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Listen: 64 min. from May 21, 2005 Show Topics: |
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| Posted by Rob Greenlee at 08:48 AM Weblog | Comments 0 | Trackback |
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WebTalk Radio for May 14th, 2005 with hosts Rob and Dana Greenlee and guest host Mitch Ratcliffe, blogger, author and co-founder of Persuadio.com. Also joined by Stephen Lee, creator of FootNoteTV.com, he will discuss his extensive analysis and background facts on the issues and events that are portrayed in TV programs. Other topics include: YaGooHoogle.com, are PDA’s becoming the undead, Podcasting Becoming Just Radio, Google Goes Down and Webby Awards Winners. |
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| Posted by Rob Greenlee at 02:27 AM Weblog | Comments 0 | Trackback |
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By Rob Greenlee The rumors and media hype around podcast father Adam Curry’s move to Sirius Satellite radio is shaking the very fabric of the podcasting industry. The question has been raised and it is whether podcasting is maturing and becoming something new or something else or if we are on just a detour back to broadcast radio of old again. A few months ago, I stated many times in articles and radio interviews that podcasting is more about the grassroots creation of audio content and listener control then about being a technological revolution. The most remarkable thing about podcasting is how it has inspired people to become audio producers and show hosts all over the world and has even inspired current terrestrial broadcasters to rethink how they do and distribute their shows. While this ability to distribute a radio show online has been around technologically for years, it was something that just seemed much too difficult and expensive for most people to do with any quality. As we all know now, things have changed and the costs of recording a good quality radio-like program have come way down. The podcasting distribution process with RSS has made it a little easier for listeners to get this new audio programming downloaded into a mobile player device. The issue still remains how podcasters are going to be able to afford to grow distribution because bandwidth can be expensive for very popular programs. This issue is coming up more and more as shows become popular and thus are forced to get sponsors to pay the bandwidth bill every month. I think the ultimate answer for the bandwidth issue will be Bit Torrent distribution of popular programs as we will see Bit Torrent integrated into all sorts of podcast catching applications. I also think we may see a flavor of Bit Torrent integrated into the major streaming media players and mobile media playback devices. This Adam Curry deal with Sirius will have very little connection to most podcasters or with podcasting as a technology, but is about Adam being a very good radio talent who has the attention of the world. He will spin podcasts like a DJ spins records, but with a strong bias towards his family of favorite podcasts which has followed his media attention. He has the ability to produce good audio content that builds an audience and creates media buzz, which is exactly what Sirius got in Curry. I believe that Adam Curry had the best of intentions for his iPodder podcast catching software he wrote, but Adam has always been and continues to be all about popular culture and content. He is a technologist second and not primarily. I believe that he saw this podcasting process as a way to propel himself to a national and international spotlight, though he may not have known how big it would get when he wrote the first iPodder. Just the simple fact that he jumped at the offer from Sirius shows us that his intentions are not about podcasting, but about content and making money. This is all fine, but it takes us back to where we all started and I thought podcasting was about rebelling against broadcast radio and bringing back how radio used to be in the old-time radio days of the likes of Wolfman Jack. Now the father of podcasting has left the building, so to speak, and gone back to the old media world, but that is the point as that was always the intention. Right! All things come full circle and podcasting is no exception. Others are starting to talk about the same thing. See other blog posts from Om Malik, It is also interesting to see how the broadcast radio folks are viewed in the podcasting world. Traditional broadcast radio shows have been looked at as a good and bad addition to the podcasting community. It seems like everyone gets all excited when older major radio broadcasters embrace podcasting, but it is only really seen as validation of concept by the larger group of podcasters. If you look at most of the popular and highest ranked podcasts, you will see very few older radio show broadcasters on the list. In some ways, you are looked down upon if you are presently also broadcasting on terrestrial radio and podcasting. Most podcasts have a show format that would not be acceptable in the terrestrial broadcast world. This format difference makes it difficult for podcasters to transition to broadcast radio and the broadcast radio folks to transition over to podcasting. The biggest difference is the number of breaks and the inclusion of spot commercials which is generally looked down on in podcasting. Live reads of sponsors and one person monologs is the rule in podcasting. Now for a little off the topic mention here. I am also seeing a renewed interest in broadcasting live on the Internet again. I have recently pulled together some inexpensive high quality audio equipment and software that make it possible to record with a telephone caller and up to two other microphones on a laptop. With this ability you would be then able to broadcast a live Internet radio show from anywhere that has a regular telephone line and an Internet connection. This is power to the people and I think we will also see traditional broadcast radio stations picking up on some of these live internet show for broadcast over terrestrial radio stations. We all complained that the big commercial radio stations had programmed us to death with corporate formatted stations that all played the same thing and had no unique personality and, most of all, was not real. Here comes satellite radio and podcasting to the rescue, but don’t be fooled. Satellite radio IS still the old media. Satellite radio has a new technology spin to it and less FCC restrictions, but it has the same long term potential of broadcast radio - slow growth. Where is the growth then? The growth is going to be in Internet radio and all the studies confirm that over the next few years Internet streaming radio will blow all other distribution methods away and that includes satellite and podcast distribution. You ask then why is Internet radio in the shadows of podcasting and satellite radio? This brings me back to my original point, which is that, as podcasting becomes mature and mainstream, all the same issues of distribution and advertising placement will come back into play and the model that made broadcast radio successful will make podcasting a commercial success. Most podcasters will be long-tail grassroots content producers that are very much like most bloggers of today. Most of these long-tail podcasters will never see commercial success and will only gain a small download audience. Remember the personal home page craze of the late 90’s and the early blogging craze earlier this decade. Yet at the same time I need to say that podcasting, at the very grassroots level, is and will continue to be quite different than the commercial podcasters. The commercial podcasters will be increasingly from the terrestrial broadcast ranks as you are already starting to see it. When I say ranks I mean professional radio broadcasters creating their own shows. I also think that most major commercial broadcasters are just playing with podcasting to get some free publicity for now until they figure out how to us it and still be able to somehow control and monetize the distribution. We will see two offshoots: the commercial podcasters that go with the major media to assist with distribution and the grassroots podcasts at home with a mic and a laptop. I think the line between broadcast radio content and podcasting content formatting will blur together into better radio and, within a few years, Internet radio streaming and on-demand audio file downloads will dominate the delivery of all audio programming, with terrestrial radio holding on to a declining share of listeners. The current satellite providers will become major Internet radio broadcasters over the next five years. We will also see more terrestrial radio broadcasters offering live streams that have Internet-only content filling in for blocked nationally syndicated shows that the local radio station cannot stream live. This will be another distribution opportunity for live and podcasting-only shows. It is possible that XM and Sirius will be acquired by the current major broadcast networks like Clear Channel and when that happens, Clear Channel becomes a huge Internet radio broadcaster. The big corporate radio guys will dominate Internet radio in a few years, just like they dominated terrestrial analog broadcast and at some point it becomes moot to draw a distinction anymore as broadcast is broadcast. The only real difference at that point is digital vs. analog. The only distribution area that will be different in the long haul is in the area of downloadable media that will include audio and video. I am already hearing about mobile Wifi or WiMax-enabled smart phones with large micro hard drives that are coming in large numbers within the next few years. With that we will see podcasting as a name become much less relevant as this distribution method will be so far beyond the iPod that is becomes irrelevant to painting a complete picture. We will still see many people holding onto the podcasting name as it will be a branded name to describe a type of content and a historical reference to the enormous acceptance of downloadable radio and video programming to mobile devices. Listeners generally do not really care how the content gets to them as the reason why Bit Torrent will only grow in use by podcasters and broadcasters. All the listener really cares about is that a show is of good quality, relevant to them, is inexpensive or free and gets delivered quickly and easily. Lastly, it must be able to be played back on any media playing device. |
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| Posted by Rob Greenlee at 02:00 AM Weblog | Comments 0 | Trackback |
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WebTalk at ITConversations host Rob Greenlee speaks with Bart Feder of FeedRoom.com about the current FeedRoom operations and the changes the company has gone through since it was founded five years ago. FeedRoom is one of the Internet’s largest streamers with over 1 million streams per day. Bart also gives the FeedRoom vision for future major-media video distribution platforms via download and streaming to PCs and mobile devices. Read more and Listen (38 min) |
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| Posted by Rob Greenlee at 01:33 AM Weblog | Comments 0 | Trackback |
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WebTalk Radio with hosts Rob and Dana Greenlee with guest host TDavid, blogger of MakeYouGoHmm.com and Internet Radio show host himself of Script School Radio. Why was Apple Tiger OS released to stores Friday at 6pm? An interview with Dean Tsouvalas, writer of The Lycos 50 popular searches terms and people. Topics Discussed: |
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| Posted by Rob Greenlee at 05:37 PM Weblog | Comments 0 | Trackback |
