You didn't think we'd launch a podcast site without also doing something to make it easy to get this stuff in Yahoo! Music Engine, did you?
The Yahoo! Podcasts Plugin does the job.
Plugins rock. And now that podcasts are finally being created by people I care about, I have to figure out when I'm gonna listen to this stuff.
Posted by jzawodn at October 10, 2005 12:36 AM
I just don't get it. For that matter, I largely don't get podcasts (I find most to be tedious, and typically discover that I can glean info and entertainment much faster by simply reading transcripts or articles).
Anyway, I went to the new Y! podcast page, pulled up a podcast (Ebert and Roeper), and found that I couldn't even skip forward. So instead, I just grabbed the mp3 URL, cut and pasted it into Windows Media Player (sorry, still like that better than YME, even though I am a happy YMU subscriber), and was able to easily skip to whatever part of the broadcast I wanted.
* * *
Seriously, I WANT to love the concept of podcasting. Everyone's a twitter about Odeo, iTunes podcasting, etc. etc. etc. But when do folks find the time to LISTEN to this stuff?! It's all I can do to just get through my blog feeds each day. And when I'm at the gym, I can't concentrate on podcasts anyway (if anyone can, they're not working out hard enough, IMHO).
Admittedly podcastingly-clueless,
Adam
Adam, you are not clueless, but you are like a green red color blind person to a same hue green red picture.
For you, it does not make sense at all. It is just gray. And you don't get everybody around you, who is excited. That is fine and perfectly normal.
Consider this: I can and do read large amount of documents. But I so much more can connect with the concepts or the background of it if I hear it. When I started to listen to podcast (in 5 days it will be one year), it was just this: WOW.
Wow, I love this. Wow, I will be able to subscribe to content I like in English and train my English through this. Wow, I would also like to do one myself to train my english. Wow, I love this - how many times a day can i give it a listen?
And I don't have the usual podcast communte time (mine is about 10 minutes from apartment to start the computer at work) or other extensiv times available.
Having light wight conversations for example are the perfect bed for me to switch into programming mode (seems as some levels of the brain are occupied then).
But that is me (and many others out there). The fact, that _you_ can't concentrate with a podcast does not mean than anyone cannot. I for example cannot have a TV running next to me (or a chat) and not focus on that. But with audio I can.
Many people can so much more connect with emotions in a voice than just with text - this is why podcasts are so powerful. And it is so much easier for many to follow voice than written word, many are not used to reading (and parsing) that much.
I have several people who said "now, that I got a Nano, podcast suddenly works!". Or "now that I discovered this programm - I like it!" And many still say "I don't".
Which is absolutly okay. It is about what you like best. But don't try to set your personal preferences as standard for everyone.
And as a producer, about what I like to produce, how I like to produce it. Sometimes it feels like a blog post, sometimes like a comment and sometimes like a podcast.
jytr: I have too many blogs and read about 900 feeds, so much for me not reading. ;)
Nicole
Podcasting is the greatest thing since sliced bread.
"But when do folks find the time to LISTEN to this stuff?!"
In their car or commuting to/from work. I spend 90 minutes in the car every day, and podcasting has changed that experience completely. Now I have an endless number of choices, in any number of languages. It's way better than normal radio which basically only gives you music (and only 3 or so varieties) and it's even better than satellite radio because it's like Tivo, you never miss what you want to listen to, and you can skip the boring parts.
Yahoo should make this a core function, not a plugin, and make it as easy as possible to transfer to the portable device.
Adam - I like to listen to Podcasts at night as I am getting ready to go to sleep, in the car on the way to work, in the gym... etc.
I do feel that there is a lot to be desired. Just because a certain technology opens up media distribution for the masses, doesn't mean I want to listen to the masses.
Since I am a Mac user i will probably stick with iTunes for my podcast needs, but I will say this... the first company that ponies up the cash to distribute This American Life podcasts will get my undying gratitude and devotion.
Not to mention huge buzz on the internets. (Yep. All of them.)
I understand all the hype surrounding the podcast launch. In general it's quite nice. Getting excited about having a plug-in for a second rate music app is a little premature. Yahoo Music Engine is slow, it crashes and it doesn't do enough to replace either Windows Media Player or iTunes. The Yahoo subscription service is awesome, but the whole experience could be better.
Why isn't Yahoo leveraging MusicMatch? It's one of the better music jukebox apps out there. Yahoo could deliver a more unified music store, music player and podcasting app similar to iTunes by upgrading MusicMatch in a minor way.
Jake said:
Why isn't Yahoo leveraging MusicMatch? It's one of the better music jukebox apps out there. Yahoo could deliver a more unified music store, music player and podcasting app similar to iTunes by upgrading MusicMatch in a minor way.
Have you used the latest version of Musicmatch (10.1)? I loved my old v8 but this latest thing is buggy as hell and a resource hog. YME has been working ok for me so far but I'm just starting with subscription music so the jury is still out on it.
