plug-ins available to use. One plug-in that I have fallen head over tennis shoes for is Zemanta. It is available for almost every major blogging site or editor. I currently use the one for Windows Live Writer instead of the version for Wordpress, but it is also available for Wordpress, Blogger, Live Journal, Typepad and many others. Earlier this week I wrote a post about the most expensive movies in history. Every time I mentioned a film, an actor or a director I put a hyperlink pointing to the corresponding Imdb page. If you are including one or two of these hyperlinks per post it is really not too time consuming or frustrating, but if you have twenty five or thirty of them it gets to be monotonous and a tad irritating. This is akin to the sliced bread analogy where if someone else has already baked the bread for you and you just have to slice it for a sandwich for yourself it is not too bad, but if you have to bake the bread and make sandwiches for your whole family it gets tedious and is by no means as efficient as pre-sliced bread.

Zemanta searches for links to words you use in your post automatically. It also searches for images which have limited or no copyright restrictions on them. It searches for related articles to include below your post giving your readers access to additional information on subjects you referenced in your post. This is all happening while you are typing. In some programs it also searches for the best tags to use in order to getter better hits from search engines. It does not do this currently for Windows Live Writer so I am considering also installing it for Wordpress if I cannot find a viable alternative which can efficiently help me add tags. If I have to I will send posts to the Wordpress editor and then use the plug-in on Wordpress to help with the tags. That is not the ideal solution so I will try to find a better one before resorting to that.

Zemanta is not perfect by any means. The Zemanta team is continually working to upgrade it so some of these complaints will hopefully soon be a thing of the past. Some users complain that it too often points to links from Wikipedia or Imdb.com. This is true although they are working to fix this by allowing you to add blogs or sites you want to search for links, images, etc. Although not always ideal in many cases Wikipedia or Imdb links are a valuable resource for your readers to get more detailed information about topics from your post. In cases where you are blogging about movies or anything related to movies Imdb is usually your best bet. Sure sometimes the links to these sites are not useful or applicable and in that case you can use Google or some other tool to help you find a different link or image that better fits what you are looking for at that particular time. Just as if you feel like some homemade banana bread that pre-sliced rye bread on your counter is not going to help you, Zemanta may not always give you all the links or images you want in every situation. Some have said that Zemanta is only for lazy bloggers, but I think that is completely unfair. Sure I am a lazy blogger, but just because I am lazy and Zemanta is convenient and efficient does not mean it is useless unless you are lazy. Although I do think people who used sliced bread from a store instead of baking their own are good for nothing lazy sobs.

Full Discolure: As I said I am fairly new to blogging so I can only attest to what I have experienced so far and from this limited experience I can tell you Zemanta has thus far been a delightful surprise and a welcome addition to my blogging toolbox. It is sort of similar to when you first begin subscribing to rss feeds and how it makes surfing for your favorite websites more efficient. You can still search for new sites, but you do not have to constantly search to see if your favorite site has updated their content it will instead come to you when it has been updated. Have used Zemanta or do you have any other tools or tips for making the blogging experience better for bloggers or their readers feel free to comment.

This entry was posted on Wednesday, January 28th, 2009 at 2:22 am and is filed under technology. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.

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