Justplain

Betsy claimes: Happiness is a Dutch bicycle

Except for today, its raining cats and dogs and i have to hurry now to catch a bus

It strikes me that the word podcasting is used in several ways. There is a lot of talk about where podcasting is heading, can and will it be commercialised, will it reach mainstream or is it just another subculture. But before we get into that, what exactly do you mean when you talk about podcasting.

You could define podcasting as a technique for distributing binary-files in an automated manner. The technique was initially invented for automatic distribution of audio-files in a time-shifted manner from a webserver to someone’s mp3 device. The core of the technique is rss in which enclosure-tags are used for pointing the software that is using the rss-feed for input, to the audio-files. The rest of the process depends on what you want to do with the files: only download them to your computer, or also add them to some mp3 software like iTunes or Windows media player, or do you have a mobile device (mp3 device, mobile phone, pda etc) that can download the files directly.
So the process on the transmition side is always the same: upload a file onto your webserver and add an enclosure-tag to your rss-feed. The receiving process depends on how you like to receive the file but you’ll at least need some aggregator that scans the feed and downloads new files found in the enclosure-tags automatically.

This new technique came together with a new content-type: podcasts. Is that true? What is a podcast exactly? You could define it as an audio-file that is distributed through podcasting technique. This means that a podcast is not a new content type. Itconversations allready existed well before podcasting was invented. They just use podcasting as another distribution method in addition to the old ‘go to the site and click the download link’ method of distribution. And i suspect it works well for them. The same goes for several radiostations that use podcasting as another distribution technique in addition to broadcasting and streaming.
But the most common ‘definition’ for a podcast is a homebrew radioshow, preferably recorded with your pc. This kind of podcast, most of them based on ‘the Adam Curry format’, really gave the podcasting-technique the boost that made it grow so fast.

This brings us to the second definition of podcasting: recording a podcast…

This is confusing, and will make discussing the subject hard.

The ‘podcasting-technique’ is much more then distributing home-brewed shows (which i like, don’t get me wrong).
For example: what if i were a teacher and made my study-material available using ‘the podcasting techniques’ and handed usb-sticks with pre-installed aggregators to my students. All they would have to do is connect the stick into their usb-port on their computer and the latest study-material would automatically be downloaded on the usb-stick. That could be usefull and there are millions of possibilities of using this podcast technique.

Well, maybe its time to make a point.

Lets devide the technique from how it is applied.
Lets call the technique of distributing binary-files using rss and enclosure tags ‘Binary Syndication‘. When binary syndication is applied to the ‘curry-format’ kind of audio-files then thats called podcasting.

This could also end the inventing dispute: Dave invented ‘Binary Syndication’ and Adam ‘podcasting’

I was just watching tv, a show about the dying of the pope. And guess who was being interviewed in Rome? Fr. Roderick!
Interesting to learn more about the pope, now that he has died. The general opinion in the Netherlands about the pope has always been very critical. Now with all the documentaries its interesting to learn about how, as an example, he used his influence in poland in the eighties. How he helped the freedom movement, Solidarinosc, and refused to leave Poland during his second visit before he had met Lech Walensa who was in jail at that time.

Today was another great spring day! I spend most of the day on the balcony getting my vitamine S(un) which i needed very badly. In the garden everything is popping up like crazy. The magnolia-tree started blooming yesterday. It’s at it most beautifull right now.