Keep podcasting simple - KPSS

Keynote address 7 – Don Katz CEO Audible Inc

The main message to the Portable Media Expo from Don Datz, was that for podcasting to take off, it needs to be easy, really easy. Here are the key points:

1) Don’t underestimate how easy podcasting needs to become. It has to be easy to fit into the non-early adopters’ lifestyle – people are intolerant of technological complexity. Future optimisation will come forward and make it simpler – the experience and content needs to become more important than the technology.
2) Make your costs as variable as you can make them – podcasting could be very expensive non-profit making effort. Plenty of big media have made mistakes sinking a lot of money into technology where there is not enough uptake.
3) Move your efforts by some degree into the direction of a sustainable business model. It will change and emerge and evolve, but have some kind of model to start with. 
4) There will be new environments and markets for content – there has to be an economy that matches the creativity that will emerge.
5) Be tenacious, tough and protect your ego – take pleasure in doing what you do and saying what you’re going to say. Just stick to it and believe in yourself.
6) Make great audio! The barriers to creating audio and being in this game are lower than they have ever been.

Podcasting will soar because of the quality of the creativity – and the content which is available.

Matt

Comments

[Martin Grossman]

I guess the name "podcasting" is here to stay... but it does seem a bit limiting... the potential to easliy add audio to marketing and other content is finally coming into its own, isn't it? Calling it "podcasting" with the association it creates with the iPod may make people think it has only to do with the Apple product... and it's so much more platform agnostic than that. I haven't fully checked out the PRWeb open source approach yet but I intend to. It seems a very logical step and should provide a great way to inexpensivley add great content to all of my marketing efforst. Thanks for the tip eAgent!

[eAgent]

Here is a new way to create great content. Podcasting is beginning to supplement the marketing efforts of many marketers. Just as with any emerging technology, we are going to find new ways of using the “next new thing” every day! One example: I just found out about the way a press release distribution service (www.prweb.com) taking podcasting to new places. This was inevitable! "Podding" may be a fairly “new wave” marketing tool, but it’s already it's evolving new mutant strains. PRWeb has just become the first ever provider of "open source" pod content. It's done under something called a Creative Commons license—and it rocks! Take any of the podcasts they make available and slice ‘em, dice ‘em, stir ‘em, shake ‘em... do anything you want with the content. Make it your own. You can string podcast interviews together to make a news program, add a podcast to a Power Point, add music to the audio, insert your own comments, use the podcast as the soundtrack to a video... it's all their for you to play with… and it’s free. Check it out at http://prweb.com/. Look for: ”PRWeb Podcasting Creates More Visibility..." We can all have fun with this.