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9 Responses to “Feeder 1.2 Released with Full iTunes Support”

1. 1 Austin Aug 23rd, 2005 at 4:51 pm

   Paul:

   I kind of wish that podcasters would get to the next step of understanding their audience and significance of effective communications through the medium. For instance, the naming, description, and summary of podcasts seems to be rarely understood by many podcasters offering their programs either in the Apple iTunes Store podcast section or on web sites.

   Podcast programs need unqiue yet descriptive titles like, to use another medium, magazine stories. We give magazines stories titles so the reader can immediately get a sense for the article’s essence, search for the story in the contents and remember it when they go back after being interrupted by everything spinning around. Podcasters don’t seem to get this contetualization of information. Few have a good index or effective referencing system.

   When I am looking in my iTunes list or in the window in my podcast, it means nothing to me and is in fact confusing to have the name of the podcast “The Point No. 38″ and then under the description “Macs-Final Cut Pro-Post Production-Audio, Podcast for Aug. 22 2005…” That is about the same as picking up Newsweek magazine on the newsstand and on the cover it says “Feature Story No. 46″ and then you go to the contents and it says “Interesting feature sotry about America for the week Aug. 22, 2005…” at this point I am lost and uninterested and I put the magzine down. And then I see another publication that says “JLo Mad at Ben” and on the contents I see maybe a pic of JLo & Ben, the subhead, “Couple Breaks Bond” and then page 12 or whatever.

   Okay, so I’m not going to buy that magazine either but do you see how much more informative the second instance is and how it is a stepping stone path that leads you into the content of the story? Most podcasts don’t get this and all of the tagging information is generic at best and totally lacking any description.

   When Feeder asks the title, description, and summary the podcaster has to put the right information in there to assist the listener and invite them into the story. It is lacking a basic understanding of the inverted pyramid and more importantly WHY that structure is important for cognitive recognition and understanding.

   If you look at some of the best podcasters — you are one — Franlkin McMahon’s Media Artist Sectrets, Chris Marquardt’s “Tips from the Top Floor” and “IT Conversations,” ust to name a few, they all kind of miss the boat in terms of getting this context and referencing system to better assist their listeners.

   Feeder can help with this but it is also a rudiment of style and type. In journalism there is a Chicago Book of Style and the New York Times Sytle Book, etc. Podcasters need to develop conventions that aid the listener.

   That’s my 2 cents…

   – Austin

2. 2 Administrator Aug 23rd, 2005 at 5:36 pm

   Austin,

   Point taken. Recently I started adding a more specific ‘description’ referencing each episode. [37-40].

   As far as the Title of each broadcast, [ThePoint 38], are you suggesting more of a ‘headline’ style title for each specific episode?

   Personally, I never read descriptions of podcasts. Makes no difference to me if the program is something I consistently tune in to. This holds true with NPR Radio programs as well. I listen to ‘The Leonard Lopate Show’ here in NYC on WNYC. It’s the consistency of the program that keeps me listening, not the specific subject matter offered on a daily basis.

   I guess it depends on listening styles, etc. For someone who chooses to ’surf’ through many titles [podcasts], searching for subject matter of interest, I can see where a more descriptive title would help, along with a detailed description.

   -paul.

3. 3 Austin Aug 30th, 2005 at 9:52 pm

   But think about how you use the podcasts.

   First, you view them either on your web site or in Apple’s iTunes. What is the intent and purpose of viewing a list of programs? One is to invite people to listen. A generic title or numbered series is not very inviting. Sure, if you regularly listen a NPR program, you might just be interested in programs 1,2,3 etc. and once you finished listening than you toss it away or never go back. But that is a very limited lisitening experience and probably not one many listeners practice.

   People often skip around, they start listening, suffer an interruption, do something else, go back and maybe they want to locate a show they heard previosuly because of a reference to a web site, blog, product name, tech spec you mentioned… The generic numbered titles don’t serve them very well at all. It is difficult to remember. I’ve done this many times with your podcast and find myself searching and searching with little to reference.

   Secondly, do you listen to podcasts on an iPod? I know not everybody choses to use their iPod this way or hey might only listen to them on a podcast feeder reader set up on a desktop computer. However, when walking, riding a bike, jumping on the subway, or working out and scrolling through the list of generic numbered show titles and try to remember which ones I aready listened to, which one I am looking for, or which ones I have yet to listen to is. Having no titles, no reference, nothing concrete to appear in the iPod window except for “The Point” and then burried at the next level in the menu, “The Point No. 39″ it is not very helpful especially in the hustle and flow of the A Train uptown or dogding lanes on eight eve. See my point?

   I think it is in the nature of human cognition, rather than preference and style, to make associations by name and meaning. What if you went to a library and all the titles in the library were called Book #1, Book #2, Book #3 or if you went to a paper filing system and the folders in the filing cabinet said, Folder #1, Folder #2, Folder #3… etc. A dedicated library patron and proliferic reader might say, “I don’t care if they have titles, I’m not going to browse, I’ll just read them all beginning with one and going to the end.” Wow! That’s, as they say, is not seing the forrest through the woods.

   I think podcasting is still in its infancy and the podcast content creatrs are going to have to get much better by seeing their body of work through the eyes of the end-user or their listeners rather than from inside their home-made studios. The better podcasters get with these details te faster they will move ahead in the line.

   -Austin

4. 4 Dorothy Sep 4th, 2005 at 10:03 pm

   Not all consumption patterns are the same – I’m on the flip side. I much prefer sequenced titling in the podcasts–cleaner design and time guide. I listen and dispense with the podcast and if it’s a keeper, I keep it. If there’s a specific topic I need to find again, I’d rather check a site’s show notes.

5. 5 Austin Sep 12th, 2005 at 4:27 pm

   I don’t what the point is being made here.

   There are way to many podcasters who fail to undertand the basic naming conventions and information organization that makes a index useful. If you called all the books in a library Book #1, Book #2, Book #3, than the card catelogue becomes pretty useless. Browsing the selves becomes surrealistic. I tried to subscribe to Adam Curry’s podcast and he names all this programs EPISODE I, EPISODE II… EPISODE V as if they were Star War sequals — after five in makes very little cognitive sense anymore as a reference and especially as archived material. It is obvious these podcasters have little experience with content creation and serialization over months, years and decades.

   I worked in the magazine publishing business for years and years and we’d be totally stupid and would have very few readers if we named our magazines, articles and sections the way podcasters name shows. It’s all a matter of the efficient organization of information.

   Sure, people have different consumption patterns but consumption has little to do with no being able to use a naming conventions that are effective for human cognition.

6. 6 John Roche Sep 30th, 2005 at 10:42 am

   I think this naming trend is simply a result, or neccesity of the limited character space available on the ipod and other MP3 players. Longer, more descriptive titles become truncated and useless when viewed on portable devices. Summary is where you want the unique descriptions for each episode.

7. 7 T. Fleming Nov 18th, 2005 at 7:57 pm

   There is need of a epidsodic or chaptering convention, but not one that creates hype and hyperbole. Where will you find the point of balance that informs and invites but does not lead to tabloid type episode “headines” just to snare the curious and casual listener/viewer/reader?

8. 8 Gary Gruba Dec 20th, 2005 at 11:28 pm

   I just want to take a quick second to introduce myself. I am a Systems Engineer supporting the higher learning institutions in MN and the neighboring states.

   I have several podcast demonstations and workshops in the near future, and I was wondering If your would be willing to provide a NFR version of your product. I would like to showcase it as part of my how to section.

   Kind Regards,
   Gary

9. 9 Administrator Dec 21st, 2005 at 12:22 am

   Gary,

   You need to contact Steve Harris, the developer of Feeder.

   http://www.reinventedsoftware.com/

   -ptfigg.

   -Podcastrigs
   -The.Point Podcast

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