Posting Realtime journals

[rhyolite]

I am interested in posting my journal and photos as I progress along the AT. I want to be able to share these posting with friends across the country who want to follow. What is the most popular site for doing this? Is it better to start your own blog site?
M

[bert304]

Use this web site: http://www.trailjournals.com/ Make sure your posts are a few days behind

[Stir Fry]

Why do you want then a few days behind

[Carbo]

It's a safety/privacy issue with some folks. Especially if going solo.

[JHG008]

I am planning on using trail journals too. Is it common for people to delay there post a few days?

[hikerbee]

I didn't think of doing it, but I think I would have if I traveled solo (I am female). I did know a handful of solo ladies that did this for safety reasons. Actually, there are a few people that follow their "favorite" hikers on trailjournals very closely and I saw people hiking out onto the AT to meet up with a hiker - sometimes without the hiker even knowing about it (to bring them gifts and say hi). It's very unlikely that anyone means any harm, but know that some people will "follow" you. And know where you are.

[hikerbee]

That being said, I hope to follow a few hikers this year on trailjournals (but I won't be meeting anyone on the trail - I'm on the other side of the country...) What's your trailjournals site, JHG008?? If it's good, I'll follow you all the way to Maine! (Or Georgia, whichever way you're going...)

[leaftye]

If you want real time, then Twitter with twitpic's might be the way to go.

[Karma13]

Some people use Trail Journals, some use a blog (Blogger or Wordpress). But like leaftye said, if you want real time, Twitter's what I'd use. The problem being that you might have tweets to post but no coverage, and the constant looking for a signal would drain battery. And Twitter's not at its best if you save up the tweets and post them in clumps.

[10-K]

I use postholer.com...

[Jefe]

Delaying your posts isn't a bad idea, but it really isn't hard to note where someone was on such-and-such date, estimate their normal pace and extrapolate from there for a likely position. A determined stalker will be quite successful. So will a likely trail angle. I have accidentally come across people I had read about in someone's journal. These people didn't even have their own journal. So, if you are paranoid, uh I mean cautious, be careful of others posting about you in their journal. The only hikers I tried to plan a meet-up with were last year's Warrior Hikers, but Trail Days changed their plans, so I couldn't personally shake their hands (or bump fists) and thank them for their service. As always HYOH.

[BrianLe]

Given that the title of the thread is "Posting Realtime Journals", I suggest postholer.com over trailjournals. For posting with any sort of mobile device, postholer is just better --- a mobile-friendly interface, the option to post journal entries via specifically formatted emails. I started out trying tj on my first thru-hike and switched to postholer for this reason. If you're not using a mobile device, then "never mind", but you're not going to be all that "realtime" either then.

In terms of delaying posts or posting incorrect time data --- my own experience on three such trips has been that I posted exact data in about as realtime as anyone I'm aware of and never had any negative issues as a result. I have had a couple of positive ones. That said, I'm not a young single female, but a grey-bearded bald married guy. So of course YMMV.

[mother goose]

If you use Postholer you can get an APP for the phone called PCTHYOH that makes posting EASY ? You only have to enter the numbers one time and the APP puts them in after that.

[leaftye]

Unless Postholer changed, the problem with it is that updates for a particular day will overwrite instead of append.

[Slo-go'en]

I was at Kinora hostel once when half a dozen pizzas got delivered at no charge to anyone there. Turns out a woman had just posted on trailjournals she had arrived and one of her internet stakers had the pizzas delivered. Kinda creepy, but we ate the pizzas anyway.

[10-K]

I was at Kinora hostel once when half a dozen pizzas got delivered at no charge to anyone there. Turns out a woman had just posted on trailjournals she had arrived and one of her internet stakers had the pizzas delivered. Kinda creepy, but we ate the pizzas anyway.

Dang.... I bet they were cold.

[leaftye]

I was at Kinora hostel once when half a dozen pizzas got delivered at no charge to anyone there. Turns out a woman had just posted on trailjournals she had arrived and one of her internet stakers had the pizzas delivered. Kinda creepy, but we ate the pizzas anyway.

Is it creepy when Taylor Swift announces a concert and thousands of people show up to watch her sing?

If you don't want the public to read and react to your journal, don't have a public journal.

[Malto]

Is it creepy when Taylor Swift announces a concert and thousands of people show up to watch her sing?

If you don't want the public to read and react to your journal, don't have a public journal.

Have to agree with the above. Also, delaying posting is not really that effective. You can quickly get the feel of the cadence of a hiker and pretty much predict where they will be days in advance. Case in point... I delivered ice cream to two hikers with nothing more than position three days back. I pulled into the trailhead as they were leaving. While this was a positive event, it illustrates how easy it is. In order to make this impossible, you would almost have to keep a fictious journal. If that's the case then I would ask if there is really a point to keep a public journal.

[BrianLe]

"Unless Postholer changed, the problem with it is that updates for a particular day will overwrite instead of append. "

I'm guessing that you're talking about the email post option. I rarely used that, and never had issues with what I did, which was to just copy/paste text into the mobile-friendly interface. For the email interface, someone with experience at that might have some feedback on how to avoid such an issue. I wouldn't think it would be common to want to later append text for a particular days entry anyway? At least it wouldn't be with the process that made sense for me.

I doubt that you can do whatever it is that the append issue represents using trailjournals anyway btw??

[leaftye]

I'm guessing that you're talking about the email post option. I rarely used that, and never had issues with what I did, which was to just copy/paste text into the mobile-friendly interface. For the email interface, someone with experience at that might have some feedback on how to avoid such an issue. I wouldn't think it would be common to want to later append text for a particular days entry anyway? At least it wouldn't be with the process that made sense for me.

I doubt that you can do whatever it is that the append issue represents using trailjournals anyway btw??

Yes, email. Most people would probably rather do a single daily posting, but for real time posting, having it append postings would be ideal, otherwise the entire entry must be uploaded each time.

Appending was something I really wanted to do. On my Peek I had a Postholer template email. It would have been nice if I could type up a quick update and send it, and have it either start a new entry or append to an existing entry. I used it less when I found that it'd overwrite the existing daily entry.

The app screenshot indicates that it sends Postholer an email, so the overwrite is still an issue unless the app accounts for it, or unless Postholer has allowed appending.

If I try another thru hike, I'll look for an app that gets around the limitation Postholer has. If I make my own, it'll probably work with Wordpress. Every post would be its own, and any day could have any number of posts. This is probably the way I'll go so I could geotag posts and include pictures with less hassle.