While most people use Flickr for uploading photos and videos, one can also use photo sharing websites like Picasa or Flickr for hosting MP3 songs and other audio files.
For instance, these Flickr pictures are identical but the one on right is actually an MP3 file.
To hide an MP3 file into a JPEG image, copy the MP3 file and a picture into a folder. Open the command prompt window (Start –> Run –> cmd) and switch to this folder. Now run the following command:
copy /b my_picture.jpg + my_song.mp3 my_new_picture.jpg
Remember to replace my_picture and my_song with relevant file names. Next, upload the my_new_picture.jpg file to Flickr. The MP3 song picture will look just like any other regular photograph that you share on Flickr.
When you want to download that MP3 file from Flickr, open the relevant photo page, go to “All Sizes” and download the original sized image (example). Change the file extension to MP3 and enjoy the music using Winamp*.
And not just MP3 files, you can upload virtually any filetype to Flickr using the above trick including PDFs and Microsoft Office documents. But you may also want to consult Flickr policies to make sure that they don’t ban you for this.
Related: Use Blip.TV for Hosting MP3 Files, Embed MP3 in Blogs
*MP3 files encoded this way won’t play in QuickTime or Windows Media Player.
Find this article at: http://www.labnol.org/internet/pictures/upload-mp3-music-files-flickr-hosting/3503/
web: http://www.labnol.org/ email: amit@labnol.org
Reader Comments
Sounds interesting! Can’t these be done in other image hosting sites as well? Only flickr?
I really sense there is some break of policies here.. but good hack :-) !!
Cheers,
Vinay
Written by Vinay on 06.09.08
Its an old trick that we can convert mp3 files to jpeg files.By the way why would one need to host their music files in flickr when there are lot many services out there for music file hosting.
Written by SaTiSh MeDoS on 06.09.08
@ SaTiSh MeDoS: Actually, this isn’t converting. It’s two files that become one. Depending on the active extension it’ll be handled as if it were either an image or mp3 file. This opens the door to using every image hosting website on the web as a file hosting website. So it’s pretty useful.
Written by Atake on 06.09.08
Started reading with great interest because I thought Flickr has started new service to serve Mp3 files but why one will go for this trick?
Why only Flickr? there are other image hosting ans mp3 file hosting service is freely avaialble on net.
I agree with you Satish.
Written by Rohit on 06.09.08
This is something I will look into using. Are their any other imaging sites it will support. I will of course try this on flickr. I hope this is something which is easy for me to do. I have very basic knowledge, and I am still trying to learn as much as possible.
Written by Abaculus on 06.09.08
As has been posted already, this will work regardless of the image hosting site. The information is in the file, and the site displays it as an image (because of the jpg extension). If there is an incompatability, it’s between browsers, as it’s the browser’s engine that actually decodes and displays the image. So this will work on Flickr, photobucket, even forums. The only problem would be if the site changes the image. For example, I think Facebook resizes large images. MP3 data would most likely be lost this way.
Written by Aziz on 06.09.08
Of note - the more you attempt to cram into an image, the bigger the resulting filesize becomes. Abusing this to host non-freely distributable content on a rare occasion is one thing, but going overboard on what you’re packing in will surely arouse someone’s suspicions.
Written by BMN on 06.09.08
and…
when i change the extension on a mac, i can encode it to a playable mp3 with MAX (sbooth . org/max).
Written by Jesse Colburn on 06.09.08
Isnt this unethical? arent you misleading viewers?
Written by vin on 06.09.08
Can we implement this MP3 tricks to other images hosting provider beside flickr and picasa ?
Written by madcon on 09.03.08