If you've been reading this blog long enough, you know that I often cycle to work in the morning. It's a 15 min ride on my great bike in the sunshine, whereas it takes me about 30 min if I take the tube (le métro) where I feel like a sardin in a tin...
Last october, I predicted podcasting was going to be huge. No wonder that version 4.9 of iTunes unveiled by Steve Jobs this week is going to include easy podcasting management: he just boot strapped the whole category!
So what do geeks like me do ? (I should really be reported on the Hack-a-day blog!) They merge the 2, and listen to podcasts while cycling around town.
How do you do it ? Super easy. But actually I'm rather amazed at the amoung of technology involved:
- recording a podcast: no clue what everyone is using, but I guess a Mac, an iPod, or a PC + a microphone + an OS + a recording / editing software + proper MP3 codec software.
- finding a podcast: I use iPodder to monitor RSS feeds of a number of podcasters; it synchronizes automatically with my iTunes setup.
- storing a podcast: I use a Nokia piece of software to do drag-n-drop from my Windows box to my Symbian phone, through Bluetooth.
- listening to podcasts: I use the audio player on my hi-fi Nokia 7710...
Actually it's pretty cool. It's more fun to listen to than the radio in the morning. I only wish that transfer from my PC to the phone was faster (I tried the USB cable as well, soooooooooooo... long. I just leave it to transfer at night).
In the meantime, just to let you know that listening to podcasts is like reading blogs: some of them are good, some of them bore you after a while, some of them are very boring. The difference is that you can't easily skim the shows (although the player allows fast forward) to check whether you're interested.
The most interesting approach in podcasting seems to me to be the commentary approach to other audio feeds, a bit like the director's voice in the bonus section of DVDs. 2 days ago, Adam Curry did a whole series of comments on Steve Jobs' keynote at WWDC'05. Check it out here, really interesting.
You know what, I guess that after text (=blogging), audio (=podcasting), video nanopublishing is going to be the next thing. You know what else ? Let's start talking about webcasting. Period ! :) Some of it pro, some of it amateur. Doesn't this remind you about the long tail again ?
