Talk:Podcast/Archive 1

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Talk:Podcasting

News This page has been cited as a source by several media organizations. The citations are in:

Does it make sense to have a list of podcasts here? Is there precedent for doing it? It seems that a link to a catalog of podcasts would make more sense here... --idcmp 16:10, 27 Oct 2004 (UTC)

Contents

Matthew Good just bloglinked here

Here Just thought I'd mention it. CriminalSaint 00:35, 6 Mar 2005 (UTC)

Suggest we start with a simple definition

Rather than starting with something about the derivation of the word, or a comparison to magazine subscriptions or RSS readers or anything else. I put one up and it was lost in a rearrangement, and I've put it back. If it's inaccurate please do fix it, but I'd urge us to begin the article with a straightforward definition, before diving into the metaphors and comparisons and testimonials. *8) --orbst 22:50, 26 Feb 2005 (UTC)

The not-so simple definition

I don't mean to be a stickler, but podcasting is not a "broadcast medium". A podcast, I suppose, might be but it seems to me that podcasting is an activity. A medium is, well, you know, a medium, not an activity. Any suggestions? --Adamnorman 21:18, 31 Mar 2005 (UTC)

Yeah, I think "broadcast medium" is inaccurate also. I originally had "usage pattern" or somehthing, but I guess that was too hoity-toity. I've just now changed it to "the practice of". Someone will probably find that too Buddhist... *8) --Orbst 14:12, 6 Apr 2005 (UTC)

Wikipedia is not a "How To" guide

Amongst the barrage of rather irrelevant SPAM and nonsense that is being dumped here, there has also been an influx of on-topic links on how to setup a podcast. Wikipedia, however, is not the place to do this. Please consider writing an article on Wikibooks! The link to Wikibooks is http://en.wikibooks.org/wiki/Main_Page — it would be wonderful if someone (or a group of someones) would write an article there rather than overstuff this article with links.

Too many podcasting links

I agree, there will soon be so many podcasting links in due time.

Cleaned up the links

I just cleaned up the links: split them up in Software, How-to, blogs on Podcasting and directories of Podcasts. I agree that individual Podcasts should not be in this list, just links to directories. There will even be a lot of those. --Pforret 23:54, 30 Oct 2004 (UTC)

  • I second that we should not be listing individual podcast sites, especially considering that there are presently podcast directories which are carry over 900 feeds. As it stands, there are already a bunch of sites spamming the Podcast directory section. This needs to be watched with a bit more vigilance. —RaD Man (talk) 23:55, 4 Feb 2005 (UTC)
    • Furthermore, the entire "Blogs" section should probably be removed. Let the actual podcast directories manage this instead. —RaD Man (talk) 02:53, 5 Feb 2005 (UTC)
      • The major hacks on this article over the last couple of days need reworking. The result is less informative.

What criteria were used when deciding what to leave in? On the HowTo section it looks like it was "first three and last three". Not good enough. Some of the most important resources have been removed and more minor ones left in. Where was the thoughtful discussion first?

The comment above says:

"let the directories manage the comments". How can they when they have all been taken out?

Have we fallen prey to a Wiki-Activist?

Also, the news spam needs to come out. Who they? Their Alexa rank is 946,716.

        • I can't take credit for any activism, but this podcasting article has become a huge spam magnet. As for the "How-to" subjection, I've personally removed it in full because that sort of information belongs on WikiBooks, not Wikipedia. I expect the list of podcast clients to become unmanageably long again in no time... Where do you draw the line? —RaD Man (talk) 22:57, 7 Feb 2005 (UTC)

Did you delete the links to directories also when you deleted "How-To"?

I'll step in here, because I deleted the directories. Wikipedia is not a mirror or a repository of links, images, or media files. This article was turning into a replacement for Google which goes strongly against established policy. Not to mention the fact that before I began trimming the links section was DOUBLE the size of the rest of the article.  ALKIVAR™ 03:36, 8 Feb 2005 (UTC)
This may sound like a bit of an extreme solution, but I was actually considering a Google search string in lieu of the inevitably long list of Podcast clients which are about to show up. We're not a repository of links and that is exactly what this article is perpetually being plagued by. —RaD Man (talk) 06:39, 8 Feb 2005 (UTC)
I don't think it's extreme at all. If you're going to list some of the clients that have come late to the show, but leave out some of the original clients, then the list of clients will have an appearance of partiality. (Example: Doppler existed before Nimiq) My suggestion would be to allow them all to be added, or add none, unless specifically referenced within an historical context. Just my $.02. -KHD

Addition of email groups?

I am wondering whether podcasters and ipodder-dev Yahoo groups should be in here, as they are more important resources than many listed here.

Also, I have a podcast-review Yahoo group and website - the group discusses about 5 podcasts each week, which is an important resource. We have recently started, but I will wait until we have 50+ members before adding it here and to allow others to comment.

I will leave these for a couple of days for comments before editing.

Julian Doncaster

Question regarding origin of "podcasting"

I have recently seen reference to a Guardian article using the term "podcasting" published (apparently) in February 2004. The article is by Ben Hammersley. How do folks feel about this? Should Ben be credited with at least part of the origin of the term, since Dannie's first use seems to be 7 months later?

This was referred to me by Martin Woodward in his comment at podcastreviews.net -- this is not intentional self-promotion; just referencing a source :).

kinrowan 12:14, 2004 Nov 12 (UTC)

Podcasting vs. Audio blogging/Video blogging

I was wondering if someone could help clarify the evolution of podcasting in terms of its origins in audio blogging and video blogging. Is there a difference between podcasting and audioblogging/videoblogging or are they basically the same? Is the difference simply the fact that audio/video bloggers a year or two ago were posting multimedia files without the enclosure tags in their RSS feeds, thus making it impossible to download the multimedia simply by subscribing to the feed? For example, in the fall of 2003 on my site http://www.andycarvin.com, I started multimedia blogging, incorporating video clips, photos and audio into my text blogs, but I don't know if this qualifies as podcasting because they were a mix of media types rather than solely audio files or video files; plus they lacked the enclosures in the RSS feeds. Just curious to see what others think. ---acarvin

I see a lot of crossover. The enclosures are a key development, in my view, linked to the development of multimedia-aware aggregators. As has been noted above, folks have been posting personal multimedia files on the web for ages. But the 'casting' part adds the subscription/series element, at least IMHO.Pzarquon 17:51, 5 Apr 2005 (UTC)

More Questions on the Origin of the Term: Podcasting

I have to agree with kinrowan, it's a bona fide article from a UK National newspaper (The Guardian) dated February 2004. I have also talked to Ben Hammersley about this and I feel that he should be credited with originally coining the term: Podcasting.

The term "Audio blogging" appears to predate the term podcasting and identifies the same general concept. I'm going to do some more researching before modifying the article however.  ALKIVAR™ 02:24, 10 Feb 2005 (UTC)

More on external links

Somebody beat me to rolling back a just-added "directory" heading and a link to some podcast directory. This topic was discussed above, but here's a reminder to future link-adders: Wikipedia isn't a link farm. Authors' articles don't have links to bookstores' musicians' articles don't have links to every fan site; Tetris doesn't have a link to every web site with a clone (at least, as fast as I can keep erasing them, it doesn't); so please don't add podcasting sites or lists of podcasting sites. An encyclopedia tells people what podcasting is, how it works, how/why it developed, and such information, but doesn't point them to every podcast in the world. - DavidWBrooks 19:14, 21 Feb 2005 (UTC)

I just took out a couple of google search external links - people can do their own searches if they want to find software/discussion/whatever. All those news stories need to be trimmed, too; incredibly redundant (and those kind of links quickly get outdated)- DavidWBrooks 15:20, 24 Feb 2005 (UTC)

News links

Good grief, this article now has 20 external links to news articles at newspapers, Wired, etc. I am going to eliminate them all, unless anybody objects. They all say the same thing, add little information to this article, and half of them will be dead links in three months. We don't need any kind of external justification to do an article, and Wikipedia is not a link farm - DavidWBrooks 22:42, 1 Mar 2005 (UTC)

Fair enough. I've moved it here instead!  :-D —RaD Man (talk) 23:28, 4 Mar 2005 (UTC)

In the news


Repeated spamming by podcast411.com

The same person keeps spamming their podcast411.com link over and over again. Here are some Alexa rankings for comparison:

  1. ipodder.org - 25,897
  2. podcastalley.com - 58,991
  3. podcast411.com - 3,713,634

Night and day. —RaD Man (talk) 23:20, 4 Mar 2005 (UTC)

podcast411

The fact that we keep reverting your external link is not a comment about your site. 'Wikipedia is not a link farm - articles don't link to every Web site that has some connection to the topic at hand. If you'll look back at the history of this article, you'll see that lots of how-to sites and collection of links have been eliminated for the same reason. This article could have 500 external links to explainer and discussion sites about podcasting - that's not what wikipedia is all about. So please don't keep adding it; you're wasting your time, and ours. - DavidWBrooks 15:15, 6 Mar 2005 (UTC)

  • David, I thank you for your response and apologize for saying you called my link Spam.
I do however respectfully disagree with your assement that my link is inappropriate for this article. Actually I feel it is very appropriate. I supplied a link to a resoucre to teach people how to podcast. Clearly after reading the article on Wiki that would be something quite a few people would like to learn about. I agree you can not have every link out there on the site. But at least mine was to a very well regarded How To on podcasting. And to a site with Zero commercial content.
I am sorry for the readers of the Wiki article you and Radman have decided to remove this link and resource from the readers. I thought this was a community site. Clearly I was mistaken.
Per Radmans comments that my site is Spam - That clearly is a mistake on his part as he must not have looked at my site. Best Regards, Rob W (podcast411)
  • As I've mentioned at the top of this Talk page, and I'm mentioning right here, right now, the correct place to contribute a "How-to" in a community based environment would be WikiBooks, not Wikipedia. Here's the link once more. -> http://en.wikibooks.org/wiki/Main_Page —RaD Man (talk) 05:35, 10 Mar 2005 (UTC)

Where exactly in Wikibooks would that be? There is nothing about podcasting in Wikibooks.

Unsigned comment at 21:40, 10 Mar 2005 by User:63.174.30.178, who deleted -- twice -- the Alexa rank posting just above --Calton | Talk 00:27, 11 Mar 2005 (UTC)

Another individual site spammer

The user Roykamen continues to add his link to an individual podcast by "Marina - nationally renowned fitness expert".

This info is linked under external links as well as history.

I've added a note under external links to add podcasts to a directory listed. I don't think it's a problem to link to directories. It will only help Podcasting grow. But the individual linking is bad.

Roykamen added his Marina podcast under history as if to say that, with the addition of Marina's podcast, Podcasting has finally gone mainstream. Which is rather incorrect and of course, completely based on individual opinion.

Under History, I believe that the originators of Podacting should be linked, but no others. In no way is Marina an originator of podcasting and because of that, should not be included in this Wikipedia page.

I've deleted the link and reference about 5 times in the last 20 minutes, but it keeps getting added. I'm almost postive that if you are reading this and read the last line in History you will see what I'm talking about as well as under external links. It's a shame and I wish roykamen would read the discussion or history.

Sorry about that

I was unaware of the issues involved with this site and its purpose. I did not understand why my additions were being deleted until I read the history just now hence the multiple attempts. I do appreciate your keeping it real here. However I see by your connections to Atkins that you may be a bit biased about what we are doing with podcasting..... and yes... MARINA is making the first podcasts specifically for working out - and i believe that is history in the making. I also believe that it may be the first use of podcasting that indeed has the potential for widespread (dare i say mainstream) use since so many people across the board use their iPods and mp3 players for working out daily in the gym or walking or jogging and many listeners are saying the same thing to me. Some are saying it is the perfect use of podcasting and may just force it into the mainstream. I am going to do my best to make that happen as all of us podcasters should be doing.

Now, i am not sure how long you have been monitoring this site... are you the official moderator?

Please, create an account

If folks are going to disagree about this article (which is a good thing; that's what wikipedia is all about - people with different ideas reaching consensus) then PLEASE take a moment to find out how wikipedia works. For example, there are no "official moderators" on wikipedia - if you don't understand that, that misunderstanding is more likely. Start with Main page and poke around a bit!

And may I suggest that everybody creates an account for themselves, so we can keep track of who is saying what and when. (You don't have to give any personal information if you don't want to, not even your name or e-mail). See Wikipedia:Why create an account. I speak from experience that a debate among anonymous people quickly gets confusing because it's not clear who is responding. - DavidWBrooks 19:42, 11 Mar 2005 (UTC)

Okay, good - glad that's settled. :)

Roykamen,

I'm glad you have read the discussion. I apologize for sounding so angry, but I thought you were aware of someone deleting what you put in and just kept spamming.

You said, "However, I see by your connections to Atkins that you may be a bit biased about what we are doing with podcasting"

I'm not sure what that means, I see by your connections that you work out and you also Podcast, which is exactly what I do (Workout 3 hours a day, while listening to Aerobic Groove Podcast on my iPod, and I have a weekly Atkins Podcast.

Sorry about the off-topic rant that has no effect on this wiki term , I just took that as an attack. My fault if it wasn't.

Back to topic.

I have created an account a long time ago, but it never adds my name. I'm BrianZimm if it doesn't add it again. Any help with that would be appreciated.

signing posts

You can sign your posts by typing ~~~~ (four of those tilda thingies in a row) after it - that automatically puts down your name as a link to your page (if you want to create one) and the date/time, like this: DavidWBrooks 03:26, 12 Mar 2005 (UTC) .... If you don't type that, this forum threading software does not automatically add your name.

What is Aerobic Groove Podcast?

[Who is the "caster" in PodCasting] With PodCasting, the casting term better connects with the fly fishing analogy, where you focus on an interesting spot, cast your line precisely there, hook what's available, and reel it back to you. Because the acknowledged “father of podcasting”, Adam Currey, came from an MTV DJ job background, perhaps he felt that using the Web to deliver content directly to iPods was a new type of broadcast model. This raises the interesting question, who is the “caster” in the world of PodCasting? I contend that the casters are the listeners, not the website packagers of the audio file material!

The iPod (MP3 player) owners are out on the banks of the Web in their waders casting about for spots from which they can reel in some good listening material. Many sites are primarily streamers of audio material, but we can’t always be listening at the right times. So, for those sites that also package their audio streams into podcasts, a downloaded S/W tool (ipodder.exe) allows us to build links to the spots we like. It automatically checks our list of podcast enabled sites at regular intervals, hooks all available new listening material (using RSS scripts), reels back what it finds & packs it away in our PC/Mac's hard drive MP3 freezer, and ultimately transfers it to our iPod/MP3 player picnic baskets. Store, forward, archive and portable-ize (thru both space & time) our listening pleasure. RRLedford 00:24, 13 Mar 2005 (UTC)

How Podcasting might affect media consumption habits?

(This is my first ever Wikipedia post. Please redirect me if this is not the proper forum for this topic).

Would this work on Podcasting be an appropriate place to discuss how podcasting might alter news and entertainment habits in the future?

It seems that the user-centric model of users selecting media to play/read might also be combined with the interactivity of blogging, except the digital devices of the future may provide easy ways to create streaming audio/video in addition to text feedback.

Consider this scenario: Users subscribe to the "PodNews Network" for either a set amount per month or year or they purchase news stories for maybe $.50 to $1 for a 3-5 minute piece that includes professionaly quality streaming audio/video, more detailed text and supporting documentation, and a mechanism for reaction by other users. The user can watch/listen/read the news piece then post their own comments, audio commentary, or even streaming video (assuming handheld devices in the future provide a cheap and easy way to do this). The user's reaction is then appended to the story and made available to other users who download the piece. The user community for the news piece could even rank commenters on the news, meaning the more insightful users/commenteers would soon gain a niche following (similar to today's bloggers Hugh Hewitt, Daily Kos, and Instapundit).

Any thoughts? What would this mean for media consumers? For for-profit media outlets?

Wikipedia articles should not contain speculation about things that might happen in the future. An encyclopedia article gives people context about the current situation, the history of that situation, and the current situation in related areas, updated as circumstances change. What might happen in the future isn't really part of it. (There are, of course, a bazillion other places on the Web where speculation is encouraged - check out any podcasting forum!) --DavidWBrooks 13:19, 13 Mar 2005 (UTC)


Note to anon editor

Somebody just undid quite a chunk of editing by an anonymous editor because that editing removed all the wiki markup. I think that the anon cut-and-pasted the copy outside wikipedia, edited it, then cut-and-pasted the new version back inside wikipedia, losing all the markup in the process. So whoever you are, please do your editing within wikipedia! - DavidWBrooks 19:12, 21 Mar 2005 (UTC)

Thanks, David. I felt bad about reverting his/her work, but I didn't want to go back and incorporate it all. --Screetchy cello 21:23, Mar 21, 2005 (UTC)


Don't need to set up google searches in the links

People can do their own Google searches - we don't need to guess what they'll search for and program it into external links. --DavidWBrooks 15:03, 22 Mar 2005 (UTC)


I must be daft

I must be daft because I don't see how podcasting is all that novel of a concept. All it is are recordings of shows (which many stations, including many NPR stations, already do) with a new name. And all of a sudden that new name is supposed to make it new? and cutting edge?? Please. Someone please explain the difference.

With NPR, you have to go to their site, click on a link, and then listen to the content, which is streamed and not available for download. Podcasting is different because listeners can automatically download content and keep it for later listening. It's that "automatic download" part that makes podcasting different, since it allows people to transmit and receive content easily.
Also, please sign your posts with four tildes(~~~~) or by clicking the "signature" button at the top of the editing box. It makes it easier to follow conversations. Thanks. --Screetchy cello 23:05, Mar 28, 2005 (UTC)


External links and iPodder.org

If all of the external links get removed all the time, why does the section exist? Perhaps it should be removed entirely. I also wonder why iPodder.org gets a link when it clearly has a corporation profiting behind it. --MasterMaq 07:37, 25 Mar 2005 (UTC)

External links are always tricky - they may be the single most common area of dispute in wikipedia. They're particularly tricky in an article like this, where the subject matter is so new that it's changing before our eyes, and so the nature and shape of related Web sites is still changing. (There's not so much link dispute in articles about, say, Elizabethan poetry)
An external link should exist only if it adds important information or insight that's not found in the article and can't be easily found elsewhere on the Web, or if it connects to an important primary source, and if it doesn't exist primarily or largely as a commercial site. (We're not a link farm, so we don't need to deluge readers with every single option, but we're not an island unto ourselves, either.)
Having said this, it's obvious that the nature of an appropriate external link is subjective, like most other aspects of wikipedia. Hence the back-and-forth. We don't want to get rid of the section, but I'm sure it will continue to be contentious
As for iPodder, it is so important to the creation of podcasting that it seems to be an appropriate primary-source link, despite the commercial concerns. Perhaps that will change with time. --DavidWBrooks 13:01, 25 Mar 2005 (UTC)
This obsession with removing the external links is actually making this page less useful to the reader. It should include a link to Podcastalley for instance as this is probably THE best place to find out about popular Podcast shows. (I have no affiliation with Podcastalley) --Danielbroad 13:36, 25 Mar 2005 (UTC)
I respectfully disagree. This entry is supposed to contain information on what podcasting is, not where to get them. Anybody who wants to find out where to get podcasts can type "podcast" into Google and get a lot of hits, including Podcastalley. --Screetchy cello 22:02, Mar 28, 2005 (UTC)
Thanks for the response David. As long as people are monitoring it I suppose. I mean there is already advertising on iPodder.org, and like Daniel points out, it is no longer vital for finding podcasts. And you can't find software on the site either. Ignorning the fact that it may be commercial, I still don't find it that useful. --MasterMaq 09:42, 26 Mar 2005 (UTC)
It seems that there is a misunderstanding about the iPodder link. It seems like the link that should be included is this, http://ipodder.sourceforge.net/index.php, which is the source for the open source iPodder software application. iPodder.org shares the name, but is a commercial site, which doesn't really provide any content that expands on this article.


The links return!

Well, we've crawled back up to a dozen overlapping external links. None of them are obvious speedy-removals, but the sum total is no help for the reader - instead it's the "link farm" mentality, which throws up everything you can find and expects the reader to wander back and forth, figuring out what's usable. Not exactly the encyclopedia method. --DavidWBrooks 17:33, 31 Mar 2005 (UTC) Ô

I vote that links to podcast directories should be deleted. As I said above, anybody can type "podcast" into Google and get all the listings they need. They don't belong here, as they're not relevant to what podcasting is. --Screetchy cello 22:52, Mar 31, 2005 (UTC)
Excellent idea. --DavidWBrooks 02:04, 1 Apr 2005 (UTC)
You either have to list all the commercial sites like Lybsyn and BlogMatrix to name two, or none. It seems completely biased otherwise.
I'm pretty horrified by the bias in the latest Wikipedia AND all the links disappearing. And Dave Winer getting edited out completely
iPodder is not the only directory site - you've got to mention PodCastAlley and the rest, or none. And don't link to Apple - they were nothing to do with podcasting until very recently.
I would like to dispute this entry under the Neutral Dispute system - it's not neutral or factually true in places - this older archive is more factual and as I remember podcasting's start: http://web.archive.org/web/20041130005814/http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Podcasting [User:timbearcub]

Opening paragraphs

Orbst changed the first sentence to

"Podcasting" is the practice of making files (usually audio files) available online in a way that allows software to automatically detect new files (generally via RSS), and download them...

which I like better than the vague "broadcast medium", but I think podcasting isn't "usually" audio files, it is audio files. And the rest of the article refers to nothing but audio podcasts, so I felt it was confusing. I kept in the part about "other formats and other types of files, such as video, can also be podcasted.", so as the technology evolves, we might expand the definition, but I feel it's pretty safe to keep the definition to just audio files.

Other than that, I tried to reorganize the first couple of paragraphs, I felt they were pretty shaggy and didn't flow well.

Anybody have ideas about fixing the "History" section? I think it's also getting out of hand. --Screetchy cello 17:47, Apr 6, 2005 (UTC)

Good on the opening; certainly clearer. I suspect someone'll have to face the "does video count?" issue eventually; the article used to be all audio (as I recall) reflecting the vast majority of current practice. There's a "listen to or watch them at leisure" in the intro still that's potentially a little muddling, but hey. I have no idea about the history. My own main concern about this article is that it should tell the ignorant reader quickly up front just what "podcasting" is; the first time I encountered the article it left me more confused than ever. *8) --Orbst 01:11, 7 Apr 2005 (UTC)
Yeah, me too. That's how I got started as well! Oh well, I'll think on it. :) --Screetchy cello 05:44, Apr 7, 2005 (UTC)

I think the essense of Podcasting is "eliminating perceived latency in receiving large/binary files by pre-fetching them based on a channel-subscription model". So video would apply as easily as audio.

And, in researching some history from DaveWiner's site, I perceive the origins to be only video, because the files are so much larger. I think audio is the primary medium right now because it's easier to generate. BillSeitz 14:32, 15 Jun 2005 (UTC)

Most important points

It can be hard to 'get' podcasting just like many people don't 'get' whats so cool about Tivo until they try it. A podcast is simply an RSS subsription with enclosures. That explains it IF you know what that means! The practical meaning is audio that is automatically downloaded such that it syncs to an mp3 player, or for later listening on a PC. It is like subscribing to your favorite NPR show so that it is automatically put on your ipod the next time you sync it. I'm not sure the magazine analagy clarifies enough.

Video is not usually played on current mp3 players, so I would be hesitant to call them podcasts. Some software also adds bittorrent to the mix. This bandwith is less of a problem for the publisher and makes video more practical in terms of hosting bandwith. Blogs hosted mp3s before podcasting, but now we can sync them with ipods. I myself subscribe to a few shows. My iPod syncs and charges overnight, so that I have them for my morning commute, automatically.

I also agree that fewer links are better. Podcasting is so new that links to software and anything not of historical significance may quickly become outdated and would be better found on Google or the like. --Witeshadow 08:21, 9 Apr 2005 (UTC)

The efforts on the first sentence are much appreciated. I'm not really crazy about "Podcasting is a new term..."; it both makes the entry self-obsoleting, and seems too meta (podcasting isn't a 'term', it's something that people do). And is "syndication" a word that the average person will understand correctly here? (There are lots of meanings of "syndication" that mean other things entirely; RSS syndicatio nand the syndication of say newspaper columns or comicsare only very tenuously related.) And on "simply an RSS subsription with enclosures": podcasting doesn't necessarily involve RSS (think atom, general rdf, etc, etc, etc), and it's not the subscription that has the enclosures; it's the feed. But maybe I'm just in a picky mood this morning. *8) --Orbst 19:52, 10 Apr 2005 (UTC)
I should have added to "RSS subsription with enclosures" that RSS could be anything, and that it might take the form of something that is different than anything available now. And of course an "RSS subscription" IS the feed, sorta. The most important concepts are not so much the specific technologies (those that undertand what RSS is, may already know what podcasting is) as what happens with them. RSS just happened to be what was easiest at the time, since Dave Winer was involved. Undertanding RSS/Atom and the syntax of syndication is more related to RSS/Atom. This is about what podcating is. The geeky way of describing podcasting is "RSS subsription with enclosures", but those are some vague pieces to put together. That is not how I would explain it to my Grandpa. But I know that he could really get into podcasts if he found a "show" he really liked. Its like "Radio On Demand" meets Tivo and Blogs. Podcasting is simply telling a program to read an often updated list of files, and to have it download new things from it at a regular interval.
I do feel that podcasting is a specific term for the more general activity that could also include video and other media, but maybe under a different name. Podcasting is radio with almost no barrior to entry, at some point it could be TV too. What do we call it when a bittorrent tracker offers an RSS feed of attached files? Not the typical use of podcasting, but it has the same effect.
Audio blogging has been mentioned as well. The difference is that the RSS feeds have attachments so a program can automatically download the files. An Audio Blog, of course is a natural place for a podcast. --Witeshadow 04:17, 11 Apr 2005 (UTC)