Know-How Exchange : E-Marketing

I don't know if understood you well, but one possibility is to create a Blog that permits visitors to post audio messages through an upload of a MP3 file. This file can be generated by any simple recorder directly in the PC or recorded in a cheap cassete recorder and transposed to the PC through the audio input. GCanto.

Gncanto’s got the right idea. The technology is not complex, but it’s not very accessible to a generalist user and it is not interactive as it involves a visitor pushing a file to your website – the file will contain their message. This can be done manually using one of the many free recording software packages around but the mechanics are complex – they need to record a message (simple these days in .WAV or MP3 format) and then FTP it to your site (Not so simple – loads of security considerations and you need to understand FTP protocols).

Using a blog site where it is easier to upload files is a good idea, but any third party site with the ability to accept a sound file without the visitor having to understand the principals of FTP transport will do. A few lines of code will put a button on a website which will enable a file you have created to be uploaded to your site – in the same way that you can upload a picture to an educational site or a chat site.

A few more lines of code and another button or actually, just the hyperlink will activate the file and download it for playing. That is tiresome, so by using Macromedia Flash Player 7 as your replay medium on the page, you will get a very high quality replay of whatever was recorded and left almost instantly.

I would have thought though that you would need to moderate or restrict access to such a site if you want to keep your reputation intact. Some wazzock leaving behind a few incendiary racial or religious comments could end up with some nasty consequences for you.

AudioGenerator (https://audiogenerator.com/default2.asp) will achieve the basic record and playback for you, but I think that the interface and cost is prohibitive for allowing site visitors to record their magnum opus. It does however provide a decent level of security, allows telephone access (Perhaps not what you want) and has a decent demo of instant sound replay enabled by a bit of code and the Flash Player.

Get a technical web site designer to write the bits of code and the associated routines for your particular website – It’ll be less expensive than paying $30/month for a third party service which only does 60% of what you appear to want.

Steve Alker
Unimax Solutions