We interrupt this podcast....

Podcasts were also in the air this week in the library blogosphere and on the email list servers. K.G. Schneider did her first podcast and Greg at Open Stacks did his second. Karen also wrote a fascinating account of how she produced her podcast.

Since I don't own an i-pod or an MP3 player of any kind, I'm sure I'm not getting all the nuance of this new phenomenon. But as far as I can tell, the "pod" part is just that if you build it in MP3, they will come. So a variety of amateur and some public radio programs are showing up as podcasts.

The broadcast part is that these MP3 format shows are put in an aggregator so that a listener can subscribe to certain programs. When the listener synchs up his or her i-pod, any new episodes of the programs are downloaded onto the player ready to be listened to at any time.

I'm getting a benefit from all of this activity, even without an i-pod. I can subscribe to these shows in Bloglines. When a new show is available, I just click on the appropriate link and it plays in Windows MediaPlayer. Of course, I can't get enough of Library and Information Science content shows since there have been a total of three now. In the meantime, I've been listening to some higher education podcasts that I found at ipodder.org.

On the public radio side, I'm getting to hear some programs that my local NPR station doesn't run. And others that I enjoy if I happen to be listening at the right time but can never seem to develop a habit to hear them every week. With the podcast technology, they show up in my aggregator and I can listen when it's convenient for me. And PAUSE the program. I can usually listen to talk radio while surfing the web, but if I want to write or read something very long, I have to turn it off. Now I can pick it up right where I left off! And I can fast-forward through stories that I'm not interested in, or rewind if I missed something. Of course, I could have done all this before from archived shows--the difference is that I remember to do it if it shows up in my news aggregator. Now, I want all of my favorite NPR shows in this format!

My current list of shows is here under the Audio file.

Of course, the next question is "How can libraries use this?" I think it will be important to remember as we are thinking about this, that libraries are competing against some very edgy stuff in the podcast world. It's hard to imagine a teenager or college student listening to a librarian read off the list of new books at the library when they could listen to the ultra-cool Adam Curry talking comfortably in his own cottage studio or to the ASCAP-licensed music at Coverville.

Something short and slightly educational like the word of the day format at Today's Podcast might work. Perhaps a Sonnet a day? Particularly if it was read by someone with a beautiful voice.

Actually, the best idea I had was for the campus library to facilitate podcasts by students. The library could convert a cubicle or closet to a small sound studio for higher quality sound than the students can create in their dorm rooms. More importantly, the library could provide the technical support--assistance in recording the MP3 programs and a campus aggregator on the website for distributing them to other students. And, of course, librarians could provide assistance in sorting out copyright issues and in background research for creating original content.     #

June 2004 July 2004 August 2004 September 2004 October 2004 November 2004 December 2004 January 2005 February 2005 March 2005 April 2005 May 2005 June 2005 July 2005 August 2005 September 2005 October 2005 November 2005 December 2005 January 2006 February 2006 March 2006 April 2006 May 2006 June 2006 July 2006 August 2006 September 2006 October 2006 November 2006 December 2006 January 2007 February 2007 March 2007 April 2007 May 2007