Matt May is a Web accessibility specialist, and has written on the interaction of people and technology since 1995. He keeps his own weblog at bestkungfu.com, and produces a podcast called Staccato, which features Creative Commons-licensed music.
Alex Williamsblogs, consults and produces unconference style events, where people immerse in DIY media. These are fun occasions, designed for people who want to get together with authors, artists, technologists and leading thinkers to converse, eat, listen to music, write, shoot photos and post podcasts and videoblogs. Alex also works with companies to establish DIY approaches, where writing, photography, voice and video come together to create new conversations and communities. Alex is currently fascinated with digital photography. His girlfriend calls him a Flickrholic. Send Alex a nice message: alexhwilliams at gmail.com.
Nicole Simon loves blogging and podcasting, dashed with an European view. As consultant she helps to facilitate such tools for business purposes or personal publishing empires. She can be found at cruel to be kind and on her private blog Useful Sounds.
Roland Tanglao is a well known podcasting enthusiast and a passionate advocate of blogs, RSS, and social software as a means of online expression for people, organizations and businesses. He is a prominent participant in the blogosphere and online communities and one of the founders of Bryght and as Bryght's Chief Blogging Officer reads hundreds of blogs daily. He graduated from the University of Waterloo, worked at Nortel Networks where he ran its first internal corporate blog, has has been blogging since 1999, and was the first business blogging consultant in Canada.
Check out the The AppGap - a group blog on the tools and trends that are changing the way we work.
This one seems to have come out of left field: Infinity, one of the major American radio networks, has reformatted an "underperforming" station in San Francisco... to play podcasts. KYOURADIO will launch on May 16th.
So much to say. I have to give credit to Infinity for experimenting with a format that not only can't be controlled by them, but didn't exist a year ago. The AP article admits they have little to lose by tapping a money-losing station for this, but it's still more newsworthy than the daily story about another local station's conversion to the Jack format ("It's like your iPod, on shuffle"). The article does note that Infinity itself is not in the best of shape, being the source of a nearly $11 billion chargeoff by its parent company, Viacom, so it's probably an auspicious occasion to start shaking things up.
There's been talk about selling satellite radio on the idea of an all-podcast channel, but in my opinion this is actually bigger news: a big, entrenched radio network, the kind most music podcasters started their shows to get away from, just took the bait. Let's just see if we can boat this bass. The implications of podcasts on the open airwaves, with the potential for lots of local flavor, is more empowering for more podcasters than having a handful of folks getting smashed somewhere between the French Chansons and Schnauzer Talk channels on satellite.
I wonder what radio DJs are thinking as they read this news. Is it realistic to lock unpaid podcasters with non-broadcast-quality equipment into regular shows, challenging the paradigm of the live studio jock and/or news room? Are we going to be held up as a bogeyman used to further limit the role of on-air talent at the station? Or are we seeing the beginnings of a hybridization, where the talent is a free agent, and the line between who is a podcaster and who is a DJ is blurred, or obliterated?
Days like this, it's fun to prognosticate. I thought I'd see news like this in two or three years, but not nearly so soon as this.
The advent of mp3 players with built in wifi so podcast listeners can swap podcasts on the fly will be the real turning point in this revolution.. not satellite or conventional radio.
For twenty years, I was a radio DJ. I got out about two years ago.
I think the rapid growth of podcasting is wonderful, and I applaud Infinity for it's leadership in giving podcasters a chance to reach a wider audience.
When I used to do my show, some of the most entertaining and informative content came from the audience-- people who were passionate about a variety of things that were outside our (the hosts) purview.
As for the effect on DJ's working today, I believe that while podcasters won't put them out of work (in the same way that cable didn't put the networks out of business), they should pay attention to the fact that their business is about to undergo a massive shift.
Alex Williams
Matt May
Nicole Simon
Roland Tanglao
1. Austin Blogger on April 29, 2005 9:26 PM writes...
The advent of mp3 players with built in wifi so podcast listeners can swap podcasts on the fly will be the real turning point in this revolution.. not satellite or conventional radio.
Permalink to Comment2. Bruce Barber on May 2, 2005 8:21 PM writes...
For twenty years, I was a radio DJ. I got out about two years ago.
I think the rapid growth of podcasting is wonderful, and I applaud Infinity for it's leadership in giving podcasters a chance to reach a wider audience.
When I used to do my show, some of the most entertaining and informative content came from the audience-- people who were passionate about a variety of things that were outside our (the hosts) purview.
As for the effect on DJ's working today, I believe that while podcasters won't put them out of work (in the same way that cable didn't put the networks out of business), they should pay attention to the fact that their business is about to undergo a massive shift.
Permalink to Comment