Podcasting is a way of publishing sound files to the Internet, allowing users to subscribe to a feed and receive new audio files automatically. Podcasting is distinct from other types of audio content delivery because it uses the RSS 2.0 file format. This technique has enabled many producers to create self-published, syndicated radio shows.
Users subscribe to podcasts using “podcatching” software (also called “aggregator” software) which periodically checks for and downloads new content. It can then sync the content to the user’s portable music player, hence the portmanteau of Apple’s “iPod” and “broadcasting”. Podcasting does not require an iPod; any digital audio player or computer with the appropriate software can play podcasts.
Paul has an nice guide for recording a podcast.
Podcasting differs from broadcasting and webcasting in the way that content is transmitted. Instead of a central audio stream, listeners download audio files remotely and automatically. Podcasts can also include metadata such as dates, titles, and descriptions. Podcasting differs from autocasting in terms of content; podcasts are generally voice broadcasts while autocasting is a speech-synthesized version of regular text blogs. Audioblogs can be easily made into podcasts if they add support for RSS to facilitate automatic retrieval.
To get audio feeds, users simply connect their MP3 player to their computer, go online, and subscribe to feeds they want the podcasting service to provide. Audio content is then pushed from the original source to an aggregator and then to the subscriber. To some, podcasting is one of the most exciting innovations to come along in quite awhile. They see it opening up an endlessly varied universe of audio content to anyone who wants it at any time. Also read Podcasting 101 - Illustrated Tips for Newbie Podcasters
Thursday, June 2, 2005
How to record your own Podcast
The best tip ever to increase productivity
The most important tip to increase productivity Avoid the email addiction - The “ding” of an incoming email is a big temptation to interrupt what you are doing to check messages. Set times during the day to check and respond to your messages to stay on task.
In a recent study by Microsoft, US workers reported that 35 percent of their work week is unproductive. CareerWomen.com, in an effort to help employers and employees understand when during the work week they can expect to be most productive, recently polled US workers and found that Tuesdays between 10 am and noon is considered to be the height of productivity.
"All of us have our best days and times, but the results clearly show that the majority of the workforce has a sound understanding of when they feel at the top of their game in terms of productivity," commented JillXan Donnelly president of CareerWomen.com. "Identifying what makes us all more productive will help both employers and employees better prepare and organize to increase efficiencies and effectiveness in the workplace."
Respondents share their insights on increasing productivity.
Best Desktop Search Tool
PCWorld.com has announced the 100 Best Products of 2005. The World Class Award winners were announced in the July 2005 issue of PC World. To select the winners, PC World’s editors examined hundreds of products, including those that have appeared in the magazine over the past 12 months. The winning products were selected for their exemplary design and usability, features, performance, innovation, and price.
“The ultimate buyers guide, World Class Awards set the standard for excellence in the high-tech and consumer electronics industries,� stated Harry McCracken, editor in chief of PC World. “From desktop publishers to travel routers to satellite radio and video instant messenger services, the editors reward the finest products and most outstanding performers in this annual award program.� See The ranked list of all 100 products
Copernic: Although this utility isn’t quite as efficient as Google Desktop Search, search geeks may prefer it. Copernic can hunt for files by size or by date and can store its index file in the location of your choice.
Google Desktop Search: It does a speedy job of retrieving the results you want, but it could use a better way of paring down your results.
The Mozilla Firefox browser get the “Product of the Year” award - This open-source program is streamlined, customizable, and just plain better. No wonder it has attracted millions of users in just a few months. Is it merely a coincidence that Microsoft finally plans to give the aging Internet Explorer the major overhaul it has needed for years?
Some great software program like Adobe Indesign, Adobe Photoshop, Zonelabs, Maxthon (MyIE2) and Corel painter find mention in the list. Flickr.com and Typepad are listed in the blogging tools category. NYTimes gets the website award while A9.com makes it to the list in the search engine category.
Google lends a ear to Mac and Linux users
Google Vidsense program was seen as an opportunity to make money from your home videos. Those interested can go to https://upload.video.google.com and load their digital videos to Google Video, itself a relatively new service that, when queried, returns excerpts of close-captioning transcripts of television programs, still images from broadcasts and other programming information.
Eventually your work will be included in Google Video, where users will be able to search, preview, play and purchase it. You may designate a price for playback of Your Authorized Content in the Uploading Form itself.
Google released a video uploader, a PC Windows only application that can be used to upload your video to Google servers.
Now R.P. Hughes writes that the Google Video Uploader is available both for Macintosh and for Linux (and UNIX and Solaris and HP-UX and AIX and lots of other platforms). Seems like the application is rewritten in Java that comes pre-installed on the vast majority of operating systems. And software written in Java really, really does work across all those platforms.
The Sun folks would love to read this but my problem remains - How to upload a 50 MB WMV video files on a dialup connection ?
Now Google wants your help
Want to improve your website coverage on Google - Read this. Google have started a new service called Google Sitemaps - a collaborative crawling system for improving the coverage and freshness of Google index. Participation is free. Inclusion isn’t guaranteed
Google Sitemaps is intended for all web site owners, from those with a single web page to companies with millions of ever-changing pages. If you want Google to crawl more of your web pages or want to be able to tell Google when content on your site changes, this is the service for you. Using Sitemaps, Google hopes to expand the coverage of the web and improve the time to inclusion of website content in their index. They however don’t guarantee that they will l crawl or index all of your URLs.
The way Google Sitemap works is pretty simple. You place a XML formatted file on your webserver which instructs Google to find out what pages are present and which have recently changed. Whenever you make changes to your website, you accordingly update your sitemap. And Google will also help you create this file using a script called Sitemap Generator - It can be configured to automatically create Sitemaps and submit them to Google. Sitemap Generator can create these Sitemaps from a URL list, access logs, or a directory path hosting static files corresponding to URLs.
There has alway been lot of speculation on When Googlebot decides to index your site and What pages Googlebot chooses to index. Looks like with GS, website owners might get some control over this. Google Sitemaps will also be a big help for SEO’s in understanding how Google reads the website layout and what layout works best. This service is however not for people who do not have access to their webserver directories. ( I fall in that category )
My Computer or just Computer
If you are a Microsoft user, there’s a big change coming in Longhorn - the code name for the next MS operating system: the “My” prefix is disappearing.
Microsoft users have become used to the “My Music,” “My Pictures,” and other “My” folders, the Seattle Post-Intelligencer, reported. Those Windows folders will still be yours - but they won’t keep hitting you over the head with that terminology.
Ending a longstanding tradition, Microsoft says, starting in the next Windows version due out next year, folders will be known simply as “Documents,” “Music,” and so on. The “My” prefix was apparently an attempt to create a personal connection between people and their computers at a time when the idea of using a computer might have been forbidding.
What would be they call “My Computer” which is generally the most visible icon on PC desktops and Windows explorer - My Microsoft PC™
Tuesday, May 31, 2005
There is life beyond Google
AltaVista offers superb audio and video searches, If you want to find people or find out what people are talking about, Lycos makes sense, If you want to customize and save your search results, A9’s your engine (but cozy relationship with Alexa raises privacy concerns). For everything else, use Google.
CNet has a nice comparison of search engines - They took a fresh look at Google, Yahoo, and seven of their closest competitors, focusing on their interfaces, features, and functionality. While Google and Yahoo still trump their rivals in terms of overall search, we found that almost every player in our competition brought something unique to the table. For example, AOL Search offers real-time search suggestions while you type in your query; Ask Jeeves offers a cool thumbnail preview of Web pages on its search results; and LookSmart has a unique periodical search feature, plus a one-of-a-kind page archiving tool.
Search engine alternatives such as A9, AltaVista, AOL Search, Ask Jeeves, LookSmart, Lycos, and MSN Search are launching innovative tools and services to catch up with the two Web searching giants. The search engine comparison report can be viewed in a matrix style - As expected, Yahoo! and Google top the charts but A9 from Amazon is fast catching up.
Google wins because of the intuitive interface; excellent image searches; best-of-class local searches, producing maps with satellite imagery; cached pages and related links; sponsored links clearly separated out into the right-hand column; desktop search tool; downloadable toolbar. Businesses can use search engines to better understand their competition in the marketplace.