Just like in subscribing to RSS feeds and tagging sites in del.icio.us, hunting for podcasts on the iTunes podcast directory, or going directly to the sites that offer them, or checking out other podcast directories mentioned in this week’s reading and resources is both fun and a little bit overwhelming. George Schwartz mentioned in his podcast, A Beginner’s Guide to Podcast – A consumer’s guide that podcasts only gained mainstream press notice starting in 2004 and becoming word of the year in 2005; but in less than half a decade it has come to its own. Looking at the iTunes Store podcast directory one can find a podcast to subscribe to on almost any topic and done by corporate broadcast networks, big-time celebrities, scientific and educational institutions and libraries. I am already subscribed via iTunes to the SJSU SLIS | 2009 Podcast, SJSU SLIS | 2008 Podcast, and The New York Public Library podcast even before this week’s activities, and added the following to try out for this week’s activities and beyond: Library Geeks, Cool Tools for Library 2.0., SirsiDynix Institute podcast, NPR: Books Podcast, NY Times Book Review, Escape Pod, and iTunes: Meet the Author. In Google I subscribed to Authors on Tour-Live podcast, LibrVox Audiobooks, IT Conversations, and The Public Domain Podcast. I also added the Cool Tools for Library 2.0 and the SirsiDynix Institute podcast feeds so I can listen to them on my laptop as I have my iTUnes software installed on my iMac desktop computer. On Juice I only subscribed to the NPR: Books Podcast as I only want to try out what it can offer in terms of what it can offer that iTunes does not already have.
After subscribing to all these feeds it occurred to me that I went a bit overboard and really went crazy with just adding subscription feeds. Honestly, I was even trying to control myself in not adding just about every podcast that sounds interesting to me. I realized though that there is no feasible way for me to listen to all of these feeds and it would defeat the essence of podcasts as episodic subscriptions if I would just be selective in what to listen to. But then again, that is also what podcasts are all about, mini episodes that stands on its own and therefore gives the power to the consumer to what to listen to, and when. That is the beauty of it since it is free and it is available at anytime I have the flexibility of reviewing my choices and hunting for new ones at any time. I would probably drop and add a few of these subscriptions as the week’s progress and follow those that can sustain my interest or provides useful information as a library student and someone who works in a public library.
Quality
As a whole most of the podcasts I listened or sampled were polished and sounds professionally done. Editing was tight, music was used to introduced the segment, but it was kept in the background and unobtrusive. I did get to listen to one or two which suffered from poor sound engineering as the speaker sounds like she was talking from a deep well. I also enjoyed a few that are not canned or scripted like the interview of actor Ron Glass that was featured in the Firefly podcasts. Firefly is a science fiction show created by Joss Whedon of Buffy the Vampire Slayer fame, and aired less than 20 episodes years ago in Fox Network before getting axed. Unbeknownst to Fox, the show has quite a following and a campaign for Firefly’s aired and unaired episodes to be put on DVD was launched. This happened and the DVD stayed in Amazon’s bestseller lists a long time so that it led to a movie to sort of write a final chapter to the series, that movie is Serenity. Ron Glass is one of the main characters in both Firefly and Serenity. The interview was freewheeling and taped over a live audience so that you can even hear the audience laughing and reacting to in the background, but it was interesting and engaging since you get caught up with the obvious enjoyment of those who were listening to it live. Before I conclude part two of these series of posts on podcasts I would also want to mention that I listened to a couple of podcasts on the Cool Tools for Library 2.0 and found them informative and professionally done. I just hope that when it is my turn to add my contribution to that podcast feed on April 6 of this year that I would sound as good as they did.
In the next two posts for this blog are podcasts wherein I discussed my thoughts on the uses of podcasts in a library setting as I worked through chapter 11 of Social Software in Libraries, as well as the podcasts guides recorded by Schwartz and that of David Free.
