Now that it’s found its way to Reason (see The New Transistor Radio), I guess the “podcast” meme is sufficiently established that I’m going to try it out. Basic concept: record some audio in a portable player-readable form (usually mp3, but you could also use AAC, or AIFF or Apple Lossless). Attach it to an RSS syndication feed, which the user snatches using a handy media aggregator that automatically synchs with the iPod via iTunes. Lather. Rinse. Repeat.
That’s a lot of geek-speak, but the real key is convenience. Once you find the feeds you want, the software runs in the background, grabbing the audio and transferring it to your playback device. Find a show you like and listen when you want.
Think of it as a step along the way to the TiVofication of radio. As a TiVo user, it really has changed the way I interact with television. The networks’ schedule is a non-issue for me; I set up all the programming I like via Season Passes or WishList keyword searches, and watch when I want. I can record two shows at the same time and watch a third that I recorded earlier. I use my TiVo’s hard drive as a semi-permanent archive medium - at one time, we had all of the last season of Sex & The City and the first season of Deadwood ready to go. If I like it enough to want to have a permanent archive, I can either send to the VCR, buy the DVDs, or record to DVD (if I had a DVD recorder, which I don’t). If I find I’m not using the archived programming, I can delete it, and I haven’t spent the cash on an unwatched DVD set (unlike Sports Night, for example, which I own but very rarely watch).
TiVo beats the pants off other systems. I could of course keep a tape in the VCR and set a permanent timer for 8pm Wednesdays if I want Smallville. But what if for some reason the show gets bumped to another time slot, as has been known to happen? TiVo also can be set to record only new shows, and not record if an episode is a repeat. It’s handy for cases like Fox right now - if a program is bumped by the playoffs, TiVo won’t record a half-hour of baseball (which I’m (a) probably watching live anyway and (b) won’t watch recorded if I don’t watch it live). And it can be set to record non-predictable programming - I have a permanent search for UofL basketball games, which I sometimes do like to watch later even if I miss the live broadcast. All of this (not even getting into the bizarro TiVo recommendations and commercial avoidance), has changed the way I think about TV.
Technology like podcasting has the same potential for audio. If adopted in a big way, I could listen to what I want when I want. Morning Edition at lunch? No problem. Tonight’s debate tomorrow instead of the sound bite summaries? Got that right here. How about serialised audio books, one chapter a week, so I can decide for myself if I like it rather than downloading the whole thing at once? The possibilities seem endless - a new foreign language lesson every morning. Out-of-town radio shows. iESPN. And so on - I’m no Jeff Jarvis, so don’t look to me for ideas. If done right, It could even be a limited competitor to satellite radio, at least for those who prefer talk to music.
At the moment, the available podcasts are home-brewed and tech-heavy, as one would expect. Hopefully this will change, and hopefully a pay-for-download system will develop, to attract for-profit content.
Resources:
- Doc Searls’ DIY radio with PODcasting
- engadget’s Podcasting How-To
- ipodder software for Mac and Windows
- Podcast directories at ipodder.org, podcast.net and podcasters.org (the last is even available in handy, importable OPML format)
