Zemanta | Quantum Xen

Image by ecstaticist via Flickr; included as a search result for 'Quantum Xen' by Zemanta

Been stuck without a topic for a post today, so I’m trying an experiment with Zemanta.

What is Zemanta?

If you are not a blogger or maybe haven’t quite learned of all the available tools a blogger can use, you may not have heard of Zemanta. A quick click on the link for it will educate you on what Zemanta thinks Zemanta is, but it would not tell you what it is to me.

It’s a blog saver.

I basically missed the boat when Zemanta launched and went months, maybe YEARS before learning about it and how it helps my blog.

So the short description is that Zemanta can add relevance to your content by scanning for semantic matches to your blog as your write it. Then, using a sidebar utility, Zemanta gives you access to additional content which can enhance your blog.

You know all these nifty images and links that have been appearing in my blog? THAT’S Zemanta!

The Setup

So, as I stated, I could not think of anything to blog about. As a matter of fact, I was just playing around in the edit field of my WordPress. Earlier in the day, I had emptied my copy/paste into the field and walked away. Those words were “Quantum Xen”. Then, later on I had actually closed the browser without thinking about it and went off to take care of mundane issues.

When I came back to my blog, I opened up the “untitled draft” in my Posts queue to find the words still there thanks to WordPress’ reliable autosave. However, Zemanta also kicked in automatically and started serving up content it thought was relevant to those two simple words.

The Experiment

I’m going to continue my regular blog posts, but occasionally I am just going to post a random image brought to me via Zemanta. No other text. No links. Just the chosen Image and the word(s) that inspires it.

The Results

This is where you come in. I’ll need feedback to know how the experiment is going. If you’ve read this far you probably have some interest as well. I’ll report back once a week to let you know how things go. Maybe I’ll stick a Poll in there occasionally. You can follow this experiment by searching the tag “Zemanta” in my blog.

Of course, this wouldn’t be my kind of blog post ending without a question for you? So, here it is.

Do you think using blog tools like Zemanta is a benefit or a crutch?

Leave a comment! I look forward to reading it!

UPDATE: I should add that what started as two discarded words became and entire blog post. Pretty sweet!