Publish and Share Your Documents Using Scribd
Posted on 10. Apr, 2009 by [modern media mom] in Applications/Software, Organization, Productivity
image common property
The Publishing world has changed immensely in the past five to 10 years. No longer must you submit a transcript to 30 different publishing houses, only to receive 30 rejection letters.
Perhaps you have something you’d like to share, not for money, but just because you realize that others might benefit from it: a pattern, a list of recipes, a tutorial.
If you are like me, you have a lot of ideas swirling around – maybe you’ve written some of them down or stored them on your computer. Or maybe, just maybe, you sense that others might enjoy reading your term paper from your junior year of college.
None of these items are items that a traditional publishing house would consider publishing. But that doesn’t mean that there isn’t an audience looking for just that topic. If you upload your documents to Scribd and categorize them, you can share them with other readers.
Not only is it a site that is beneficial to writers looking for an audience, but there are many helpful tutorials, how-tos, menus, patterns etc for readers to seek out.
Using the iPaper area of the site, you can convert just about any major document format, including Word docs, PowerPoint presentations, PDFs, OpenOffice documents, and PostScript files. Upload your documents and embed them on your blog/website. The embedding feature is really helpful and is a tidy and efficient way to place an entire document on your blog page or site. (see below for a sample of an embedded document)
Look into the Group area to find materials that are already sorted. Or use it to create your own mini-library. Create a group and choose whether it is private or open to anyone.
Consider using Scribd to free up space on your hard drive, or to finally be able to get rid of those boxes of old college term papers (scan them and upload them) There are many ways to use the site: learn something, share something, store something.
*One word of warning: there are no rating labels to show materials that may not be appropriate for children. I haven’t come across anything offensive, but, as with any other site, that doesn’t mean it isn’t on there.
(For more help or support visit the Support Desk.)
Sample Embedded Document:
Your turn: Would you be willing to post documents for free?
