Comments on: Could Kelner be right about podcasting?

By: Olly

Olly — Fri, 23 Mar 2007 12:51:22 +0000

Surely Simon Kelner has met his brother, who does a weekly podcast?

On Richard Fiarhurst’s point about the Guardian’s Media Talk - I tend to listen to it on the train journey into work… it’s easier to access than a newspaper on a tube and also you get a sense of involvement that you don’t with written content.

It’s just a different way of delivering content; I don’t think one is necessarily better - it’s just what people prefer.

By: David Burckhard

David Burckhard — Thu, 22 Mar 2007 16:35:43 +0000

Indeed, the single number alone doesn’t tell the whole story. Consider just how podcasting has spread throughout the under-graduate schools and podcasting’s use in business, especially business-to-business which mostly ignores the “Internet Radio” model with its attendant commercial advertisement as a means for gathering revenue and you have the potential for explosive growth. I think what we’re seeing now is a levelling off of Podcasting as a vanity broadcasting medium and only the beginning of podcasting and subscription RSS feeds used as another viable business and organizational medium.

By: Richard Fairhurst

Richard Fairhurst — Thu, 22 Mar 2007 10:46:10 +0000

There’s a big difference between podcasting as timeshifting, which is what the BBC does and what Adrian Monck refers to; and podcasting as new content.

Timeshifting is a major innovation and has made the daily commute more pleasurable for thousands of people. It’s radio evolving for the Internet generation.

But the new content, which I think Kelner was referring to, is _generally_ a bit of a dud. Why indeed would you want to listen to stream-of-consciousness Heffer rants, when you can read a more thoughtful article of his in a quarter of the time?

By the same token, I get exasperated every time the Guardian plugs one of its “Media Talk” podcasts. I fail to see why I should waste half an hour of my time just because they can’t be bothered to spend some time transcribing it into a two-minute read.

By: Tom Webster

Tom Webster — Wed, 21 Mar 2007 18:12:34 +0000

In some circles, 32 million is a honkin’ big number. It all depends on your frame of reference.

Cheers,

Tom

By: Chris

Chris — Wed, 21 Mar 2007 17:06:39 +0000

13% of Americans is more than 32,000,000 people, which isn’t a tiny tiny number…

That said I’m not convinced about podcasting. I think it works better in some sectors than others, specifically tech.

By: Adrian Monck

Adrian Monck — Wed, 21 Mar 2007 11:01:26 +0000

Update: Telegraph's Shane Richmond thinks it does exist...

By: Tom Webster

Tom Webster — Wed, 21 Mar 2007 01:10:37 +0000

To be precise, the stat about paying for content referred to the fact that 40% of podcast listeners had ever paid for “digital content”, such as a song from the iTunes music store, and not for a podcast per se, which would no doubt be significantly lower. We’ll have the full report up on our site later this week for you to link to properly, which will hopefully clear up a lot of confusion.