“Less than two years ago, an article in this newspaper coined a word to describe a new trend for posting audio files online. Since then, podcasting has taken the internet by storm, with millions listening to radio shows, comedy skits and the random musings of strangers through their MP3 players,” Tim Dowling writes for The Guardian. “What is a podcast? The answer is not so simple. The word is not yet two years old, the concept barely three. The term podcast – coined and first used, according to most sources, by the writer Ben Hammersley in this very newspaper in February 2004 – distinguishes a certain sort of internet-borne audio (or, increasingly, video) content from all the other sorts, and specifically denotes an MP3 file that can be downloaded to one’s computer automatically via RSS subscription technology and thence transferred to one’s personal MP3 device for later listening. In short, it’s like a radio programme that you listen to on your iPod.”
“Back when podcasting was still called “audio blogging”, one of its pioneers was Adam Curry, a former MTV VJ who was among the first popular bloggers to include audio files on his website; he helped to finesse the software that would lead to the current explosion in podcasting. In the online world, Curry is famous for two things: his influential role in the development of the podcast, and his judicious editing of the Wikipedia entry on podcasting, allegedly in an effort to enhance his role in the development of the podcast. But his own podcast, The Daily Source Code, remains one of the most widely followed and it is not for nothing that he is sometimes called the Podfather,” Dowling writes.
“George Bush’s weekly radio address is now available as a podcast, so you can sit on the train listening to upbeat economic propaganda and partisan sniping being delivered in the president’s conspiratorial, one-moron-to-another voice: “Some people in Washington are saying we should raise your taxes …” There is also a weekly parody of the weekly radio address, but I leave you to judge which is funnier,” Dowling writes. “And then there are religious podcasts, or “Godcasts”. The weekly offering from the Sierra Vista Community Church was among the scariest I came across: a sermon from a guest speaker, missionary Buck Rogers, who opened with a few jocular remarks about the church fantasy football league results (he won) before sliding into a creepy account of an exorcism by way of a long-winded explication of Ephesians 6.”
Dowling writes, “In the main, though, podcasting is still audio blogging. No matter what the putative subject – be it sex, sci-fi or sewing – the average offering is usually a personal log of skin complaints, half-baked opinions, blood-sugar level updates, TV programmes watched and dreams remembered, produced with a level of technical incompetence one couldn’t hope to achieve with ordinary weblog software. Though the technology probably exists, my iPod has no means of fast-forwarding through a boring rant or a dreadful podsafe tune. If you want to hear the phone interview with the female ejaculation expert, you first have to listen to the full account of last night’s Battlestar Galactica marathon. That’s just the way it is.”
More in the full article, including Dowling’s favorite podcasts, here.
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of course you can fast forward on ALL iPods!! someone tell the stooge
If he can’t even figure out how to fast forward his iPod how can you give weight to anything else he has to say. The iPod is the simplest, most intuitive player on the market but too hard for him? What the…?
It makes me wonder if he knows anything about any of the things he writes about.
The Presidents Weekly addresses (the comedy) is hilarious!
To fast forward:
While listening, press and hold the >> button
To fast forward even faster:
While listening, press the select (white circle) and scroll the wheel forwards (shows a diamond moving). When you stop scrolling it will jump to that position.
everybody seems to be “casting” something these days… with all these trendy names like Forecasting, Broadcasting, Podcasting, Photocasting, Godcasting etc.
so, when can we expect the next new trend? maybe it could be called something like FUDcasting and be reserved for Apple bashing?
Guardian = 85% RUBBISH
He’s not saying that it’s impossible to fast forward, he is saying that it is difficult to do so effectively; since you don’t know at what point the boring rant will be over, you have to skip through a bit at a time trying to find the spot where you get to the good stuff. I think what he is saying is it would be nice if you could just hit a button to automatically skip past the boring junk… maybe some sort of “chapters” system, like with DVD’s.
Man! Was THIS worth getting out of bed, or what?!
Another “writer” discovers podcasting and female physiognomy, and does his show-and-tell while cleverly working in a way to smack the Prez. How very intelligent and original, yet trendy somehow… oooooooh!
Al & Mike better look out!
MW = “same:” SSDD.
Wow, uhh, Dowling — show your bias much?
Take your Brit liberalism and open hatred and shove it up your ass.
Lest we request payback for saving your sorry brown-toothed, brown meat-eating asses 60 years ago.
Podcasters are technically inept??!! Of course, that’s the whole point. Taking radio away from the “pros.”
This writer can go to hell.
One would expect puerile Bush bashing from a Marxist rag like the Guardian.
Shove it where the son does not shine, Dowling.
I meant “sun.” I must have been thinking of that son of a bitch who wrote the article.