Posterous, which launched in June, is one of those sites that I tested and it stuck – I continue to post pictures to it regularly.
What I like about it – you don’t have to create an account to use it. Just start emailing text and files (images, video, whatever) to post@posterous.com and you’ve got a site where it all goes. And they’ve steadily added features. You can, for example, repost all the stuff you email in to Twitter, Facebook, Flickr, Tumblr or wherever.
Today the company is announcing a new product, group blogs. You can add your friends or family’s email addresses to any Posterous site you control, and they can then email stuff in too. It’s useful for families, sports teams, etc. to share photos and video. Once you’ve added those emails, all they have to do to post is send whatever they want to publish to post@sitename.posterous.com. No registration required. An example is here, and see the image below.
Posterous is a Y Combinator startup. They also just raised a second angel round of financing – $725,000 from XG Ventures and a whole bevy of high profile individuals.
they need the funding mainly to keep guy kawasaki’s online diary alive.
How long before Guy rips it off and copies it?
I bet you now, it’ll come with a funky name like allposts or postmors and a story how he built it under $5.
I have already built this software. It was so unpopular that I killed it. If you want a free copy email techscreamer@gmail.com
It’s not packaged for redistribution, but I can release it under the GPL license.
It would take me about 2-3 days to repackage this for others to install. I also made a multi-user twitter client in response to a techcrunch post. That took me about 6 hours. I think I will put these up as GPL on my new blog techscreamer after work today.
It requires PHP with IMAP compiled and a dedicated pop email address with which the PHP can go and fetch the mail then parse the MIME attachments and dump them into the blog db.
That’s about all the requirements.
Toodles, I gotta go to my job, ie, not at a startup.
Actually, I think the best would be to release this as a word press plugin. I will do that. I have some free time after I get home this week. Then everybody with word press can have posterous like behavior. Hooray.
Ah, but you can use Posterous with WordPress already, without installing any software. We autopost to WordPress using open API’s (Metaweblog API)
Does it create new users automatically when somebody emails X address?
Not the same thing. To really get that functionality in WordPress you need the plug in to either parse the mail out of /var/mail or you need to have it grab X many emails at a set interval out of imap.
Parse the attachments with the PHP imap functions, then have it save them to files, map the mp3s to a free flex mp3 player, map the pictures to a litebox viewer, and finally create new user rows in Word press.
I did most of the work already except I made email signups with mp3 postings and picture postings for social networking, not word press. It’s php though and pretty easy to adapt. I think I may need a week to get it ready.
XG Venture investing in Posterous? These guys are hilarious. And they wanted to invest in adsense-independent business ideas!!
Posterous is a pretty awesome product. So simple, and yet it is immediately and obviously useful. I’ve always found that the process of converting a post in my favourite editor into a post on my blog is the killer problem of blogging (it’s certainly a problem for many non-techies). Posterous largely solves that problem. I’m already using it on two smaller blogs and, when I launch my next blog, I plan to use Posterous as the posting method (though it may be hosted on WordPress or some such more customisable system).
I’m also very impressed with the general turnaround of features on Posterous. Garry Tan (twitter @garrytan), their technology lead, is clearly on the ball (witness this feature request on YCNews and the quick turnaround: http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=366718 ).
All in all, an Awesome Start-up. One to use, and watch.
I would agree. If they now add a bookmarklet a la Tumblr for quick grab/post of quotes and content from other places on the Web, they’ll have overtaken Tumblr by far.
Now if they add many more ways to tie in streams from elsewhere a al FriendFeed, they may create competition for them as well. Sort of like the inbound/outbound switchboard of Web 2.0 properties.
Kawasaki or no, if they deliver what works for me, I hope they can stay in the game.
I can confirm great bookmarklet/reposting is coming in the near future. Thanks for your support!
I will try this out. Not sure I understand exactly how it works, but I’ll give it a shot.
I have to agree Posterous is one of those sites that comes along (like Twitter) with a novel idea that I believe will make them very successful.
cool stuff, i’m deff gonna give it a try.
I use posterous for my personal blog and it’s absolutely the easiest blogging platform to use on the web hands down, which is likely why I tend to post on it more than I would other products. The design is clean and I like the facebook integration stuff.
They have a large advantage with not having to sign up but some people enjoy signing up and customizing for branding purposes.
That’s my worry, how do you keep your brand on the posts here?
If all you do is post images, why not use Twitpic
Twitpic is only useful for one photo. If you email us, you get an automatic image gallery with multiple photos attached.
Or, try attaching a video file straight from your camera, and we transcode, host and show a flash player automatically.
Or try documents. Or music. Attach anything and we support it.
Twitpic can’t post to Facebook either.
email becomes your auto pilot ultimate open id.
signals the end of sign ups as we knew them.
worlds greatest killer app wins again.
BlogService.com – dont be preposterous
I made software that does exactly what posterous does in about 1 hour.
Obviously these ideas have made you enough money to sit around and post to TC all morning. Congratulations!
Give us a try and you’ll change your mind.
I really like the simplicity behind the idea, especially for personal blogging.
But I wonder if social networks could do the same thing (using email) for posting images and text to a person’s group? They already have the user base.
Why do websites that have no revenue model continue to pull in funding? Who are these idiot investors and where can i meet them?
How about chilling out on the anonymous trolling on tech blogs, and spending that time working on a startup of your own?
Garry such remarks reflect poorly on your company. Let it go.
It’s easy to say things on the Internet anonymously and shoot your mouth off. I stand by my comment because if you have something to say, you should be proud to have your real name attached to it.
Anonymous or not, you are avoiding the question. You provide a free service with no visible revenue stream. Technically, your “business” is worth less than zero. Unless of course, you are running a charity.
In addition, I spend all of my time working on my business and actually making money. You know, the tangible kind.
I am truly amazed that there are still investors who buy into the “build a user base now, monetize later” model. It is fundamentally flawed. Not only does it expose problems in the underlying service, but once you create a culture of free, you are locked in. The best you will do is with banner ads and overpriced up-sells on storage. Then it’s a straight shot to the deadpool. Have fun with that. I’m not hating, I’m just being realistic.
Again, good for you. Milk em’ while you can.
“Technically, your “business” is worth less than zero. Unless of course, you are running a charity.”
That statement could not be more wrong. You’re valuation approach only takes in to account current DCF and ignores users, traffic & comparable transactions. If posterous started charging $5 per month – I’d pay it and so would many others.
Just because they haven’t monetized yet, doesn’t mean they’ll never monetize in the future. They’ve been around less than a year. Relax.
And if they started charging $5000 per month they would make even more, right?
Saying you will pay isn’t the same as paying, and speaking for others is just ridiculous. Show me a successful site that has moved from free to subscription and we can begin to talk.
What about google? Google did not have any business at first but later they came out with a terrific idea. The same with twitter and I believe posterous can do it too.
Are you really going to compare Posterous and Twitter to Google? I’m not even going to waste my time listing the differences, but they are numerous. In any case, I hate to break the bad news, but Twitter is currently hemorrhaging tons of money with no legitimate revenue stream in sight.
My initial point was that the business model being applied to sites like Twitter and Posterous is flawed. These services are not legitimate commodities and will only ever exist as free because moving from free to subscription simply does not work. The only way to generate revenue will be through ineffective banner ads and non-essential up-sells. Both will fail long term and these companies will go under, having lost millions of dollars. There are plenty of other examples like this in the current bubble.
Good investors diversify, knowing they will take losses in certain areas. “Businesses” like Twitter and Posterous will go down as losers.
It sounds like the YouTube business model and it’s great if you can make it work: build a huge user base and lots of buzz – even if you don’t have any revenue – and then sell to Google/Yahoo/Apple or whatever. Is YouTube a loser? It arguably is for Google (losing $500M/year by some estimates), but not for the YouTube founders, who already cashed out.
I think it’s a little crazy that this is a valid business model, but you can only blame the Googles of the world that continue to buy these companies.
As for Posterous, it looks like they’re providing a great free service (much like YouTube and Twitter). I like using these sites for free, so it’s a win for the consumer if they are able to continue to get investors and/or get bought, even if they don’t make any money for their buyers.
Thanks for the tip, Mike.
I’ve had a neat concept for a blog on my to-do list for about six months, but haven’t had the chance to build it yet. (Oddly, it was one of my winter break plans). It was essentially the same concept as Posterous, but for just me (and some friends), and built on App Engine.
You’ve saved me the trouble. Now I can finally start Entresting!
Tumblr gives you an email address you can post to as well, and is a much better service overall.
I don’t get what makes posterous so much better?
See Jason’s post below.
Tumblr is missing the outbound reblog to other services piece. Mostly love them as well though… if you understand the SEO implications of these, then you know that the more services the merrier.
For all I care, they could both keep copying and outinnovating ech other forever, better for the users.
BTW, the Posterous-To-Flickr autoposting is very useful, because I just grab batches of screen-caps images in an email, and it all gets copied to Flickr where it is presumably hosted forever, and lets me mouse copy/paste those images directly to my WordPress blog post editor.
Saves a ton of work with media libraries in WordPress.
i was also an early user of tumblr and fundamentally believe they are trying to address 2 different user bases and use cases. my mom would never use tumblr but she would use posterous. i highly highly recommend that anyone who wants a simple way to publish content online try out posterous. it is a wonderfully designed product with a great founding team. quickest feature turnarounds EVER. and so simple to use. congrats and great job buys.
I love Posterous! Posterous is positioned perfectly between Twitter’s micro blogging and my penchant for macro blogging on Ugotrade.
I’ve been using posterous for months. Full-featured simplicity is bliss, and a tremendous UI/UX doesn’t hurt at all, either.
I have used posterous for 2 months and love it. Would really like to have a private blog so I could use it exclusively for our team, though.
Great work guys!!!
Hi Taylor. We’re working on private sites now. Should be out soon. Thanks!
While Posterous does seem very slick – I wish they had more customizable themes. That’s my fave thing about Tumblr is the theme customization so that I can put just about anything I want in my post. Granted, I haven’t played around with Posterous much, but I already have a WordPress blog for my long diatribes about gaming, and a Tumblr blog for personal and random posts. I’m just not sure what the incentive is for me to start yet another blog, even if it’s on a pretty neat platform.
Private sites though, that will be great – I look forward to having a private blog for our company and being able to just email in images and content for it. Especially if it’s a private group blog that all 25 of us can contribute to.
Next time I feel like having yet another blog, I’ll start it on Posterous. I’m not too vested in Tumblr, as I’ve only been with them for 1 month – but I like the customization, the dashboard, and the large community.
Seriously, every time I see “dead simple” at TechCrunch I throw up a little in my mouth.
HI Tami. We’ll be adding themes and customization in the future.
The reason why we think we’re “dead simple” is that we create all our services to work well with email. This means:
1. No account needed. We know who you are. And you can add contributors to a site by adding their emails, they don’t need to create accounts
2. You have email everywhere. Mobile, etc
3. Email handles media attachments well. You can attach 50 photos in 2 seconds to an email. We’ll do all the scaling and hosting. And we’ll even post those photos on flickr and facebook for you
For rich media, we think we’re the easiest way to get stuff online
congrats Garry & Sachin… best of luck with Posterous & hope you guys have a great 2009
I love this service.
what’s the best combo of sharing pictures on facebook – simply using facebook mobile uploads, twitpic, flickr, or now posterous?
I can’t seem to find a winner here.
Scott: We offer a really compelling photo sharing workflow:
1. Simply attach as many images as you want to a single email. if you are using a program like iPhoto, Picasa, or Lightroom, email is built in. Just select a bunch of photos and click “email”
2. Send the email to post@posterous.com
3. We’ll receive the email, scale and process all the images, and post them on your posterous
4. We’ll also create a new album in your facebook account and post the photos there so they can be tagged, etc, within facebook
5. We’ll also add the photos to your flickr
6. And we’ll update your twitter with a link to the new post
So… email once, update everywhere. It’s really awesome. Set it up and try it out. If you have any problems or questions, just email us!
Sachin:
Looks like a nice site.
How do you handle e-mail spoofing though?
Since your e-mail submission process doesn’t require an authentication key, what’s stopping someone who knows my e-mail address (and has some technical skills) from posting unauthorized photos to my Posterous account?
Thanks.
We definitely have a security layer in place that looks at various aspects of the emails we get to make sure they are legit.
When we launched back in June, Arrington posted a challenge for people to spoof his site. We fared quite well and it hasn’t been a problem.
Good to know Sachin. Thanks again and best of luck.
If i recalled correctly, I believe MA’s account got “hacked” or “spoofed” in a matter of minutes.
Jordan, minutes is a misrepresentation. On the day of our public launch on TechCrunch, we had one small bug that was fixed immediately.
It took thousands of emails and several hours of pounding by various people for one small flaw to be exposed. This flaw was fixed and has not been a problem at all since.
If you don’t believe me, try posting as Michael or myself now.
The point of Posterous which some commenters seem to miss is that the packing is so slick. I just tried it and within ten minutes, most of I spent thinking of what pictures to upload, I had a blog and my first post.
I will start using Posterous for my photos and have them pass thru to Flickr.
This can be in a number of really neat new ways.