Colin Dixon, Senior Analyst, IP Media and Michael Greeson, Founder & CEO of The Diffusion Group have posted an essay entitled “Recasting the Concept of Podcasting: Part I.” The essay points out what many of us suspected, the vast majority of people consume podcasts on their computer (or not at all) as opposed to on a portable device. The authors cite a study by Bridge Data indicating 80% of podcasts never make it to a portable device. The essay focuses on the existing definition used by the New Oxford American Dictionary which includes “downloading to a personal audio player” and then goes on to suggest creating a new “understanding” of podcasting starting from scratch. As someone who was around when the term first was used (Dave Slusher’s September 18th, 2004 post regarding Dannie Gregoire’s “podcaster” user agent hitting his URL – now there is some podcasting history for you) I never presupposed it required a portable device; just that podcast files could make that migration. This was an added benefit hopefully leading to increased consumption. The authors correctly point this out in their article and make a distinction of what “podcasting” means now that Apple’s marketing team is involved.
The information is interesting. What is troubling is, in an article focused on the technical meaning of podcasting, the authors misuse the term “podcaster” and seem to have no idea what it means:
You mean to say that four out of five “podcasters” don’t consume podcasts on a portable device? You mean these are “poser podcasters”? ….(b) 80% of those who we call “podcasters” are nothing of the sort.
They have confused podcast listeners with podcasters, i.e., those who create and disseminate podcasts. This is akin to confusing a radio listener and a broadcaster. Why am I writing about this? Because The Diffusion Group has a number of studies focused on podcasting that are often referenced in the media. Since they hold themselves out as an authority, it is important that they are correct on such basic issues. This is the kind of stuff I usually just ignore, but anyone who sells their research reports on podcasting for $1495.00 a piece ([link] and [link]) has a duty to be right on these issues. I guess I just worry when the “experts†get the basics wrong. I’d be curious to see if their podcast research reports contain similar mistakes, but I just can’t justify spending three grand for the pleasure of proofreading them.
Oh dear! Your going up hill here, Michael 🙂 (sorry my english)
We need exact definitions of podcast, podcasting and podcatching, and I must say, there are a few unexact ones around.
New Oxford American Dictionary, which you refer to, got it wrong the first time, when they chose the word “podcast” as word of the Year 2005:
“a digital recording of a radio broadcast or similar
program, made available on the Internet for downloading to a personal audio
player,”
no RSS – just download? – maybe that was too complicated to grasp – better luck in 2006 🙂
I have, for my (however danish) study, defined “podcast” as the medium – like newspaper, radio, newsletter, etc.
“Podcasting” is the production of the medium – like broadcasting and publishing. And – you are so right. A podcaster is – like a broadcaster – the one who publishes podcasts.
AND the listener, the subscriber – is not a podcaster. We could call it the “podcatcher” – but that is among podcasters the word for an aggregator, so the problem might be, that there is no good word for, what we define as the podcast-listener/downloader/user/subscriber….
We need that, I think –
Therefore I have suggested to gather a konference panel at the EXPO in September, where the more theoretical matters, definitions, analysis of the medium, etc. can be discussed. A more academic, but authoritative, approach which could maybe add to eliminate the CONfusion, which among others the DIFfusion Group is adding to. 🙂
Good point Mike. What I’ve found is that the so called experts use the good names of their companies to anoint themselves as the leading information sources for new technology. Then they publish expensive white papers that include dubious information. These white papers are supposed to assist businesses with understanding the medium. Instead, they confuse people even more than they had been.
People who really know the medium need to speak up (as you are doing here) and disseminate the correct information. I’ve already begun efforts on a social media wiki that will allow the folks who know to post their knowledge on podcasting and other social media technologies. My hope is that the new (and true) experts will be seen as those who are actually using and applying the medium. As opposed to those who got their information from other expensive white papers and hearsay.
Aside from the definition or whether or not a podcast makes it to a portable player vs. the computer: I see this more about content. There’s a ton of utterly useless garbage out there I have to weed through to get to substantive content. So I download them (to my computer) to preview and then when I hear some bozo rambling about his neighbors (on a travel-tagged podcast) or ranting about their childhood (on a politics-tagged podcast) I dismiss it and move on. So no, it never made it to my portable device.
I don’t expect the polish of a commercially-produced radio broadcast, but I expect some semblance of topicality.
Most people subscribe after listening/previewing on their computer first. Why waste the time or the device space?
Just a note, nowadays about 99% of the podcasts I download make it to my portable device, and I’d guess that over 95% of my listening is done while away from a desktop computer…
Oh, I’ve also been downloading audio via RSS and putting it on a portable device for just over 2 years now. (My itconv.pl client has a date of Feb. 2004 on it.)