Gmail Adds mp3 Playing Capabilities

August 22, 2006 · 13 comments

It seems like I’m announcing some new Gmail feature every month, but they are definitely welcomed features. This month Google adds the ability to play mp3 audio files attached in emails. This feature adds-on to the recent news of the updated version of Google Talk which allows for voicemail messages; now gTalk users can listen to their voicemail messages within Gmail.

Similar to how you can view the original size of an attached image or simply download it, Gmail gives you the option of playing or downloading attached mp3 files. Playing an mp3 file pops up a window with a basic audio player with a GUI similar to that of the Google Video player.

Gmail Adds mp3 player

Update: You can also embed the audio player by calling something like the following (as mentioned on Uneasy Silence):
[code lang="HTML"][/code] where MP3_URL is the location of the mp3 file on your server to play. From what I’ve seen messing with the CSS, you can make the iframe as wide as you want and the Google player fluidly expands nicely.


The song was something I made for a Garageband project for a Computational Media class.

PaulStamatiou.com runs on the Thesis Theme for WordPress

How smart is your Theme?  How good is your support? Check out ThesisTheme for WordPress.

Thesis is the search engine optimized WordPress theme of choice for serious online publishers. If you’re a blogger who doesn’t understand a lot of PHP, Thesis will give a ton of functionality without having to alter any code. For the advanced, Thesis has incredible customization possibilities via Thesis hooks.

With so many design options, you can use the template over and over and never have it look like the same site. The theme is robust and flexible enough not only to accommodate a site like PaulStamatiou.com, but also to enable the site to run far more efficiently than it ever has before.

{ 6 trackbacks }

Gmail Adds MP3 Player at T. Longren
August 22, 2006 at 2:48 pm
doispontocinco
August 22, 2006 at 3:36 pm
Digital Drops
August 23, 2006 at 8:54 am
Bitperbit » Cómo escuchar MP3 desde GMail
August 23, 2006 at 3:23 pm
Gmail adds Embedded Mp3 Player
August 23, 2006 at 7:37 pm
Gmail.pro, News, Tools, Gmail Hacks and more for Gmail Junkies or Gmail Professional types » Blog Archive » Gmail MP3 Player promoting Piracy? Easy to embed player in your own site?
August 24, 2006 at 8:21 am

{ 7 comments… read them below or add one }

1 Dr J August 22, 2006 at 1:14 pm

Now it would be nice if they would only allow us to import VCard contacts into the contact list instead of only allowing CSV files. Pretty much every contact/email program uses VCard, but not GMail.

Reply

2 Cory August 22, 2006 at 1:18 pm

ewww, Panic at the Disco…. horrible band…

as for gmail, sadly i wont use the feature cause i download all my mail to thunderbird.

Reply

3 Zach Wilt August 22, 2006 at 1:26 pm

haha. I’m not a big fan of Panic at the Disco either. GMail is always adding new features and I think this is pretty cool…though I never would have noticed it myself.

Reply

4 josue salazar August 22, 2006 at 4:11 pm

Dude I moved to Mail.app yesterday just because. Today I’m going back to web based gmail. Playing MP3’s is the shit, and I bet they will be integrating the same thing for attached movies.

Reply

5 titanium_geek August 23, 2006 at 6:51 am

nice song! man, now you will have me fiddling around with garageband instead of doing my work (argh mid semester! (in Australia… have fun starting a new year!))

mmm… I _like_ gmail

Reply

6 Mark August 23, 2006 at 8:31 am

Heyyy, nice song.

Reply

7 Ryan September 5, 2006 at 12:53 am

Isnt the mp3 format patented? Does this mean Google has purchased some kind of licensing to allow distribution of mp3 files that are created via GTalk??

Reply

Leave a Comment

You can use these HTML tags and attributes: <a href="" title=""> <abbr title=""> <acronym title=""> <b> <blockquote cite=""> <cite> <code> <del datetime=""> <em> <i> <q cite=""> <strike> <strong>

Previous post:

Next post: