1 Emerging Technology: Podcasting CATS 2005 Presentation Steve Sloan steve.sloan@sjsu.edu

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Emerging Technology: Podcasting

CATS 2005 Presentation

Steve Sloansteve.sloan@sjsu.eduhttp://sloantech.blogspot.com/

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Podcasting a topic of great interest

See:

•www.mercurynews.com

•Itconversations.com

•Dangillmor.typepad.comThis is a podcast!

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Agenda What is podcasting? Emerging Technology (ET)

Define and understand ET Where podcasting fits into ET

Define and understand podcasting Podcasting nuts and bolts

How to create a podcast Podcasting tools

Summary Benefits of podcasting Downside of podcasting

Conclusion, credits and conversation

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Emerging Technologies of the pastPortable phones once niche players in

telecommunications

Hard to use

Cumbersome

Expensive

Now considered one of the three things everybody has

Wallet/purse

Keys

Portable phone

Continuing to change face of society, this tech is still emerging

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What is Emerging Technology?

What are some emerging

technologies?

The adjective emerging has 3 meanings Coming into view

Coming into existence

Coming to maturity

Internet + Weblogging The read-write web

Dan Gillmor, “We the media”

User enabling software-hardware Common computers over 1 billion instructions a second (Super

Computers, “Lethal Weapons”)

Media creation applications such as iMovie, iPhoto etc.

Portable devices OQO, Sony devices, Nokia and “Scoble” phones

Always-on broadband in the home Cable-DSL

Ubiquitous connectivity, “digital dial tone” 802.11, Cellular, RSS, (wireless plus download)

See:

•www.answers.com

•www.bushin30seconds.org

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Emerging Technology Is:

Useable, portable & powerful systems

capable of accessing and creating

dynamic content in the hands of the

public.

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Podcasting and Emerging

Technology

Podcasting is a subset of RSS which is a subset of Emerging Technology

Podcasting uses RSS v. 2.0 Enclosures

Also includes videocasting

XML based

Download based

Not dependent on high bandwidth

Dependant on relatively pervasive connectivity

Technically it is pull technology Push / pull convergence

Subscription required

Has push characteristics

“Long tail” technology

Infinite number of channels!

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Podcasting is Mixing of the words iPod and broadcasting

A web-based broadcast medium

Audio files (most commonly in MP3 format) Made available online

Software (like iPodder & xPodder) Automatically detects new files

Based on RSS v 2.0 enclosures

Downloads the files For listening at the user's convenience

Allows time shiftingSee:

•www.wikipedia.org

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Understanding Podcasting

A podcast is like an audio magazine subscription Subscribe to a feed

Subscriber receives regular audio programs delivered via the Internet

Can listen to them at their leisure

Differ from traditional internet audio in two important ways They can be listened to at any time because a copy is on the

listener's computer or portable music player (hence the "pod" in "podcasting")

Are automatically delivered to subscribers, so no active downloading is required

Podcasting is functionally similar to the use of timeshift-capable digital video recorders (DVRs) such as TiVo which lets users record and store television

programs for later viewing

Push / Pull convergence

See:

•www.wikipedia.org

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Podcasting is not just for iPods

See:

•www.edupodder.com

•www.itconversations.com

•www.engadget.com

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XML code of a podcast

See:

•www.edupodder.com

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Some uses for podcasting in

education

For distance learning

To facilitate self-paced learning

For remediation of slower learners

To allow faculty to offer advanced and or highly motivated learners extra content

For helping students with reading and/or other learning disabilities

For multi-lingual education

To provide the ability for educators to feature guest speakers from remote locations

To allow guest speakers the ability to present once to many sections and classes

To allow educators to escape the tedium of lecturing

To offer a richer learning environment

See:

•www.edupodder.com

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How to do a podcast?

Production can be simple or complex, depending on platform and how polished you want the end product to be Len Pryor has shown several cookbook methods at

Engadget

New WYSIWYG web-based tools promise to streamline podcast production

See:

•www.engadget.com

•www.odeo.com

•www.audioblog.com

•www.edupodder.com

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One easy way to create a podcast

QuickTime™ and a3ivx D4 4.5.1 decompressor

are needed to see this picture.

See:

•www.audioblog.com

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Audioblog

See:

•www.audioblog.com

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This is Odeo

See:

•www.odeo.com

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Odeo offers some attractive features

Access Control Lists (ACLs) on the roadmap

Can control who can get access to content

Easy to use user interface

Evan Williams, former co-founder of Pyra Labs

Pyra created “Blogger”

Blogger is now owned by Google

See:

•odeo.com

•Flickr.com

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Audioblogger

See:

•www.audioblogger.com

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Feeder

See:

•www.reinventedsoftware.com

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Podcasting kit

See:

•www.pwop.com

Less than $400!

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One podcasting kit High-quality gear that is also compact and affordable

You don't need a computer in order to record your voice

The mic plugs into the preamp. The preamp plugs into the recording device's line input, and the headphones plug into the recording device's headphone jack

Only the preamp requires AC power

Recording device uses a single AA battery which lasts a long time

See:

•www.pwop.com

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Lifeblog

See:

•mobile.kaywa.com

•www.nokia.com

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Transparency By nature RSS is transparent This can be good or bad

Invites the world into the classroom

Some solutions for this

Use application layer security (SSL/SSH)

Tools like Odeo to feature ACLs

Secure RSS?

Do we adapt to provide more transparency, or do we adapt the tool to provide greater security? Route around nature of Internet may make it difficult to

not be transparent

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See:

•www.infoage.idg.com.au

secureRSS? Does secure RSS exist?

Will secure RSS exist?

If so may enable easy one-to-one podcasting

Digital Rights Management (DRM) an alternative?

Also, application layer security (SSH/SSL)

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“When it comes to podcasting, we are

all newbies”~Doug Kaye

Tools are making podcasting easier and easier

Podcasting can be done from and to everything from desktop computers to cell phones

The key to podcasting is RSS Download verses streaming

Low bandwidth tolerant

Podcasts are XML files Platform and device agnostic

Dependent on capabilities of receiving device

A non-proprietary solution

Extends reach of Internet Files are local

Works with cell phones

See:

•Itconversations.com

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Downsides of podcasting(and RSS)

Depends on a relatively pervasive connection to the Internet at some point Can be via telco

By nature it is transparent

Major changes in faculty/student relationship Value of human interaction cannot be ignored

What about the student peer relationship?

May prove to be a barrier to faculty and/or students who are tech challenged

Lack of searchability

Potential for information overload

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Credits Special thanks to

Robert Scoble

The Gillmor brothers

Dan

Steve

Doug Kaye

Lenn Pryor

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Contact info and conversation

SJSU Steve.sloan@sjsu.edu

(408) 924-2374

General Skype/AIM: ssloansjca

Web: www.edupodder.comMain Geek Blog: sloantech.blogspot.com

(408) 605-0692

S_sloan@mac.com

Conversation What do you think of podcasting?

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www.sjsu.edu/cats/2003/showcase/