Poddermania

Technical Luddite that I am, I must admit I've become fascinated with the latest rage on our little wired universe. Over the weekend I discovered the crazy little world of podcasting, I know, I know I'm a tad late to this party, but hey I'm old and thankful I can get the clicker to the VCR to work somedays.

Part of my hesitation to embrace the pod generation is the fact that I don't actually own an Ipod yet, they're a tad out of my budget range at the moment so I'm an Ipod less soul roaming the world. If the folks at Apple wish to help me join the wave I can be reached podunkcan@yahoo.ca. For the moment I'm using the Ipodder software as a pretty fancy little computer jukebox, transferring my CD collection over for that day that I too joing the Ipod gang. The Podcasting portion of the program is new to me but offers a great variety of options to dedicate ones time to.

The interesting aspect of the Podcasting idea is that it gives anyone the chance to become their own radio station. Yes every Tom, Dick, Harry, Judy, Bob and Sally can put toghether their own ideas for a show and share with the world. This of course may not necessarily be a good thing in some instances, but every positive step must suffer from some overkill one suspects.

But with Apple ruling the world with the Ipod of late, Podcasting seems to be a wave that won't be denied, so best to try and get onboard in its infancy I guess. It kind of reminds of the Napster days of a few years ago, when the wild west atmosphere prevailed how many folks spent countless hours downloading obscure tunes from long forgotten artists, just because they could.

Of course those days are almost gone I guess, as the downloadable tune becomes the balliwack of Itunes, Walmart, Future shop and such, but for a while there it was a wild ride that made you feel like part of the revolution.

Podcasting seems to have that same kind of feel right now, Friday night I spent a few hours "subscribing" to a variety of Podcasts, some good, some brutal, some entertaining and one even educational. Where else would one be able to find a two hour lecture from Noam Chomsky on American in Iraq, short of attending the lecture I guess.

Since then I've discovered podcasts from the CBC Radio Three a pretty entertaining cast of new independent music, some podcast content from Slate magazine, MSNBC and the BBC to name a few. All of it free and rather easy to download and not particularly complicated nor time consuming. As the podcasting revolution carries on I suspect the latter two items will continue to be streamlined, but once the corporate types clue in I imagine the free aspect will begin to be reduced.

As the process becomes more widespread and attainable I wonder what the future of the over the air radio stations will be and more importantly where the audience share for them will go. With the ease of downloading a podcast onto ones Ipod for instance you can suddenly arrange your own type of programming. News, Sports, Commentary and Music will be what you want when you want it. It must give radio executives nightmares to think yet again they may rendered to the end of the media parade line.

It surely does seem like a brave new world in communications though so to find out more check out this article courtesy of Slate magazine, then pick up your own Ipodder software for your computer. After that check out a few of the directories listed below, on them you'll find content for every interest imaginable.

Of course you too can joining the revolution as well with your very own podcasts, I haven't quite progressed that far in my education yet, so the world is safe from my spoken word ramblings for the foreseeable future, but I had not delay too long I figure, cause it seems that this revolution isn't going to wait for long. It will be interesting to watch and see where podcasting goes though, whether it's the next big thing or simply a fad that will burn out. Is it the next step evolution from Blogging or simply a diversion for folks with a lot of time on their hands, we shall see over the next year.

For those who like me gently wade into the technological revolution the news is good, this is a pretty simple thing to learn, it took me less than fifteen minutes to get a handle on setting up my Ipodder and pulling in the information. So if I can get a grip, most others should have no problems at all. At the right in my links sections I've developed a place for podcasting information, I've listed the directories I've found, where to get the software for the program and a few of the sites I've found interesting, I'll update it as time goes along.

But for now it's over to you. So get busy seeking out those gems of the Podcast world and if you find something drop us a line either in our email below or here in the comments section.

iPodder software site

Podcast Alley Directory
Podcast.net Directory
NPR Podcasting Directory
iPodder Directory
Odeo Directory