Dropbox is a fantastic service. I use it regularly to sync files between my desktop and laptop. It does have other uses though, like sharing files with your friends and even hosting a website. While I would not recommend you host your main business website with a Public shared folder using Dropbox, using the service to host some images, like your websites favicon, has some advantages.

If you are using a service such as Blogger and want to add your own custom favicon you have several choices of where to host your favicon. You can upload it and host it on Google’s server, although last time I tried they did not accept the .ico format. That works until you want to change your favicon then you have to do it all over again including updating your code that points to your favicon.

You could host your favicon on an image hosting service, but then they might delete it at anytime. Again if you want to change your favicon you will be redoing all of the code.

Since Dropbox can host files that are publically accessable on the Internet you now have another option. Following the tips and tricks wiki to making your own website you can simple create a folder for your favicon, and copy your favicon into that folder. The advantage of hosting your favicon in your Dropbox public folder means you have more control over it. If you decide to change your favicon all you need to do is simply copy over your existing favicon and it will be replaced on your website. You don’t have to redo the code pointing to it, and you never have to worry about an image hosting service deleting it.

If you have not tried Dropbox, you really should give it a serious look. They offer 2gb of space for free, which is more than enough to share and sync files between computers.

They also have a great favicon if you are looking for some inspiration.

I am a freelancer and one of the tasks that I have to admit I am not very good at is invoicing. Sure I keep good track of my time and projects, but I was often behind on my invoicing. A few months ago I made the switch from desktop invoicing software to Cashboard, and I have to tell you it has made a world of difference. Not only can I keep track of my project, time and invoicing all in one spot, but I can schedule my recurring invoices to be sent out regularly.

What does any of that have to do with a favicon website and blog? Well nothing really except they also have a great favicon.

Their favicon comes from their logo and does a great job of branding their website and their twitter account. It also gives you a great idea of what the service does and makes it easy to recoginize.

If you are looking for a great online invoicing service I do recommend Cashboard, and not just because I like their favicon.

I admit that I am a huge Mozy fan. I use it to backup my personal photos and files and I use MozyPro to backup my business files. Of course that is not the point of this blog, the point of this blog is to highlight some great looking favicon‘s, so aside from the fact that I use the Mozy, I honestly do think they have a great favicon.

The favicon obviously is taken from the logo:

Not every logo can work well as a favicon. Many logos have to much detail, and a 16×16 pixel space is just not enough space for little details. The Mozy logo works perfectly in the 16×16 pixel space and I can only guess that someone must have been thinking about how the logo would work as an icon on desktops, taskbars and as a favicon.

Great job on the icon Mozy, oh and on a great product as well. Nice to know my photos, work files and memories are safe.

favicons have gone from being just a graphic or an animated graphic to full fledged games thanks to Mathieu Henri who has created “Defender of the Favicon“. This favicon is a little different than the ones you will find here at FreeFavicon.com. The favicon is actually a Javascript that dynamically updates the favicon. It is playable but not viewable in all browsers. The best browsers to try the favicon game in are Opera 9.5, Opera 9.2 and FireFox 2. I was using Firefox 3 and it was working alright, other than the fact that I suck at Defender.

I was trying the site out in Firefox 3 on Ubuntu and it appeared to run fine. I also tried it on Firefox 2 on a Windows XP machine and it was pretty much identical. I could only ever play in the favicon. The instructions say that if you press Enter it should open in a canvas display but I could not get that to work on either machine.

Here is a short video of me trying to play Defender of the Favicon. Not easy to do but it is a creative use of the space. Perhaps a different game would be eaiser to play as a favicon. Pac-Man comes to mind or even Asteroids maybe.

This is a unique approach to creating a favicon and deserves to be recognized this week as the favicon of the week!

Yesterday I talked about how Hotels.com did not even bother trying to create a favicon for their website, which is a real shame. While I was doing research for hotels for my holiday I also spent time on Expedia.ca. They have a nice site and they have a great little favicon for their site. I can always find their site fast in my bookmarks because of that little airplane favicon.

That is a great favicon that matches their logo and branding on their website and t makes it easy for me to find their bookmark when I am looking for them. Good job Expedia.ca on an easy to recognize favicon!