How to Create Flash MP3 Player of WinAmp Skin

In spite of emerging lots of mp3 players software, Winamp still remains the classic of media players. Thousands of skins add to its brilliant features ability to change player's appearance to anyone's liking. It's great to have such options for web audio players too. And we've got the possibility to do it with neat FlashWAmp tool.

FlashWAmp is so easy to use - all you need is Winamp skin you like and mp3 tracks you want to embed to the web page. Or you can even use URLs of mp3 files to stream them directly from the web.

Options to customize player in FlashWAmp are rather numerous:

• Player view - normal or small with or without playlist
• Sound options (autoplay, repeat sound)
• Playlist options (playlist height, option to change visible playlist).

Settings can be saved to cookies for further use.



The tool has lots of advantages and the main is that it really allows to make flash audio player of WinAmp skin in minutes. Then the player is saved as SWF file and can be easily published to the Web. But it's necessary to mention its disadvantages as well:

• audio can't be embedded into the player, it is external only. That is not very good for bloggers who can't create folders on the hosts to store player file, mp3 files and playlist file in one folder
• the program is compatible with Winamp 2.x skins only. Still, these skins are easy to find - for example, here.

Summary:
I think that the idea to make flash audio players of Winamp skins is brilliant. Not only because there are thousands of skins of any kind, but also because Winamp is familiar to everyone. Sometimes I see mp3 web players of so weird design, that I don't even know where to click to make this futuristic device play. Moreover, I can understand that this is a web music player only when I see playlist. I never want to make my website visitors guess whether this stuff play music, or open game, or what on the earth it can do. I want them just see the player and enjoy the music. Familiar Winamp interface will simplify listening to the music from your web page, even for dummies. That's why I like FlashWAmp.

So, try and create your own Web Winamp FlashWAmp player :)

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Top 3 ways to SEO Flash

In spite of the fact that Flash websites is less SEO and browser friendly than usual HTML sites, more and more people want to use Flash elements for their websites. Why? The main reason is that flash animation, menus and buttons are visually appealing and help to attract visitors' attention. Your visitors and customers want not only good content, they also want it to be in a nice "wrapper". And flash is exactly this wrapper. Developers like Flash because it allows to place more content in a less space without spoiling page structure, it's perfect for presenting multimedia content and can be easily combined with such technologies as MySQL, XML, PHP, etc. Besides, flash is not so unSEOable as it's often believed to be. Here are the top 3 ways to make flash content seo-friendly.

1. Using CSS element DIV with the content which can be accessed and indexed by search engines along with using JavaScript SWFObject to detect user's (or browser's) ability to handle Flash. It allows both search engine bots and users without Flash plug-in to view non-flash content, while users with Flash player installed will see enhanced Flash content. This method let you kill two birds with one stone. You'll have no problem both with search engines, and with users who can't (or just don't want to) see flash content – they'll still get full accessibility and functionality. Non-flash content within DIV can contain everything you're able to add to usual HTML page, including links, text, images, etc.
   
2. Creating an alternative HTML version of the pure Flash sites. Maybe, this'll add you work, but this also will give you better rankings and visibility. As well as with DIV element, creating an alternative HTML content will ensure that your site will be indexed by search engine spiders and viewed even by people without Flash player plug-in, while other visitors will see its Flash version. The best way is still to create each page as HTML with installed Flash movie, even though this won't have a smoothness of all-Flash sites.
   
3. Using SWFAddress for deep linking. This smart developer tool creates virtual URLs for Flash websites that enables visitors to bookmark certain pages, send links via e-mail or IM, use browser history and back/forward/reload buttons. Also, this helps you with search engines as they can find specific content on a website. To learn details, read SWFAddress blog.
   

Also, don't forget basic SEO techniques like META tags and title tag, building inbound links, etc. and I hope your rankings will as high as you dream :)

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