Windows Live Writer is pretty cool!

So I know I don't update this thing enough, and have been looking for ways to more easily and simply (and QUICKLY) post blog entries. A bunch of my more technically savvy (READ: geeky) friends like to "bang the metal" and dig down into code, but I simply do not have the time nor knowledge to do so. Well, you've seen my attempts at mobile blogging, and now comes Windows Live Writer. I ran across this on the Windows Live Ideas page (http://ideas.live.com/), thinking at first it was the live MS Word type thingy I had heard about. but no, it is a blogging tool for easily putting together blog posts and posting them to your blog (whether it be Blogger, MSN Spaces, whatever). The nice thing is that it has a plug in architecture that gives you new functionality. Though only a few plugins are out at this point, here are some examples of stuff that I really like and have downloaded for it:

I can insert pictures from my hard drive....

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

...or directly from Flickr...

If I want to quickly show you a map of wear I work, hey, I can do that too:

 

How about a notification for an upcoming event?

Headgamer kicking butt in XBLF in Vegas, baby! Tuesday, November 21, 2006 1:00 PM

I can enter a table really quickly with stuff like results and things (though I probably will never use it, it is neat).

Gamertag	Kills	Deaths
Headgamer	8	0
zer0	0	1
Davidson	0	1
Team_Binky	0	1
Ram2600	0	1
Lulu	0	1
Lilbones	0	1
Keg O War	0	1
Asphyxiate	0	1

(a guy can dream, can't he?)

And I always am a sucker for those Quote of the Day kind of things:

Quote of the Day:
Reason often makes mistakes, but conscience never does.
--Josh Billings

And finally, I can show off my measly gamercard...

 

So, these are just a few things you can do quickly with Live Writer and some plugins. Now it is still in beta and seems rough in beta. I have had lots of errors and crashes, both with Writer itself and some of the third party plugins. Hopefully this stuff will eventually get ironed out though.