Podcasting Hacks

Foreword

Podcasting rules.

Well, no. It actually doesn’t rule. In the world of online media, hyperbole often seems to be the principal coin of our realm.

But podcasting is one of the most important developments to hit the scene in a long, long time. It is the marriage of several genres, including weblogs, audio, radio, and TiVo-ish devices. It is made possible by the ever-powerful forces of technological progress, competitive instincts, and—this is key—our perfectly human wish to express ourselves.

Podcasting, simply put, is the idea of downloading an MP3 audio file to a digital device and listening to the program—a song, a lecture, a rant, whatever—at a time and in a place of your own choosing. Although the favorite audio device of our times is Apple’s iPod, the word “podcasting” is actually miscast because we don’t need an iPod to listen. For example, I listen to podcasts on my mobile phone, the device on which I now also listen to music.

Like almost everyone else reading these words, I’ve been a radio listener since my early days. In my car, the radio is one of the most indispensable devices. But the radio has always been a purely linear medium: to hear an entire show or song or segment, you listened to its beginning, its middle, and its end.

Audio remains a mostly linear form in any medium, whether broadcast or on the Net or, now, on podcasts. But digital audio is freeing us from the tyranny of live—the days when we had to listen to the programming as it was being broadcast if we ...