ten billion butterfly sneezes

Several coworkers got shiny new iPods under the tree a few days ago, and several of them are using the word “podcast” in complete sentences now. Just a scant year ago, I was explaining podcasting to a small group during a post-work bull session. The consensus then was “I don’t have an iPod, so I can’t participate.” I explained that iPods were at optional item; evidently I was not clear enough, or persistent enough, in my explanation.

Now, though, I’m getting a lot of questions about how to find podcasts, what podcasts are good, etc, etc. The iTunes store has been a source of choice for several; they were already familiar with iTunes, and it was a natural progression to seek out podcasts there. If Apple did nothing else for podcasting, they certainly brought it into a lot of folks’ awareness.

Some with a little more podcast listening experience say they haven’t found that many that interest them. I mentioned they should check out AmigoFish. I explained the concept¹, and told them to rate what they’d heard, get some predictions. Listen, rate, repeat. It really doesn’t take that long to get some decent predictions from AF.

Lastly, another coworker hacked up the Sage RSS reader FFX extension to automatically update subscribed feeds on on a user-specified time period. So, now I get asked, what do you subscribe to? What should I subscribe to? What can I subscribe to? My answer is “If you read any website on a daily basis, odds are they’ve got an RSS feed. Click the Sage magnifying glass, and it’ll find it.” They just can’t believe the ease of use, and love the fact they can follow more stuff in less time. And all without visiting the website. I’ll point out the virtues of full feeds to them later.

It says somewhere that a “little child shall lead them.” The last few days, in this limited arena, it’s been this grizzled old guy. I like that.

-k-

1 - Chief amongst this explanation was that the Fish is not some cheesy, hoked-up popularity rating scheme. Simple rating schemes abound, and have some utility for someone just starting out in podcast listening. Kinda like using WikiPedia as a springboard to better information.

Technorati Tags: AmigoFish, RSS