This page looks at podcasting, the audio spin-off of RSS and blogging.

It covers -

• introduction
• basis and tools
• genres - what people doing with podcasts
• statistics and directories - how many podcasters and how large an audience
• issues - censorship, copyright, defamation, economics

Blogging is discussed in a separate, more detailed profile elsewhere on this site.

    introduction

In essence, podcasting encompasses -

• the creation of wholly original audio content or compilation of existing audio content in an MP3 or similar audio format, with the audio file/s being made available over the web, whether from a personal computer or from a separate server
• access to those audio files by other people with an internet connection, in particular using the RSS (Really Simple Syndication) protocol to automatically receive new files for listening on a personal computer or on a device such as an iPod.

Purists have thus characterised podcasting as "essentially a constantly updated list of links to new MP3 files" - voice and music - with automatic download onto a personal listening device.

Podcasting has been described as a mechanism for individuals to create self-published (and non-commercially 'syndicated') radio-style programming, albeit radio that is accessed on demand by the user rather than received by anyone whose receiver is tuned to a specific part of the spectrum. It is distinct from streamed webcast delivery of audio or video content.

Although most attention has centred on individuals, podcasting has also been adopted by some commercial and not-for-profit terrestrial radio broadcasters as a means of promoting their operation, by record companies and by film or other media organisations.

Podcasting has been hyped as the next 'revolution' after blogging, with for example claims that it liberates music, empowers podcasters - every man it seems can be his own radio station (not necessarily a pretty thought) and - as problematically - has been embraced by six million people in the US. The New York Times, belatedly sniffing the zeitgeist in mid-2005, three years after the advent of audio blogging, asked

What do the pope and Paris Hilton have in common? They're both podcasters - and you can be one too.

Blogging pundit Doc Searls argued that

The key virtue of traditional radio is its immediacy: the fact that it's live. They key virtue of this new breed of radio is that it's Net-native. That is, it's archived in a way that can be listened to at the convenience of the listener, and (this is key) that it can be linked to by others, and enclosed in an RSS feed.

Todd Maffin, characterising podcasting as "a vertical revolution", echoed the 'netizen' and 'redemption' themes evident in much early writing about blogging -

Blink and you might miss it. That guy apparently talking to his laptop computer at the coffee shop. Those teens in the basement monkeying with microphones. They are pioneers of a new form of radio that will forever change our industry. They are podcasters: citizen broadcasters who arm themselves with rudimentary recording tools, free software, and a speedy Internet connection. And, like the bloggers before them, they are changing the nature of the medium. Podcasters may indeed revitalize the art of radio itself. And they're hitting it in all four of radio's vanguards: Sound design, talent, revenue, and distribution.

Others have characterised it as a tool for "jumpstarting the Open Media Insurgency". Wikipedia proclaimed that podcasting

has significant advantages over traditional methods of broadcasting due to the egalitarian nature of the technique. In most countries, the radio spectrum is heavily regulated, and personal broadcast licenses are difficult or impossible to obtain. Podcasting allows individuals to easily transmit content worldwide without these difficulties.

There has been less attention to consumer aspects, with RSS allowing listeners to filter available podcast content from across the globe, in principle accessing only the recordings of interest to them at a time of their choice.

The cheerleaders at Forrester saw blue skies ahead for podcasting, reflecting the desire of US consumers

to listen to what they want, when they want, on the device of their choosing.

    basis

Podcasting is based on two technologies.

The first is audio compression and editing technology, centred on the MP3 format. That technology allows the creator of a podcast to copy a musical recording, albeit with some loss of quality, from a compact disk or other source. Audio commentary can be added using editing software such as Adobe's Audition or iPodcast Producer; some podcasts emphasise music created by the podcaster or the spoken word, useful for those who want to be shockjocks but are worried about the FCC or ABA and cannot get a gig at a station.

The second technology is RSS aggregator or podcatching software such as iPodder or Doppler, significant because it allows the user to program identification and downloading of new audio files on the net. RSS draws on a podcast feed, essentially a list of links updated by the publisher of the files. Australian radio station Triple J explains that podcasting is

a way that triple j can automatically send you some of our radio programming to your portable device. To do this, you subscribe to the podcast by downloading a small piece of software that manages all of your podcast subscriptions. When connected to the internet, the software searches for the latest edition of the program on our website, and will download it to a folder on your computer, ready for when you next plug in your iPod or other portable device. This means that you don't have to manually search & download for new programs to download on this website. It happens automatically!

Some podcasts feature basic metadata (such as dates, titles, and brief descriptions) although it is unclear whether much use is made of that information.

    genres

Podcasting encompasses any 'genre' that involves a music or voice recording. As of mid-2005 major uses appear to be -

• audio-blogging - spoken versions of blogs, whether replacing or supplementing text blogs
• music programs - compilations, with or without spoken content by the podcaster as disk jockey, of live or previously-recorded music
• 'sound seeing' - narrations of a podcaster's travels, with or without background environmental sounds such as waves breaking on the shore or the hoot of sirens as the narrator walks along a beach or dodges the traffic in Beijing
• academic lectures and conference presentations
• 'authorised' or unauthorised museum guides - audio tours of institutions or particular exhibitions.

    statistics and directories

How many people and organisations are podcasting? What is the size and shape of the podcast audience.

The answers are unclear and some of the more triumphalist statistics, such as claims by the Pew Internet & American Life project, are contentious.

One indication of podcast production is listings on online directories such as iPodder.org, Podcast.net, Podcasting News and Podcast Alley.com.

As yet there have been no major academic studies of podcasting. It is likely to follow the same trajectory as blogging, with

• discovery by early adopters equipped with enthusiasm and internet publishing skills
• attention by specialist and subsequently mass media reinforcing propagation among those without those technical skills (and underpinning development of tools for creating, publishing and managing podcasts)
• normalisation of the podcasting population amid workshops and release of books on 'how to podcast', with many people creatng podcasts on a non-recurrent basis and few people becoming dedicated consumers of podcasts

For the moment, detailed demographics about the audience for podcasts are uncertain. Pew famously announced in April 2005 that "more than 6 million American adults have listened to podcasts", claiming that the US audience was predominantly under 29 years. The research was criticised for extrapolating from a tiny and arguably unrepresentative sample with overly broad survey questions.

Forrester more modestly - but perhaps with equal authority, given past projections - forecasts that the US audience for satellite radio and podcasting will grow to 12.3 million households by 2010.

    issues

Podcasting faces the same issues encountered by multimedia bloggers, including -

• defamation and hatespeech
• censorship
• intellectual property
• commerce

Defamation and hatespeech

As noted in the detailed discussion of defamation elsewhere on this site, the internet is not a law-free zone. As yet there is no case law regarding defamatory statements by wannabee shockjocks or other podcasters. However, it is inevitable that someone will take offence at words spoken in a podcast and seek legal redress - whether within the podcaster's jurisdiction or otherwise - against the author and third parties such as an ISP or ICH.

There is similarly likely to be action against hatespeech, although as with personal defamation action for racial or other vilification faces challenges regarding litigation that crosses national borders.

Censorship

That is an issue for the censorship of podcasts for breaches of national or local regimes regarding sexual, political or other content.

Jason Evangelho of Insomnia Radio is quoted as claiming

The whole beauty of it is that I don't have to censor myself. And I can say 'um.'

In practice much podcasting seems replete with 'um', 'ah' and non-meaningful silences. It is likely that salting the noise with calls to overthrow the 'butchers of beijing' or denunciations of religious dogma will attract the same responses encountered elsewhere on the net, including prosecution of podcasters and third parties such as hosts, takedown notices and blacklisting of particular addresses.

Intellectual Property

Much podcasting involves dissemination of an existing recording and thus intersects with the intellectual property rights of lyricists or poets, performers, publishers and the entity responsible for the production of that recording.

There has been little attention to the legality of podcasting or rights mechanisms (eg remuneration of copyright owners via a collecting society), with governments, industry bodies and others instead focussing on more traditional filesharing.

The Recording Industry Association of America has unsurprisingly commented that

Podcasters, like the users of any other sound recordings, must obtain the appropriate licenses from the copyright owners, or their designees

although it is likely that few podcasters see the need for such licencing.

In the US some of the more prominent podcasters do appear to be paying annual licensing fees, of up to around US$500 for intensive casting. Others are featuring performers who own the rights to their music, either recordings that have been licenced under a mechanism such as Creative Commons or that are licenced to the particular podcaster after contact with the performers.

Publication through use of the MP3 format in principle requires licensing from that format's developer. In practice Thomson has relinquished licensing fees unless the user makes over US$100,000 per year from the podcasts.

Commerce

We will presumably see claims that it is possible to make a living from podcasting, echoing rhetoric about "blogging for dollars" that has featured arguments that blogging can be a career rather than a vocation (whether funded through contributions by readers, subscriptions, payola for featuring a music track or inclusion of advertising or even discreet advertorial in a sort of 'paid placement').

The jury is currently out: it is unclear whether pleas for sponsorship or contributions are falling on deaf ears (and resulting in de-selection from RSS profiles) and whether inclusion of explicit advertising (modelled on commercial radio) will alienate listeners.

The Australia-based Podcast Network was promoted as 'evolution rather than revolution' -

Podcasting is a viable commercial medium because it has the same characteristics of more traditional mediums such as radio but with the added benefits of time-shifting, portability, user control, and global coverage.

It remains to be seen whether that's enough to sustain treats such as The Microsoft Developer Show and On The Pod with Senator Andrew Bartlett.

Maffin, in arguing that "podcasting will save radio", asserted that

The Podcasters are few today, but as the tools mature, expect plenty more to jump on the bandwagon. By podcasting, sometimes in public venues, some are already developing broadcasting skills the radio veterans have spent years learning: quick reaction to live events, multitasking technologies while speaking, the art of the cold-read, and voice performance. Podcasting also removes the barriers to getting on the air – as long as you can build enough of a brand to get people to your site, you are "on the air." There's no station producer or news director to convince. Already, netizens like Adam Curry have developed a brand with their podcast, and that brand can easily be turned into revenue. …

Radio executives can afford to write off podcasters now because there just aren't enough listeners to make it a worthwhile. But when 20,000 "high-value demographic" listeners regularly tune into a show, that show will attract advertisers. And advertisers will attract radio stations. It's a trend I call "program backdooring" – where the show will develop enough of an audience to make a "real" radio station take notice. ... Further, it's entirely possible that radio stations can sell individual shows on-demand: If you like such-and-such show so much, maybe you’ll pay $1 to listen.

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