Recently in Podcasting Category

Podcasting support for Movable Type just got better. In this most recent release of the Podcasting plugin for Movable Type, iTunes support has been rounded making it easier than ever before to get your podcast listed and listed properly within the iTunes Music Store. This latest release adds the following features:

• a complete RSS feed that includes all of the proper iTunes meta data.
• an enhanced submission form that collects addition information about your podcast including its duration, whether it contains explicit material, a subtitle, summary, keywords and more.
• additional plugin options to capture important information about your blog so that its listing within iTunes can be finely tuned.
• support for basic authentication to access podcasts located behind a username and password.
• enhanced error messaging when linking to feeds.

This release is a necessary and important step to help make Movable Type the premiere self-hosted podcasting platform on the planet. I am excited by this release and am growing even more excited about the next one, which may include any number of the following features:

• download statistics for your podcasts
• iTunes notification pings
• auto-podcast submission to iTunes

But this plugin has been more the result of the feedback I have heard from folks like Bud Gibson, Todd Cochrane and others. So I anxiously await hearing from the Movable Type user community what they would like to see in the next version.

Last year I was on the hunt for a good Battlestar Galactica podcast. The selection was not the best in the world - not in grand scheme of podcasts, but there was one that stood out from the rest. Galactica Watercooler featured a trio of friends that actually managed to have chemistry. But after listening to them for a while I eventually grew tired. I mean how can anyone host a two hour podcast in the off season of a television show? I am a reasonable man, and I could talk about BSG as much as the next fan, but I could never carry on a two hour conversation about it, especially when there is nothing new to talk about! And therein lies the crux of why their podcast has grown tired. They have simply talked themselves out.

Then a couple of weeks ago a reader pointed me in the direction of Galactica Quorum. I picked it up looking to appease my Galactica addiction and I was actually surprised. I was expecting very little, but the podcast was refreshing. Not only was it short, but they were actually critical of the show as opposed to being these sycophantic geeks that think Ronald Moore can do no wrong. Who woulda thunk?

Naturally, I called in with my own ideas to share. And lo and behold, they aired my message! I admit, I am a simple man, with a simple ego (I am about 8:25 seconds in).

If you are a fan, of virtually any sci-fi show on television, you will probably like this group of cynical friends - they trash (and admire when the case calls for it) virtually every show on televion, from the awful Bionic Woman to the do-no-wrong Heroes. Trust me, it ain't bad. It's even a little good.

So yesterday was a day just like any other day, except that I had the pleasure of listening to a Movable Type user rant about our claimed, but "lacking" support for podcasting. Man, it hurts hearing such a passionate user become so frustrated.

But it is precisely at times like those that we at Six Apart swallow our pride and listen to our users. Not hear them. But actually listen to them.

And you know what, Todd is right about at least one thing: Movable Type's support for podcasting could be better. A lot better. So I went ahead and slapped together the first Podcasting Plugin for Movable Type 4.0, and I call upon Todd (and the rest of the Movable Type user community) to help me make this the best podcasting plugin for any blogging product.

Now I put together this first pass really quickly - in just a couple of hours actually, which I think is a testament to how easy it is to build a plugin on Movable Type for anyone who knows a little Perl, not to mention evidence to what it means to be a true Media Platform (see also the YouTube, Flickr and Amazon asset integration provided by Media Manager).

But I digress. I purposefully put together the most minimal feature set possible and still meet Todd's basic requirement: the ability to link to an externally hosted MP3 file and have Movable Type encode the necessary enclosures within an RSS and/or Atom feed. For fun I am redistributing a free flash MP3 player licensed under the creative commons to make it easy for users to allow readers to listen to their MP3 files directly from their blog.

But now I need to pass the baton to Todd, ProNet (especially Budd) and any other serious podcaster (Niall?) to help me shape the remaining feature set for this plugin. As a Product Manager myself I am reasonably certain think I could define a feature set myself, despite how clueless Todd may think I am, but I really do want this plugin to be something informed directly by the community. So please, everyone, chime in.

Todd, I am personally sorry you had a hard time with Movable Type. I sincerely hope this plugin will begin to provide the functionality you need, and I hope we can continue to evolve its feature set together as a team.

At first when I heard Niall Kennedy introduce his 19 year old sister as the person he would be interviewing in his latest podcast I thought he must be getting desperate. In the past he typically interviews an Internet professional of some kind inquiring about their products and businesses. So I was skeptical going in, especially as his sister got comfortable with the idea of being interviewed. But what followed was perhaps one of the most interesting podcasts I have heard in a while as it provided real insight into the mind of a Facebook user. As a product manager, and as a product manager at a company that produces products like LiveJournal and Vox this couldn't be more relevant to me. Of course it was especially interesting to hear her tell of how as she transitioned from one phase of her life (high school) to another (college) that her social groups and the tools she uses to engage with them change as well. Niall covers topics like:

• Her willingness to tolerate advertising
• How she discovers the groups she joins
• Her feelings about privacy
• Why she joins the groups she does
• How she feels about "sponsored groups"
• How she has transitioned to and from products like LiveJournal, MySpace and Facebook

I sincerely hope Niall produces more podcasts like this one, but to focus on a variety of different applications and user types. If, for example, he could interview users of LiveJournal, MySpace, Pounce and others in a similar fashion it could make for a very useful series. In time it could also become an hugely valuable resource for other product managers and marketers - a resource I may consider paying for. Although I much prefer that they are free.

His podcast is 30 minutes in length.

Last week Niall Kennedy asked if I would sit down with him and record a podcast about Widgets and Six Apart. Not wanting to miss an opportunity to hear myself talk, much less have it recorded so that I could listen to it over and over again, I eagerly agreed. From Niall's post:

Last Friday I visited Six Apart's headquarters in San Francisco to talk about widgets with Byrne Reese. Byrne is the former product manager of TypePad, currently a product manager of Movable Type, and a developer of plugins and widgets used in both products. Byrne and I talked about the current state of widgets in Six Apart's four blogging products: TypePad, Movable Type, LiveJournal, and Vox. Our 25-minute conversation about Six Apart widgets is available as a 11 MB audio download.

Read a summary of the podcast, or listen to it below.

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I remember when I first started listening to podcasts and I started polling the office, "what podcasts should I subscribe to?" Unanimously, everyone said, "The Show" (with Ze Frank)!

Case in point:

God, if I could posses just a smidgen of the wit and creativity that this guy has... I probably wouldn't know what to do with it.