What is podcasting?

What is podcasting?

In brief, podcasting is a blog read aloud. Just as a simple blog - you write down whatevr you like and publish it for the others, but - as a sound file. And anyone can download and enjoy it. As simple as that.
The word "podcasting" includes two components: ipod + broadcasting.

Why do we need it?

It depends on who are "we"!
One who reads (well, listens to...) the blog now may listen though blog entries, when they have to look at something else (some red-tape docs or such), or in public transport or just lying on the sofa. You may make an exclusive radio-program for a whole day, and listen only to your favourite voices.
One who writes may finally get the opportunity to talk to the world. Then, you may say your news and opinions quicker than if you type them. And, finally, a podcast is alive! This is not those emotionless letters, but your own voice. Even if there is some noise or lapses, it is your manner of speech, your intonations and your pitch. All this gives you the nearest contact with the readers (oops, I mean, listeners).

Listening to podcasts.

A podcast is a simple sound file, which you may simply upload to your player and enjoy listening. But (!) you make do this in an even easier and more convenient way. All you need is a magic three-letter combination RSS Well, and
a program to load this RSS. E.g. - GreatNews(http://www.curiostudio.com/download.html), FeedDemon(http://www.bradsoft.com/feeddemon/)or OmeaReader(http://www.jetbrains.com/omea/download/reader.html). As soon as you have subscribed to an RSS-feed with podcasts, you'll start receiving them as "attachments" in rss-messages, and never miss something interesting and important. If, by a lucky chance, you are an owner of iTunes(http://www.apple.com/itunes/download/), it will make everything for you: player version 4.9 and higher have the Subscribe To Podcasts option.

Well, how to do this?

Not difficult at all. First, you need the necessary hard- and software. Any microphone (huh, not any, of course, but, hope, you'll choose one yourself) will do as the hardware. The software is the freeware and compact Audacity (welcome at: http://audacity.sourceforge.net/ ).
Download, install, launch and see the following picture, or such:

Now, listen to the procedure:

Step 1 (setting - only once): Click the "Edit" menu, there choose "Preferences..." (the bottom one) or simply press Ctrl + P. A window will appear. In this window we need the following:

Section "Quality": set "Default Sample Rate" � 22050Hz.

Section "Formats": if below is written "MP3 exporting plugin not found", download http://www.webhostxpress.net/%7Emitiok/lame-3.96.1.zip, unzip it to a safe folder (say, C:\lame\). Then press the "Find library" button and specify where this file is. Then set Bit Rate as 96.
Press "OK". That's all. Now we'll get small files which fit voice recording best.

Step 2 (recording a file)
Everything is simple. Press "record" (a big red circle) and tell the mic your clever (or funny, or useful, or whatsoever) thoughts.

If you stop and then restart the record, it will be recorded from the very beginning. If you want, however, resume an interrupted speech, simply point your mouse to the end of the record, and only then start recording.

Step 3 (listen to what is ready).
No surprises here - press "Play" (green triangle) and listen to the record. And you just throw it away if you don't like it. But if you do...

Step 4 (saving).
To publish your record at a blog, you should saved it first. In the "File" menu choose "Export As MP3" (if you recorded the message at several attempts, you'll see a "Your tracks will be mixed down to a single mono channel" message). Then we indicate the path to the file and its name.

(Apropos, when inventing a file name, think of your listeners. If they load scores of podcasts to their player, how will they recognize them later on? You may be very kind to put here the date, the author and the podcast name, e.g.: 2005-11-28-Administrator-FirstPodcast.mp3)
Now we'll type the info of our nice selves. It will accompany the mp3 file:

(it's not obligatory to fill in all the blanks, but it would be nice at least to say who is the author and what is the topic)

Step 5 (publishing)
Now click "Upload podcast" in your blog (in the lower part, under the box for a new entry). Indicate the podcast file (before publishing - check if it's under 10 Mb!!!) and the name of your entry. Heh, it's even easier than to insert images.
That's all! Now your podcast may be listened to whenever, wherever and by whoever.

Would you try it?
Categories: Podcasting

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What is podcasting?