Synth Motion

 

What is Podcasting?

 

 

Podcasting is broadcasting on iPods or other MP3 Players. Created by ex MTV host Adam Curry, Podcasting is a new method of communication for the internet – unfortunately, it’s still limited to your PC. But thanks to companies like Apple, creator of the iPod, podcasts can be downloaded to your personal media device and accessed at anytime. Your trusty mp3 player can become a true audiovisual media player – this handy companion is not just for music anymore.

 

 

Apple is developing iPods that can play videos, handle live streaming, make phone calls, etc. Popular television shows such as “Lost,” and “Desperate Housewives,” are main attractions. Motion picture editors are busy transforming hour long stories into six minute formatted ‘vcasts’ to be played on your iPod. This raises some alarming questions about the future of television programming – perhaps it will become as short as the average viewer’s attention span?

 

 

However, will people enjoy watching their favorite television show on a 2.5inch screen? IPod itself is continuously going through changes. The original model had the capacity to save three thousand songs, yet the current versions hold over a thousand. Please note that in order to listen to podcasts you do not need an Apple iPod. Any personal media device will probably meet the requirements, even your regular PC.

 

 

Retreiving Podcasts

 

 

Podcasting relies on RSS feeds (really simple syndication) technology. RSS is a family of XML file formats used for Web syndication. The RSS feed was chosen by Apple because it can handle multimedia attachments and facilitate content description, search and syndication.

 

 

The podshow itself is contained in an XML file. To retrieve this information it is necessary to have podcaster software. The purpose of this software is to constantly monitor the subscribed podshows and update them automatically. This reinforces the easy nature of the podcast – once you log on to your computer your favorite casts are ready. Simply add them to your media player and go, or listen there on your computer.

 

 

Podcaster software was initially made and sold by independent companies and offered as ‘standalone code’ compatible with the majority of media players. In June 2005 Apple jumped on the bandwagon and released itunes 4.9 which supplied native podcasting support.

 

 

There are currently several different ways to search for content on the internet, from keywords to sites that will provide a rating system. Unfortunately, even with all of these developments providers have not yet created a system of recommendation. Audience members have to subscribe to podcasts – an ‘intelligent sorting’ and registration system must be just around the corner. Voice search is another tool being developed; an intelligent search engine scans vocal tracks for more accurate data.

 

 

iTunes 4.9 is designed with the iPod in mind and is supported by Apple computers. Currently all new Macintosh computers come with it standard, but if you have an older model you can go to www.download-it-free.com/itunes/.

 

 

iTunes software is not exclusive to Apple or iPods; anyone with a window’s media player can take advantage of this free technology. It’s very user friendly; all podcasts are offered for free. To register for podcasts you can simply refer to the sidebar menu and click on podcasts. There you will find an extensive content list supported by iTunes.

 

 

Other available resources for retrieving RSS feeds are:

 

 



 

 

www.newsgator.com: this website supports feeds from Forbes to Rolling Stone and everything in between. It currently uses Feed Station as their retrieval software, and the software is available for free when you register with newsgator.com.

Newsgator is convenient and is currently supported by various websites that have a podcast or blog. Just register for the feeds found on Newsgator supported sites.

 

 

my.yahoo.com: Are you already a yahoo email user? If so you might already be familiar with the process of adding a podcast to your personal content. If not then let me assure you it is quite simple. Go to My Yahoo and click ‘add content’. Then choose ‘multimedia’. Then it’s just as simple as clicking and adding what interests you most. Much like Newsgator, My Yahoo is supported by various independent blog or podcasters.

 

 

www.enewsblog.com: does not currently support podcasts, but you can register for automatic updates on blogs with eNewsBlog, as well as create your own. To add a blog from a supporting site click the eNewsBlog tab shown on the corresponding blog site.

 

 



 

 

The above are not necessarily the best examples, but are the very commonly found on podcasting and blog supporting sites.

 

 

A Top 10 list of podcasts as voted by visitors can be found at www.podcastalley.com.

 

 

Creating your own Podcast

 

 

After you have experienced a podcast you may wish to compose your own. Unless you are particularly handy, this isn’t easy. You will require the following equipment and software:

 

 



 

 

Head phones

 

 

A microphone

 

 

A computer

 

 

A program that records audio i.e. Window’s Media Player, or a more advanced program such as ePodcast Creator. A more affordable alternative to ePodcast Creator would be Audacity 1.2.3, which is available for free download at, audacity.sourceforge.net/, importantly it is both PC and Mac compatible.

It’s important to consider the quality of the recording; no one wants to hear any distortion these days – so try to keep unwanted background noise to a minimum.

 

 

A website to which you may upload the podcast

 

 

An RSS feed. To make finished content available to large audiences you must publish it on podcast supporting networks like itunes. But first you have to create an RSS feed.

 

 

There are two ways of doing this Manually using, www.rss-specifications.com/, or Download the software from places like FeedForAll at www.feedforall.com. Although the later option is easier, be aware that the software from FeedForAll is not free.

 

 

Lastly you need to keep in mind the following:

Bandwidth costs money; this cost is dependant on such factors as audience and file size. Once your podcast takes off you may notice that the cost of bandwidth increases proportionally with audience size – like most Producers you will almost certainly have very little control over how many downloads your media receives.

Also, it is almost impossible to “know” your audience. Some hosting providers will give you a log of audience members, but they are far too complex for the average Joe to understand. This makes it hard to direct your content to the audience, some more successful podcasters employ professionals to translate the information, but this of course increases costs.



 

 

These are just the basics. For those already familiar with digital recording you will digest this information much easier then to those who are starting from the beginning. Unfortunately because it is still a fairly new technology it doesn’t get any easier… yet.

 

 

Once you’ve played with the software, and have a basic ide
a of how to be creative in this medium, you can start thinking about crafting your own successful podcast.

 

 



 

 

Choose a topic that you know a lot about, it’s always better if your topic is 100% original because there’s no competition. If your material is not unique than spend time now thinking about fresh angles, hooks and gimmicks to make it stand out in the crowd!

 

 

Who is your target market? What age demographic do you most want to reach? Is the show directed towards a particular ethnic group or sex? All of these questions need answers, because all of your content should be aimed at a specific market to ensure penetration.

 

 

When the first episode goes to air it needs to make an impact! Tom Green performed stupid gags on people he knew on a local cable TV station – and it exploded all over the world. He didn’t have fancy graphics or advanced equipment, he was himself, and it worked.

There is an evolving ‘Show Format’ which has grown from a standard radio template into something sleeker and more dynamic. Where once a musical intro would fade to allow an announcer’s voice… Now it’s content, content, content, and the music often swells into composite synthesis that’s equally informative and way more entertaining.

Keep in mind that only 10% of the music content should be slow songs and or new artists, unless that’s central to the premise of the show.

 

 

Jump into it! Have your content organized and ready to go. Avoid wordy scripts that sound rehearsed. Write what you want to address in point form, in large type, either on paper or on your computer and ‘just do it’. Topics should be well researched; narrators must appear well informed or will lose audience interest.

 

 

If you plan to do interviews on your show, it’s important to keep questions short and to the point. Sometime the question can get lost or bogged down by excess wording and the guest may become confused and not answer or answer incorrectly. The question should be straight forward and simply worded.



 

 

Start small, keep it short, and broadcast only once a week. If your audience grows you may increase content accordingly. But the schedule should remain fixed and easy for an audience to follow.

 

 

Marketing and promoting your podcasts

 

 

Affiliate Marketing is a great resource for beginners. Visit websites that have content that relates to the format of your show, or local business looking to increase traffic, i.e. Lets say you creating a program entitled “Cooking with Stacey,” assume also there is a popular local butcher from whom you buy meat. If he (or she) has a website you may approach the butcher and offer to advertise your cooking show on his site. In turn you’ll be sure to mention the great cut of meat you found at Vinny’s for the show, etc.

 

 

When you’ve created your own podcast and made it available to the world, you need to tell everyone about it and drive an audience to listen.

 

 

Marketing maximizes audience potential. With podcasting there’s always the possibility of generating revenue, but only if people are aware of, and or interested in, your show. Successful podcasters understand the importance of creating awareness. If the work doesn’t shine in a crowded marketplace, the product is invisible in the medium.

 

 

So now you’re a lone podcaster with what could be a popular show… Now you’re wondering how to make enough profit to cover the cost of production. On my travels I’ve found some information on the various ways to gain revenue from podshows.

 

 

Micropayement- this is equivalent to asking for a fee in return for each presentation. Although it’s straight forward enough, it’s not the most reliable method. Think about it, why would someone pay for something they can get for free somewhere else? There are two versions of Micropayment employed in the marketplace today.

 

 



 

 

Pay-per view: think of movies on demand on your television via cable

 

 

Monthly Subscription: like your electric bill

 

 



 

 

Google Adsense Ads – their payment method is based on the amount of traffic your podcast generates.

 

 

Income Stream – often considered the most profitable, Producers sell a portion of their podcast to a recognized sponsor. Advertising is inside the show. The advertisers can pay a fee on monthly bases which is determined by your audience size. The problem with this is that most audiences perceive this as a shameful sell out.

 

 

Because the internet is open to piracy, in order to ensure that your show is not floating around free for anyone to access without a fee, providers need a form of security to protect their work. Systems such as ticket-master and online music stores have used verification images to authenticate downloads – and these have proven quite effective.

 

 

Benefits of using Podcasting for your Marketing Campaign

 

 

Podcasting is an ideal medium for PR and advertising to young audiences. As yet it’s barely regulated and rules regarding its broadcast generally center on copyright issues – profanity and sexuality are ****.

 

 

This is why podcasting is the medium of choice for companies such as Durex condoms – they are able to reach their target market and not be censored. When Durex first used podcasting as an advertising medium they increased their website traffic three fold by advertising on the “Dawn and Drew Show,” alone.

 

 

Another benefit of podcasting is an inherent ability to measure your investor’s return on investment (ROI). The ROI can be determined by analyzing sales performance in reference to the amount of the listeners visiting the website.

 

 

It has been proven that advertising on television or the radio has not had the same influence it has in the past. Not only are people becoming blind to the messages, but it is hard to motivate people from non-action to action. When people are vegging out on the couch watching the tube, the chances that they are going to jump up and go to your website because of a TV ad, is less likely than if they are already on the internet, then it is only a matter of click, click and the consumer is surfing your website.

 

 

The benefits of using Podcasting for your PR campaign are multi-dimensional. All available content including newspaper and magazine articles, press releases, news stories, and existing marketing media can all be translated into podcasts and be organized and distributed to users all over the internet. Every client should have news resources online that embody all PR and stories in a search engine ready website. Remember that having a brand ‘personality’ is the secret of secrets to success in audio and video entertainment and podcasting is no different; people must want to listen. Successful podcasters fill a need for information and turn promotion vehicles into stories shaped to fascinate audiences with shorter attention spans.

 

 

No podcast is complete without a text blog detailing the subject. Attack both mediums so search engines will have more data to sift and generate more favorable results.

 

 

There are many free flow information pathways for PR gurus. Innovative media pioneers take advantage of new technology when relaying their client messages – podcasting is just one of them. Remember, newswires, blog sites, chat rooms, discussion boa
rds, viral / buzz promotions can now be easily converted to podcasts.

 

 

Sharing media lowers advertising costs and increases its effect. Peer to Peer distribution is a concept made familiar by Napster. Individuals share various files through the use of specific software. In the recent past it’s been p2p efforts pirating music. But this is still a valid process you may employ in your own effort to distribute your podcast. In order for it to work properly, both audience and producers need to embrace p2p sharing. Audience members need to have p2p software and have bandwidth to contribute to increase the efficiency of the network.

 

 

Is there a downside to P2P networks? Firewalls, slow connections and audience members who turn off their computers reduce its efficiency. Also there needs to be an incentive to make subscribers want to participate. Because a regular network takes fewer steps, many users prefer other, more simple means…

 

 

But right now let’s say that podshow audience members embrace your new p2p network, all your affiliated podshow producers will need to ensure that they to are p2p compatible and have the software to support the upload. If producers make the transfer easy enough to understand, more audience members will use it. This leads to cheaper bandwidth costs.

 

 

A fresh medium

 

 

Podcasting is a fresh medium. There has not yet been a comprehensive marketing plan developed to guarantee positive results with advertising in podcasts. Because the medium is still in its infancy, many advertisers are unsure of how to maximize its potential – pioneers are still experimenting.

 

 

More progressive marketers are researching information / entertainment hybrids or what they call ‘focused programming’ that will let them distribute a compelling message through traditional podcast channels. Podcasting’s challenge is similar to video-on-demand’s own situation – What does a brand have to say to consumers on an ongoing basis beyond a buy-me-now message? Brand as content producer is a trend that’s not likely to abate any time soon.

 

 

You can view podcasting’s role in two ways: advertising to an early-adopter audience and developing marketer-created podcasts to deepen customer or prospect relationships on your sites. A great example of this is “Queer Eye for the Straight Guy” podcasts ( www.bravotv.com/Queer_Eye_for_the_Straight_Guy/Podcasts/) of HipTips and previously aired episodes. This is interesting on many levels, as it allows the network to deepen the relationship between the audience and the characters, and it’s a nearly cost-free way to build audience share between episodes.

 

 

Many networks sell advertising on their own sites. By providing an additional reason for people to visit sites, they can increase traffic and maximize revenues. For more on the above article go to: www.clickz.com/experts/brand/cmo/article.php/3520536

 

 

In the recent past many marketers have turned to email as a way to appeal to consumers. This form of marketing is quickly losing its success rating as consumers grow more and more intolerant of SPAM. Pheedo reports that by integrating online advertising into an RSS feed, a new online advertising technique, it has achieved measurably better results than e-mail for its client.

 

 

The online campaign for a free IT evaluation was conducted through specialist publication www.infoworld.com, which could offer direct access to IT professionals.

 

 

Pheedo said the six-week effort outperformed the best click through rate in email by over 26% as compared to the industry average of 8.7% CTR reported in DoubleClick’s Q4 2004 Email Trend Report. Furthermore, they were able to lower the effective CPM by three times of that over email, saving its client thousands of dollars.

 

 

Pheedo’s client realized its ailing email marketing campaign was in part due to e-mail’s unpleasant user experience. One benefit of placing ads in RSS feeds is you’re not competing in an overcrowded, SPAM and virus filled email inbox. In addition, marketing messages are increasingly becoming victims of email filters or the delete button.

 

 

RSS advertisements have many advantages over emails short comings. RSS is 100% opt-in. It has a 100% delivery rate, and when delivered to a two-pane news aggregator, the feed has a 100% open rate.

 

 

Steps taken to ensure positive results:

 

 



 

 

Identify those feeds read by the IT professionals that met its client’s target market requirements.

 

 

Understand the intricacies of the fairly cluttered environment of content aggregators to ensure the ads display correctly, or appear with relevant content.

 

 

Pheedo specifically developed technology to track RSS feeds for the purpose of advertising.

 

 



 

 

Podcasts are powerful weapons that can maximize brand exposure, but keeping track of your success is important. Currently there are a variety of ways to monitor relevant audience information – numbers, satisfaction levels and even minute by minute preferences.

 

 

www.feedburner.com is one of the more popular publisher services available. It helps monitor your feed, track circulation and implement revenue generating programs. Currently there are approximately 90,000 publishers taking advantage of Feedburner’s services.

 

 

www.syndicateiq.com is another resource out there helping Podcasters maximize potential. Syndicate IQ helps users monitor their RSS.

 

 

Although podcasting is proving to be a promising new marketing tool, its shortcomings include the inability to target specific audiences.

 

 



 

 

“RSS publishing still faces many hurdles: measuring traffic (on a subscriber level) is nearly impossible to do, which will relegate RSS to a broadcast marketing tool in the near term.”

 

 

“RSS is not well suited to promotional-offer-oriented content because it does not offer the targeting and personalization capabilities of e-mail.

 

 



 

 

Looking for more resources?

 

 

For a free consultation on Podcasting and other e-marketing services for your company, contact LCI at 416-408-4669, info@lifecaptureinteractive.com, or visit us at www.lifecaptureinteractive.com.

 

 

Sources:



www.pheedo.com



www.howtopodcastforprofit.com



www.jupiterresearch.com/bin/item.pl/home

 

How do the media influence young people in today’s society? Our society still seems confused about what to think about children and young people. It seems to be gripped with a fear of children, blaming them for much of society’s ills: crime, vandalism, drugs, drink, sex, teenage pregnancy. The list goes on. But if these theories are true, where do these rebellious attitudes stem from? The obvious answer would be from the upbringing of children, but in my opinion the media also plays a substantial role in the attitudes, behavior and physical aspects of youth today, in particularly that of young women. We are constantly being bombarded with advertising, opinions, images and stories which appear to be forcing us to conform to a specific image of how we are supposed to be, whether it be slim, more intelligent or prettier.

Media strongly affects youth culture. The media executives are quick to defend their role in youth violence and bullying while selling millions of dollars in ads focused on youth. TV producers, network executives, motion picture companies and others in the media deny any impact of their programs on the attitudes and actions of youth. Meanwhile they continue to spend millions on special effects and marketing geared to increase appeal to youth markets. While corporations spend millions on market research and advertising to create products and campaigns targeted at a youth demographic, they still deny their ability to influence youth. If this were true to fact, would NIKE continue spending millions every year on product development, marketing and advertising? Would McDonalds still be using cartoon like characters to sell hamburgers? Would music labels be increasing the level of violence and sexual content in the music geared towards the youth audience? Would liquor companies be using youth oriented activities in their advertising? Of course it works on influencing youth and its ideals advertising would not be a multi-billion dollar a year business. If it had no influence, M-TV would not have consultant on staff spending huge amounts of money to ensure them keeping up with youth culture.

We’ve all heard it before. Blame it on TV or other means of media. If a child bludgeons another child to death with a wrench or shoots a classmate, it is the violent TV programs that they watch which are to blame, not the parents or the supervisors who are supposed to be there to make sure their kids do the right thing. How far is it true that the media is responsible for trivializing death and violence, thus causing the children of America to go out on shooting rampages, or kids in Britain to murder innocent toddlers? First let us look at the way the media portrays death. Death has always been a taboo subject. People do not usually sit around talking about death, especially to children. It may be for that reason that children do not really understand the concept of dying. We constantly see instances in cartoons where a character is killed, but in the next scene, that same character is alive and well again. The fact is that they do not actually die. Characters like Warner Bros. Wild E Coyote never die.

As clichéd as it may sound, it has been rightly said all things have their good as well as bad effects. In the similar conduct media also has its good as well as bad influence on youth. Well these were the negative influence of media on youth. Now we focus on the affirmative aspects of media.

Media plays a very important role in creating awareness. There are certain issues which remain untouched among youngsters as they feel guarded concerning it. Media helps in providing information regarding such topics. There are many such topics that are highlighted by the media. The current one that can be talked about is the quota system in colleges. Media created awareness that how injustice was being done with deserving candidates due to reservations in colleges. There was procession taken out by students in order to object regarding this bias discrimination.

One other such issue is the debate carried on regarding sex education. Media was trying to highlight both the aspects of the matter that whether sex education must be allowed in schools or not. There were a group of people who were all for it and there were people who considered it a taboo. Even though we are heading towards westernization, our roots still remain Indian. And that is the reason why we fell anxious discussing such issues with young ones. But if we think practically then there are so many instances where children head the wrong way just in the anxiety of knowing certain issues. So, the only acceptable approach in which we can guard our child from choosing the wrong path is by talking to them and educating them about the issues that need to be learnt at the right instance.

Media being one of the important means to reach out to the masses and influence their thinking and decision making, only to the positive media cannot attract attention of the masses, and to gain viewer ship, negative media has to be incorporated to balance out and attract the masses, but a line has to be drawn between the positive and the negative media in the interest of the younger generation.

In the months to come by, we will bear witness to the various kinds of Bollywood awards, Filmfare Awards, Screen Award, Zee Cine Awards, Sansui Awards, Stardust award, IIFA Awards..The most prestigious and well attended of the lot is the Filmfare Award(though it had a dismal attendance last year). Filmfare Awards are also generous of the lot, if they cannot fit an actor in their list, they make a special category for him/her with flashy names like ’special award’ ‘ outstanding performer’ etc. Last year, in 2007, we had Shahrukh Khan facing the heat from the child prodigy Darsheel Safary.

This time in 2008 Bollywood awards, SRK’s fantastic act in Rab Ne Bana Di Jodi has intense competition from his favorite rivals: Hrithik Roshan and Aamir Khan. Hold on to your seats, get the popcorn out, and go through Filmfare Awards 2009. Though it is a tad early, here is a calculated prediction on the Filmfare Award 2009 and many other awards that will precede or follow it. You are free to argue on our choice of Filmfare Awards and other Bollywood awards.

Best Bollywood movie of 2008: Rab Ne Bana Di Jodi (Shahrukh Khan weaves magic again)

Best Director: Abbas Tyrewala (Jaane Tu Ya Jaane Na) His first shot at direction is well rewarded)

Best Actor: Aamir Khan (Ghajini) Aamir has believably given his best performance ever.

Best Actress: Priyanka Chopra (Fashion) Priyanka Chopra is so inconsistent, some time she can give the worst performance and sometimes she can knock you out with her histrionics. In Fashion, Priyanka was amazing.

Best actor critics awards: Hrithik Roshan (Jodhaa Akbar) We have forgotten how Akbar looked, it all Hrithik for us.

Best actress critics award: Aishwarya Rai Bachchan (Jodhaa Akbar) The sword fight is still in our minds.

Best movie critics award: A Wednesday. The dark horse movie of the year, the super success stunned even the director.

Best supporting actor award: Arjun Rampal (Rock On). Tum ho toh..who else will win best supporting actor?

Best supporting actress award: Kangana Ranaut (Fashion) Kangana’s stoned act is always in Fashion!

Best actor in comic role: Abhishek Bachchan (Dostana). Watch the scene in Dostana, where Abhi tells how he and John fell in love, and you know you have got to hand it over to him.

Best actor in a villain’s role: Naseerudin Shah(A Wednesday) We just loved it Naseer sir

Best male debut award: Imran Khan(Jaane Tu Ya Jaane Na).

Best female debutant: Asin Thottumkal(Ghajini) We would have considered Genelia, but she had already appeared in Masti.

Best story: Rock On

Best screenplay: Rock On

Best choreography: Jaane Tu Ya Jaane Na (remember the cute ‘Pappu’ dance?)

Best cinematography: Aamir

Best editing: Ghajini

Best sound: Jodhaa Akbar

Best action: Race

Best dialogue: A Wednesday (haven’t heard such powerful dialogues in the climax for quite a while)

R.D.Burman award for upcoming talent: Rashid Ali (Kabhi Aditi)

Best male playback singer: K.K for Zara Sa (Jannat)

Best female playback singer: Shreya Goshal (Teri Or) Singh is Kinng

Best lyrics: Javed Akhtar for Jash-e-bahar(Jodhaa Akbar)

Best music: A.R.Rahman (Jaane Tu Ya Jaane NA) What a year, this little master has had! Jodhaa Akbar, Yuvvraaj and Ghajini apart from JTYJN