A Podcasting Blog from Podcasting Tools - Daily Podcasting News and Information for Podcasters and Listeners.

Daily Podcasting Blog and news related to podcasting, RSS, podcast news and aggregation. Information related to podcasts are added on a daily business and cover the gamut, from new podcast product announcements, podcast directories, marketing for podcasters and much, much more.

08/31/2005 Apple plans surprise: vPod? iTunes phone? Apple Computer plans a major announcement next week in San Francisco, sparking speculation that the company that revolutionized digital music will unveil a video-playing iPod or an iTunes mobile phone. The Cupertino company e-mailed an invitation to reporters Monday, alerting them to a ``special event'' Sept. 7 at Moscone Center. The invitation featured a close-up image of the watch pocket on a pair of jeans, and text that hinted at something big -- or more precisely, something compact.

08/30/2005 Podcasting Tutorial - Step By Step How to on Podcasting Step by Step ... How to Podcast Using FeedForAll Podcasting is simply an RSS feed that contains an MP3 or audio file in the enclosure tag. The following is a step by step tutorial that explains how to setup your podcast. Start a new RSS feed 1. Enter a title for the new feed/podcast 2. Enter a collective description of all the audio files contained in the podcast. 3. Enter the URL of the website or webpage you want associated with the podcast. Read the 12 step Podcasting Tutorial

08/30/2005 Another Apple Announcement? Apple Computer plans a major announcement next week in San Francisco, sparking speculation that the company that revolutionized digital music will unveil a video-playing iPod or an iTunes mobile phone. The Cupertino company e-mailed an invitation to reporters Monday, alerting them to a ``special event'' Sept. 7 at Moscone Center. The invitation featured a close-up image of the watch pocket on a pair of jeans, and text that hinted at something big -- or more precisely, something compact.

08/29/2005 Software Will Play Podcasts On Cell Phones Mobile software vendor Melodeo said Friday it is developing software that will locate and download podcasts to cell phones. The company said its Mobilcast software can be added to cell phones, although it did not say which phones would be supported. "The mobile phone is the perfect tool for finding and listening to Podcasts," Don Davidge, the company's senior vice president of sales, said in a statement.

08/26/2005 Voiceover Podcasts Using the InteractiveVoices proprietary voice-over job posting software, podcasters will be able to find, audition, and hire voice-over talent within a matter of minutes. This valuable podcasting tool organizes responses online with demos and quotes from a variety of qualified talent while sorting and promptly identifying talents that are most suited to their needs and that vocally match the overall vision of the podcast.

08/26/2005 Unicef is Podcasting The UNICEF Podcast is a new global radio service focusing on the health, education, equality and protection of children.

08/24/2005 Motorola gets FCC approval for iTunes phone Motorola is one step closer to launching its long-awaited iTunes phone. According to documents posted to the Federal Communications Commission's Web site on Saturday, Motorola has received regulatory approval to start selling a cell phone that runs a mobile version of Apple Computer's iTunes software. Complete Article

08/24/2005 Apple to face more competition for its iPod in the coming days Market experts believe that Apple has enough of the domination for its iPod range of music players and the iTunes digital music stores. The products expected to be out in the coming months would be capable enough to give a tough fight to the current leaders in the digital music player and webstore segment. However, Apple would be quite aware of the fact and is expected to take enough actions to please their fan base. Apple has been quite innovative with their approach in this market. Their products are sexy and quite innovative. They complement the online service from the same company so well, that people tend to buy the hardware product to be able to avail the facility to purchase songs from Apple iTunes. Complete Article

08/22/2005 Union Broadcasters Fight Back with a Podcast Podcasts are helping locked-out Canadian broadcasters route around the broadcast towers. Five days after being locked out of their broadcasting jobs, the broadcasters are creating shows again, with podcasts and a new website CBCUnplugged. On August 15th, the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation locked out 5,300 employees represented by the Canadian Media Guild, as a result of a standoff in an ongoing labor dispute.

08/22/2005 New Tools Available for Podcasting FeedForAll Mac - FeedForAll Mac launches, making it easy for anyone to create podcasts, RSS feeds for iTunes. FeedForAll Mac, a software tool designed to create, edit and publish RSS feeds and podcasts, has been released by NotePage, Inc. Now, with FeedForAll Mac, webmasters have the ability to create new RSS feeds and podcasts from scratch. Publishers can also modify and enhance existing RSS feeds and podcasts. rss2html.php v2.0 - Turn RSS feeds into a search engine friendly web page using rss2html.php. a free PHP script from the makers of FeedForAll. NotePage has just released a new rss2html.php script that allows webmasters to display RSS feeds on their websites.

08/22/2005 Podcasts and RSS Staying Up to Date Latest Articles Related to RSS - RSS' Copyright Debate - RSS is commonly defined as really simple syndication. So, this means that any material contained in a feed is available for syndication, right?. Do Marketers Really Need RSS? - The recent Forrester Research study, which claims that only 2% of online households in North America use RSS, took the internet marketing world by storm. Does this data really mean that marketers can still afford to ignore this channel? The Future of RSS is Not Blogs - Blogs vaulted RSS into the limelight but are unlikely to be the force that sustains RSS as a communication medium. The biggest opportunities for RSS are not in the blogosphere but as a corporate communication channel. RSS vs Email - Although RSS and blogs are slowly reaching mainstream, they are still missuderstood by most marketers in relation to eachother and in relation to their relatives, e-zines and e-mail. How do these four really relate and what does this mean for your internet marketing strategy?

08/22/2005 Software Will Play Podcasts On Cell Phones Mobile software vendor Melodeo said Friday it is developing software that will locate and download podcasts to cell phones. The company said its Mobilcast software can be added to cell phones, although it did not say which phones would be supported. "The mobile phone is the perfect tool for finding and listening to Podcasts," Don Davidge, the company's senior vice president of sales, said in a statement. According to a demonstration on the company's Web site, the software will connect to a server and look for updated podcasts. The software will display all available podcasts and the user can select the one he or she wants. The company's Web site said the Mobilcast software will be available in September. Complete Article

08/18/2005 Turn Down the Volume According to researchers at Sydney's National Acoustic Laboratories, one out of four iPod users is damaging their ears by blasting audio at unsafe levels. The researchers found that about 25% of those surveyed listened to their players at volumes similar to small power tools. The team predicts increased levels of tinnitus as a result.

08/18/2005 Air Force Podcast For the first time, the Air Force is using the Internet and digital technology to podcast its radio news. “We’re excited that Airmen, civilians and their families can now hear our daily updates whenever and wherever they want,” said Tech. Sgt. Ryan Hoke, of the Air Force Broadcasting Service. "The Air Force News team works hard to make sure the information in 'Around the Air Force' is useful to our audience. Now it’s much easier to get to as well.” Complete Article

08/15/2005 Presidential Podcast The President of the United States' radio show is now available via podcast. From its roots almost exactly one year ago. Podcasting has certainly become mainstream, occurring on a much more frequent basis. In his weekly radio address President Bush said, "The terrorists cannot defeat us on the battlefield. The only way they can win is if we lose our nerve. That will not happen on my watch. Presidential Podcast

08/08/2005 From The Street - Apple and Google Shake Hands? According to market chatter, Apple is set to announce a deal with Google calling for Google to offer Apple's iTunes music store through its own site. The rumored deal would pair the nation's leading online music store with its leading search engine. There's "speculation of an iTunes launch," says Paul Foster, an options strategist at Theflyonthewall.com. "Google is going to offer iTunes somehow on their platform," according to the rumor, he says. Complete Article

08/15/2005 Podcasting 101 Everywhere you turn online these days you hear the word "podcast" or "podcasting." No, it's not some broadcasting method used by Martians, even though it might sound like it. A Podcast is just an audio file that is syndicated via an RSS feed, that you download and listen to with your computer or a portable device such as an iPod. What makes it different from an ordinary RSS feed is the audio component included in the "enclosure field." Think of it as a feed that talks to you. Podcasting 101

08/12/2005 10 Tips for Improving Your Podcast In this article, I'm going to do a little condensation of the content in the book and give you ten ways to improve your podcasts. There is no priority to their listing, though the first five tips cover some of the basics: getting a good microphone, proper microphone technique, show preparation, reducing noise, and formats; the latter five are more concerned with the content of your show. All are practical methods for improving both the sound and the content of your show. Top 10 Tips for Podcasting

08/12/2005 Venture Capital in Podcasting Investors give the green light to podcasting meeting and sees green in its future. High-profile investors pump money into two startups that helped pioneer the grassroots broadcasting medium. Two podcasting startups have won venture capital funding, a sign that both the promise and the hype is building for a grassroots broadcasting phenomenon that started just about a year ago. Podshow, led by former MTV host Adam Curry, who helped invent podcasting in July 2004, received $8.85 million in funding from Kleiner Perkins and Sequoia Capital, Private Equity Week reported Wednesday. In another sign of podcasting’s growing stature, eminent Kleiner VCs John Doerr and Ray Lane are joining the company’s board, the publication said. Miami-based Podshow is a project of Mr. Curry and Ron Bloom’s Boku Communications. The second company to announce funding Wednesday was San Francisco-based Odeo, led by repeat entrepreneur Evan Williams, who created the Blogger service which is now owned by Google. Charles River Ventures led the round; the sum was not disclosed. The round also included Amicus Ventures, and individuals including Mitch Kapor, Joe Kraus, Tim O’Reilly, Ron Conway, and HotorNot’s James Hong. Complete Investment Article

08/11/2005 Podcasting Makes it into the Oxford English Dictionary Podcast has made it into the Oxford English dictionary today. Podcasts and podcasting has exploded of late and is proving popular with the iPod generation the dictionary addition is simply an acknowledgement of the success of podcasting.

08/10/2005 CBS Looking for Podcasters CBS has announced a Podcasting Call. The network is searching for an "amateur DJ" to interview CBS stars and create a podcast about the upcoming fall season. The podcaster will join top DJs at the CBS Radio Junket on September 10 in Hollywood to interview CBS talent for the podcast, which will be made available to listeners via CBS.com and Infinity Broadcasting’s San Francisco-based KYOURADIO, the world’s first-ever podcasting radio station. For consideration, podcasters need to upload a mock three-minute interview. Details are provided at the CBS.com

08/10/2005 One Small step for Podcasting Technology experts who predicted that podcasting would "take off" have been proven right, literally, with a Discovery shuttle astronaut transmitting a message from space. While preparing to return to Earth, Mission Specialist Steve Robinson recorded the 3½ minute clip - the first podcast from orbit, according to NASA.

08/10/2005 Apple Computer has announced it will refund the Piracy Tax the Canadian government put on every iPod sold in the country. Although the Canadian Supreme Court declined to hear a challenge to a lower-court ruling that the tax--a levy put on all recordable blank media, such as tapes and CDs, to compensate the music industry for piracy--was unlawful, the levy had affected new iPod buyers for more than a year. Apple said it will be refunding the levy, which was first introduced in 2003, to its Canadian customers shortly. The company said in a statement: "Apple is pleased that the Supreme Court of Canada let stand a lower court ruling that blank media levies on iPods are invalid and will shortly announce a claims process so customers can request a refund for the levies they paid."

08/09/2005 IBM Podcasts to Customers Progress reports, product updates and other information will be posted in podcast format. Big Blue is getting hip. Just a few months after adopting a corporate blogging policy, IBM is latching onto another hot tech trend, podcasting. Last Friday the company posted the first podcast in a new series aimed at sharing its researchers' views about the evolution of technology in various fields.

08/09/2005 Podcast Connect Award Winners The 2005 People's Choice Podcast Award Winners are as follows: Peoples Choice: This Week In Tech Best Produced: Daily Source Code Business: Media Artist Secrets Podcast Comedy: Distorted View Daily Cultural / Political: Free Talk Live Education: Tips from the top floor Food and Drink: Good Beer Show General: illinoise! Gaming: Orange Lounge Radio - To Go Health / Fitness: MARINA's Walking & Aerobics Podcast Mature: Dawn And Drew Show Movies / Films: TheForce.net Music / Radio: Coverville Non English: Annik Rubens: Schlaflos in Munchen Religion / Inspiration: Catholic Insider Sound Seeing: The Richard Vobes Radio Show Sports: 1954 and Counting Technology: This Week In Tech Top Rated: Slice of SciFi World News: Kathleen Keating Podcast Connect received over 100,000 nominations which resulted in a slate of 482 nominated podcasts.

08/08/2005 Financial Content FinancialContent, Inc. has announced that the Company is seeking beta-testers for StreetIQ.com. StreetIQ.com will offer financial podcasts that draw from many of the Internet's top sources for business news, market commentary, investment opinions and public company conference calls. The concept looks similar to that at Financial Investment Feeds, a directory of finance and investing RSS feeds.

08/08/2005 PodcastAwards.com has announced the winners of the 2005 People's Choice Podcast Awards. Congratulation Winners! What an amazing contest. All of the detailed statistics to be announced at PodcastConnect.com. Expect prizes to to be distributed within 30 days with special awards to be given at Podcast Expo. Winners and Nominees send e-mail to podcastawards@gmail.com with the subject Winner/Nominated (Category) include name address and telephone number.

08/08/2005 Display Your Podcast Feed on a Website Turn your Podcast feeds into a search engine friendly html web page using RSS2HTML.php. The new rss2html.php script helps webmasters syndicate content contained in podcast feeds. Using rss2html.php webmasters can customize the format and look of the web page created from the RSS feed. The Podcast's contents can easily be integrated into an existing website's theme. The rss2html.php script parses the Podcast's RSS file, extracts the pertinent information, formats it, and serves it up as regular HTML. The new version of rss2html.php has new options to allow it to run on secure web servers. It can be run on any webserver that can run PHP scripts, and it support feeds in the RSS 2.0, 1.0, .93, .92, .91, and .90 format. The new version optionally uses curl rather than fopen, to address any security concerns that webmasters might have.

08/08/2005 Yahoo Rolls Out Digital Music Search Engine First it was photos, then video, now music. Yahoo is the first major portal to introduce a search engine dedicated to finding music and other audio files on the Internet. The Aug. 3 launch is the latest effort by Yahoo and other Internet search portals to organize the growing number of multimedia files on the Web. One of the key features of the new search tool is its ability to scan the music libraries of almost all legitimate online services selling digital tracks.

08/04/2005 Apple Opens ITunes Music Store in Japan Apple Computer Inc. launched its music download service, the iTunes Music Store, in Japan on Thursday with 1 million songs, the maker of the hit iPod portable player said. Apple's announcement for the online music store was made in a nation that's home turf for Sony Corp. and other Japanese electronics makers.

08/04/2005 Yahoo Audio Search Yahoo has launched a new audio search that searches podcasts!  The Audio Beta claims to "Find any audio file on the Web."

08/02/2005 iPods and Nightclubs are In And now the iPod craze has hit nightclubs. At the bosco's noWax Wednesdays, launched in June, guest DJs who've brought their MP3 players take a number. When it's their turn, they plug their player in and the whole club hears three of their songs. The fun is in laughing at a bad song, marveling at a great, forgotten hit, or peeking over a person's shoulder to spy on their playlist. Complete Article

08/02/2005 Podcast Hints from MarketingSherpa Podcasting, RSS feeds, blogs... David Lawrence, host of Online Tonight with David Lawrence, has experimented with them all to extend the reach of his radio show which has 4 million regular listeners. Lawrence was one of the first broadcasters to put daily audio newscasts online, which he delivered via email. "I knew that the attachment limit on most ISP's was one megabyte, so I figured out how long I could talk, and it was 10 minutes and 40-some seconds, so every morning, people would get GeekSpeak and Tech News in their in-boxes." Incidentally, that's about the same amount of time you get a listener's attention on a podcast, he says. Lawrence shared his thoughts on some of the new advertising models: how to advertise within them and how to use them successfully without branding yourself clueless. http://www.marketingsherpa.com/sample.cfm?contentID=3042

08/02/2005 Apple Reorders Popular iTunes Playlist reports that Apple changed the way it lists its most popular podcasts in the iTunes Music Store over the weekend, using the term “Today’s Top Podcasts” in place of “Top Podcasts.” The move came shortly after Adam Curry noted that the “Top Podcasts” list was time-based, rather than an aggregate figure.

08/01/2005 Did Google Make a Mistake? Is it possible that Google, Silicon Valley's golden tech company of the (Internet) moment, actually made a mistake? Silver Lake partner and famed Silicon Valley VC Roger McNamee thinks so: ``How did Google miss podcasting?'' McNamee demanded last week during a gathering at an event, ``Legends in Internet & New Media,'' sponsored by The Indus Entrepreneurs, or TiE. Shortly after launching a directory of thousands of free podcasts on its iTunes online music store, Apple reported more than 1 million podcast subscriptions, he noted to the networking group. ``In one day, they won,'' McNamee said of Apple. ``Google whiffed on it.'' AOL GETS HIP TO RSS: It's slightly ironic that America Online is just now introducing an RSS feed aggregator service, since it was Netscape that led development of RSS waaaay back in the day, and AOL owns Netscape. Nevertheless AOL has finally hopped on the RSS bandwagon, now that it's pushing its services out from behind its fabled walled garden. The service is called My AOL, and it's not unlike My Yahoo, in concept. It's a page that users can customize with content from really simple syndication feeds.