Earth: Mostly Harmless

Interesting podcasts

I just found out via TUAW that The Economist has a podcast [Podcast XML feed].

Also worth listening to in this list are Grammar Girl [Podcast XML feed] [iTunes subscribe]; Mark Kermode’s film reviews [Podcast XML feed] and NPR Music Podcast [Podcast XML feed] [iTunes subscribe].

I love the internet.

‘The Podcast Revolution’

This is a story I wrote for publication in my University’s student newspaper. It went out in the 16th October edition of the Strathclyde Telegraph. My thanks go out once again to all my interviewees.

South Kent College has become the latest institution to issue MP3 players to students. The college is issuing iPod nanos to enable learners to download lectures and other content from the college through podcasting technology. Podcasting, for the unfamiliar, is a system of distributing audio or video via web ‘feeds’, where new content is made available automatically to feed subscribers with ‘podcatching’ software such as iTunes or Juice.

Typically, this content is then synchronised onto a music player for listening. Mark Hunter, creator of the popular tartanpodcast (http://www.tartanpodcast.com), is enthusiastic about the medium’s educational potential. “Versatility is embedded in what podcasting is - user-created content. That means that every user can create content unique to them: their tastes; their passions; their vision; their message”.

South Kent is not alone in recognising the power of podcasting: many educational institutions now have podcasting schemes. Some, like Stanford and Wisconsin-Madison University, have set up ‘iTunes U’ sites with Apple’s assistance. Others, such as the University of Western Australia have created bespoke systems: UWA’s solution is now marketed commercially as ‘Lectopia’. By all accounts, both types are extremely popular. Indeed, the Wisconsin-Madison programme was initiated as a result of student and staff demands.

The policy of institutions distributing MP3 players to students is more contentious. The first institution to do so on a large scale was Duke University in North Carolina, where media reports suggested that students and staff were failing to take full advantage of the devices. A report in Duke student paper ‘The Chronicle’ even contained a plea for the programme to be scrapped, according to Christian Science Monitor. Beginning with the current semester, Duke will instead lend the devices to students, with a fee charged to those wishing to retain players after term.

Meanwhile at Strathclyde, some academics have been pushing forward with podcasting. Kevin O’Gorman, PhD student at the School of Hospitality and Tourism Management, is creating ten video podcasts based on BBC archive material thanks to Higher Education Academy funding. The ‘Talking Hospitality’ collection takes in such themes as the 1936 Berlin Olympics and the indigenous hospitality of the Bedouin peoples. The BBC programmes were sourced through Spoken Word Services at Glasgow Caledonian University (http://www.spokenword.ac.uk).

Does this new technology pose risks to the traditional relationship between lecturer and student? Hunter sees podcasting as a way to “augment traditional learning” rather than replace it. O’Gorman concurs, seeing the mechanism as “another space for learning and teaching”. Lack of appropriate written evidence on subjects of interest led him to look elsewhere, and “constructing podcasts from BBC programmes has been a particularly rich theme”, he attests.

A wider podcasting strategy at Strathclyde is currently in development, according to Prof. James Boyle, Academic Champion for Teaching & Learning Through Technology. “Mobile devices, including the ability to work with podcasts, will have a major role in the future”, Prof. Boyle explains. He notes that Strathclyde has plans for deploying infrastructure to support technologies like podcasting: “Learning Services also recognise that their existing Streaming server (for streamed video and audio) should be extended to allow podcast downloads”.

The opportunity to be Scotland’s leader in academic podcasting is still within reach, if staff and students are willing to embrace the medium soon. Persuading them to do this shouldn’t be hard: Hunter suggests that part of the appeal of podcasting is the masses of free content for MP3 players. And who could say ‘no’ to that?

By Graeme West


9th October 2006

Winer Whines to ‘Dixie’

Okay, yesterday I noted the need to sort the “wheat from the chaff” in blogs and podcasts. Now, you wouldn’t expect Dave Winer, pioneer of blogging, XML-RPC Frontier and Manila, to come into the ‘chaff’ category - but yesterday’s podcast is pretty dubious!

Scan forward to 1m 55s, and you’ll hear Dave’s… rendition of ‘Dixie’ - him ’singing’ with a MIDI file (played through a terrible software synth)…

On today’s podcast I ponder…:
On today’s podcast I ponder the possibilities for tomorrow’s broadcast podcast for KYOU-AM in San Francisco. More singing this time with the MIDI of Dixie. You’ll have to wade through it to get to the talk. Also includes philosophy from Ed Cone and Rogers Cadenhead.

(Via Scripting News.)

Winer also posted an expletive-laden entry criticising Adam Curry’s claims to have invented Podcasting:

I winced a half-dozen times reading this interview with Adam Curry. He didn’t invent podcasting, he didn’t figure out that RSS would be a good transport. And he didn’t write the first iPodder. Here’s what Adam actually did do. He figured out the last yard was important and worked tirelessly to get people to listen to him. I was the only one who did, and I turned that idea into RSS with enclosures, and wrote the first iPodder, in 2001, three years before Adam claims to have done all this stuff. I never denied him credit for his role in this work, quite the opposite, I praised him every way I could for his insight. I also did regular podcasts for a couple of months before he started. He was listening to them, calling me all the time, ecstatic at how I was reinventing radio. There are a couple of ideas in Daily Source Code that didn’t come from me, and for that Adam deserves full credit and our thanks. But these lies have gone on and on, he just doesn’t stop.

He then threatens to:

kick him in the ass, and then look him in the eye and say “Shouldn’t have lied so much, dickhead.”

Someone has not taken all of zee pills zis morning, no?