Free Google Cards – Got mine!

Google is giving away, with the help of iPrint.com, sets of 25 profile business cards (pictured left) to the first 10,000 Google profile users who complete the process.

The point is to refer people to Google to search for your name. If your Google profile is set up correctly, it should appear in the search results. Within that profile you can configure all your contact information. Sure, these won’t be taken seriously in a business context, but they’re free, and might be fun.

100s of Free Worship Backgrounds & Graphics [Church Media]

I was recently hired by a church in my area to maintain their computers, networks, information services, and web site.  Being a poor college student, and previously, a jobless high school student, I’ve gained an appreciation for frugality. That, combined with witnessing disproportionate amounts of cash misdirected in other area ministries, I am determined to support the ministries at this church by positively affecting the most people and supporting the ministry staff while operating under one of the smallest budgets.

One of the responsibilities I took over was the creation of the Sunday morning visual presentation (lyrics, sermon notes, announcements, etc). Previously, someone purchased stock photos from iStockphoto to use as backgrounds for lyrics. Unfortunately, it seemed that this person (long gone before I arrived) had very little money with which to work. There were only a handful of images which were only in small to medium-sized web quality; certainly not something that would look any good when blown up on a large projection screen.

So, off I went on a hunt to find web sites and Flickr users that would allow me to use their photos freely. Sure, there’s plenty of sites out there that offer spectacular photos made specifically for the purpose, but it all comes at a price. After some time, I’ve discovered a few good sites, and one really good Flickr group who freely share their works with the church community. Even if you don’t need backgrounds, or any of the images found on these sites, they’re a great place to get ideas for your own graphic projects.

Free worship and church backgrounds, graphics, and media:

• Shared Worship Background Graphics (a Flickr group pool)
• CreativeMYK Gallery (community dedicated to sharing resources)
  
• Background 4 Christian
• Church Worship Graphics (Flickr set by dtchristner)
• Christian Wallpaper (Flickr set by David Gunter)
• E-Water (offers simple, yet inspiring videos available in flash, PPT, or avi format) (Added 7/19/09)
• kineticFaith (focuses on providing a full suite of images and videos for central themes) (Added 8/20/09)
• VintageChurch.cc (web site dedicated to connecting churches with substantial resources to those with less) (Added 1/24/11)
• Free Presentation and Worship Backgrounds
  

Also, if you’re looking for videos or motion backgrounds, here’s a web site that gives them away for simply registering. They’re the real deal, and they’re doing a wonderful thing. Consider sharing your media with them if you have any to share:

• Muddy River Media

This web site provides a small selection of free video backgrounds in return for registering:

• Videos2Worship – Motion Background Loops (Added 11/30/10)

AVG Needs a Better Marketing Dept [A NEW! BETTER! FASTER! One]

AVG inserted this little advertisement into my copy of AVG Free 7 alerting me to all the GREAT things available to me if I were to upgrade to AVG 8.0.

New? Check. Better? Check. Faster? Oh, you betcha.

Free Podcast Music [No, Seriously!]

PodSafe Audio – Podsafe Music under the Creative Commons license for Podcasting

Perks that AT&T Yahoo! DSL Don’t Tell You About! [WHY NOT!?]

If you have AT&T Yahoo! DSL (or AT&T DSL) you have some perks you might not know about. I found out about one a few years back by chance and I just discovered another one a moment ago! They don’t advertise this stuff! You’d think they would! Maybe I missed something obvious, but I didn’t find any of this stuff when ordering or in the fine print afterward and I’ve ordered the service twice myself, and set it up a dozen times for other people.

Perk #1: Free Yahoo LaunchCast Plus. LaunchCast is a large array of online radio stations provided by Yahoo. The basic account is free and allow access to roughly half of their stations. A free LaunchCast Plus account is yours with your DSL service which allows you access to all stations, all commercial free, in “premium” quality, and an unlimited number of skips per hour (basic limits you to 3).

Perk #2: Free Flickr Pro. Flickr is a online community-driven social networking photo sharing web site (is that enough buzz for ya?). A Pro account allows all your uploaded photos to be available (basic limits to the last 200 uploaded) as well as ad-free browsing, stats, and unlimited sets/collections for organizing your photos (basic limits to 3).

You get these FREE as long as you keep your DSL service. Are there any others I don’t know about!?

UPDATE 12/4/2008: Well, it seems the free ride for Flickr Pro will be coming to an end. As of January 31st, 2009, Flickr Pro will no longer be provided by AT&T and Verizon DSL.

“AT&T and Verizon Internet Services have reworked their broadband packages and will no longer be offering Flickr pro to subscribers after January 31, 2009.” – Flickr Help Page

Sounds Effects on the Cheap [Free]

What blew me away is that I hadn’t come across this web site before! I’ve done a few sound projects before and I always had to deal with what I could find, what I was given, or have to make the sound effects myself.

Usually the web sites that offer sound effects offer low quality stuff, or preview only. Other professional sites will offer a small free collection and keep the good stuff under lock and key. Still other sound effect sites look like a high school project hastily thrown togther with excessive animated GIFs and too many text colors.

Well, I was delightfully surprised to find Soundsnap. Soundsnap is a community web site where users upload, share, and download sound effects and music loops. Best of all, it’s all free and most of the stuff I previewed where of good or high quality. This isn’t a small collection either, there’s something like 80,000 different sounds. Though, 50,000 clips are music loops, but I suppose if that’s what you’re looking for, you’re in luck!

Here are some samples of stuff I was looking for:

127 BPM Monkey (I wasn’t really looking for this, but came across it, thought it sounded neat…)

Monkey

Powerful Thunder and Rain

Also, according to the FAQ and the Terms of Service, everything is offered at no cost and users are free to use for any purpose, commercial or not.