so what's a Gravatar all about?

...basically it's an avatar of your choosing that follows you around Gravatar supporting blogs, websites etc.. kinda cool really But in all honesty Gravatar sums it up best themselves...

"A gravatar, or globally recognized avatar, is quite simply an 80×80 pixel avatar image that follows you from weblog to weblog appearing beside your name when you comment on gravatar enabled sites. Avatars help identify your posts on web forums, so why not on weblogs?"

I'd seen quite a few Gravatar enabled blogs but I rarely posted to them...I'm quite behind the times when it comes to blogs and blogging... you see I've only just recently got around to registering so that I can comment on my friends blogger.com accounts... only to then be told that I could have been using my Google account all along all that aside, I had no need for a Gravatar really.. I figured, and had read, it was only for blogs... for sure I wanted one, but I wasn't convinced that I would ever get to use it a great deal.. and then I figured that by the time I did get to use it I would have forgotten which of my... numerous ...email accounts I would have associated it with so it all went by the by and got dumped in the "too much brain function required" basket... that is until I got JomComment (my article here) which is Gravatar friendly... and that is until I released it was for more than just blogs..... so off I trotted to grab an avatar.. well a Gravatar...

The signup process is incredibly simple register at http://www.gravatar.com/signup.php with the email address you wish to have your Gravatar associated with, e.g. if you don't generally comment on articles, blogs etc with say your ISP email then don't use that to login to Gravatar, use the email address that do use during your public travels around the internet, then select a password and you're in.

Within minutes you'll be sent an email... activate your account with the link provided... doing so will log you back into Gravatar and now you can upload the avatar of your choosing You can upload any JPG, GIF, or PNG image, the file size can't be any larger than 100kb and it will be resized if the dimensions are greater than 80 pixels x 80 pixels which is cool I guess.. but here's a tip for you....

make sure you play around with the avatar first, your best bet for a good result is to submit an image that is already 80x80 that way you know exactly what it will look like once it's been associated with your account and also make sure, prior to submitting, that it still looks aok at 40x40 as well as quite a few blogs have 40x40 as the default size that's displayed. JomComment, which we are now running all over the bee.geek.articles, had a default Gravatar size of 40x40, I've increased it to 60x60 for personal preference but I'm sure this will change over time to anything in between 40x40 and 80x80... and because I'm not that unique ...I'm sure other site admins will do the same so do ensure your avatar looks good to you and in a variety of dimensions.

Once you've uploaded your avatar now you just have to wait for it to be Rated and assessed by human eyeball generally this doesn't take too long, I've submitted 3 so far and the longest I had to wait was approx. 6 hours.. which is pretty dang great for a human contact service You'll be sent an email once your avatar has been screened and is all ready to go.. but you don't have to wait until then because it will catch up to any comments that you've made using the associated email address... so comment away on any Gravatar enabled blog or website you come across and if you're at a loss as to what and who actually supports them check out their Gravatar implementor's guide but don't take it as a be all and end all as there are other applications that also support it's use.. like JomComment and then there's a Thunderbird Extension also.. oh, and if you want to check out a place packed full of Gravatars when swing by http://www.technorati.com/blogs/gravatar

Now if your avatar goes belly up or you change your mind, don't panic because you can resubmit a new graphic, you just have to wait for it to be rated again, no big deal though as you're better to have one that you like rather than one that really yanks your chain. Do note though, you can only change your avatar not your email address, if you associate the wrong email then all you can do is remove your address.. then sign up with a different one and re-submit your avatar but if you run multiple email address and wish to have them all associated with the same Gravatar then there is an option for Multiple Email Adresses for US$5... apart from that... everthing else is free.

If you run into bigger problems then check out their Gravatar Forum and / or their FAQ section,

my Gravatars for when I use my email addresses...
@wackyb.co.nz	@wackyb.com	@bee.geek.nz