Most blogging platforms advertise themselves as easy to use, and most are. But recently I discovered one that truly delivers in the "Really-Easy-to-Use-and-Still-Has-Some-Cool-Features" department. If you are not familiar with Posterous, I strongly encourage you to give it a look (you're actually reading a Posterous blog right now). If you're wanting to publish a blog or you need a place to host your podcasts, it may be just what you're looking for.

Here are five reasons why I recommend Posterous:

1.  It's free. Enough said.

2.  It's free. Free is good, so it's worth saying twice.

3.  It's easy to use. REALLY easy. In fact, if you can send an email, you're ready to start blogging with Posterous. Yes, you can write and edit posts on the Web, but one of the great features of Posterous is that a post can also be uploaded by sending a simple email. The title of your email message becomes the title of your blog post, and the body of the email becomes the content of the post. That's it. Want to include media in your post? Simply attach it to the email and Posterous automatically converts and embeds it into your blog post. Attach an audio file and Posterous embeds a media player into your post so visitors can listen right in their browsers (see below).

sample_recording.m4a

(download)

Click here to download:

sample_recording.m4a (76 KB)

Attach photos and Posterous creates an image gallery, right in the post. Here's a sample gallery containing some of my students' recent artwork.

(download)

Click here to download:

cool-tool-posterous-CImdvFjctdyCbGxDBmeg.zip (612 KB)

4.  It's perfect for hosting podcasts. Posterous provides users with 1GB of total storage, giving podcasters plenty of room to store their broadcasts. Plus, Posterous automatically creates an iTunes-ready RSS feed, making your podcast subscribable. Oh, and did I mention it's free?

5.  You can post from your smartphone. Since posts can be published via email, you can use your iPhone, Droid, Blackberry, or other email-enabled phone to post when you're away from your computer. Want to publish a podcast episode while on the go? Use your phone's voice recorder to make a recording, and then email it to Posterous. Bam! Instant podcast.

Give it a look. I think you'll be happy with what you see.

OK, so I'm a little slow. I've had my 5th grade students blogging for a couple of years, and I'm just now joining the party. Better late than never, right?  

Starting my own blog is something I've thought about doing for a while, but I never did due to that little voice in the back of my head that kept saying, "What do you have to say that other people would want to read?" Well, I've listened to that voice long enough. Am I going to change the world with this blog? Probably not. Do I have all the answers to questions about teaching and educational technology? Absolutely not. But I'd like to think that after 15 years in the classroom, I've learned a few things that are worth sharing. 

So join me on my blogging journey and hopefully I’ll make it worth your while. Oh, and that little voice? Well, I’ll tell it the same thing I tell teachers during my professional development workshops. I understand that not every one of my students will take advantage of my classroom website, tutorial videos, or iPod flash cards. That’s okay. But if even one student benefits from one of these tools, the time and effort spent creating them was well worth it. In the same way, if one teacher gets something out of this blog, it will have been worth my time.

- Brent