Podcasting: Audibly Awesome!

Lend Me Your Ear…

The following blog post explores my interaction with and critique of three podcasting resources:  Soundcloud, Podbean, and Podcast Garden.  To use this media outlet, podcast audiences “tune in” online to access audio files created to educate, entertain, inspire, and everything else in between.  Through this forum, anyone with something to say can become a modern day talk radio/news host/hostess.  The possibilities and implications for educational, professional, and personal enhancement are infinite. 

Three immediate ways I plan to employ this tool in the coming school year are:  “casting” book club meetings to document and promote the great discussions that take place, providing book club selected text previews along with materials to be acquired, and creating “this week in the library…” reviews recapping completed programs/initiatives and advertising those on the horizon.  The casts can be played during campus-wide announcements, at the beginning of rotation classes, and/or featured on the library web and social media sites to keep the entire community of stakeholders “In the Know”!

Soundcloud

My Soundcloud podcasts can be accessed at:  

https://soundcloud.com/johtell-johnson/podcasting-in-the-library

https://soundcloud.com/johtell-johnson/podcast-1st-book-club-text

The account set-up using Soundcloud was a breeze beginning with the ability to log-in using Google or Facebook accounts.  If this method is not preferred, new users also have the option of providing a few brief articles of information to identify themselves to create an account.  The process of creating a podcast simply involved the following steps:  select the “upload” feature, press “start a new recording”, press the orange “REC” (record) button, click “Allow Adobe Flash”, and finally press “REC” again to start the cast.  Done!  Three hours of recording space is available under the unpaid plan, but additional time is available upon upgrading to a Pro account.

I had been aware of and have actually used this audio site in the past and most recently revisited it to preview the cast of former students who recently launched “Here’s the Thing…” a podcast about the music, sneakers, and news relevant to young urban adults.  While I don’t subscribe to all of their views or share their taste in music, the commentary offered is insightful and thought-provoking.  As their former English teacher, I can certainly appreciate that! 

A new discovery was that Soundcloud provides the ability to catalog and create playlists of favorite artists similar to functions available on Spotify.  I especially appreciated the ability to sample the music of unknown creative types who have done covers of artists I love or dared to publish works of their own. 

Podbean

Access my Podbean podcast at:  

https://thelibrarylounge.podbean.com/mf/web/syg9dm/Podcast

Though it was child’s play once all of the necessary accoutrement were downloaded and in place, it took quite some time to upload and publish my podcast using this service.  I originally used the screen-cast-o-matic feature to record myself offering a pre-bookclub meeting preview for the awesome microphone and audio quality available through this resource.  I then attempted to upload the file only to get an error message over and over again.  I realized that the problem was that I was attempting to attach an MP4 instead of an MP3 file but had no idea how to covert it:  YouTube to the rescue!  (Really, where would we be without it?!)  Following the download of Goldwave and a LAME encoder, I was able to make the switch and upload the audio file into the media manager file storage space to generate a URL for the cast.  

The site boasts that “With Podbean, you can create professional podcasts in minutes without any programming knowledge.”  After arming myself with tools to get the job done, I found this to be true. 

Podcast Garden

The following link will grant access to my Podcast Garden podcast: 

http://www.podcastgarden.com/episode/september-book-club-preview_82644

This was my least favorite of the three resource previewed; it will probably not be one that I revisit.  Its underwhelming interface and poorly placed page navigation tabs were the first signs justifying why Podcast Garden was not listed among the higher rated podcasting outlets following a Google Search.  Not understanding why my sound file, which claimed to have successfully loaded, could not be accessed after six additions/deletions, I took a chance on reverting to an older version of the service which finally yielded a published podcast. 

Another odd finding was, instead of reporting the duration of the cast in minutes : seconds, the service lists 0 : 00 as the running time.  When the arrow to listen is clicked, the clock counts upward in an ascending fashion. 

Though not a total waste, there are certainly more efficient podcasting services available than the one offered by Podcast Garden.