Thing 21 Podcasts; Week 8 TLC

Take a look at one or two of the podcast directories listed and see if you can find a podcast that interests you.

I started with Podcast Alley. I didn't care for the interface. My concerns are the same as YouTube. They could do a better job of classifying using more categories and tags. I selected Grammar Girls Quick and Dirty Tips for Better Writing since I can always use help with Grammar. Though I think grammer would be better as a video podcast.
I liked the Digg Podcast directory better because it had a less cluttered interface and it directly linked to the actual podcast in addition to hosting it on their site.

I decide to use Podcast Alley to look for a library related podcast. I chose the Library Channel to add to my Bloglines account.

However, I ran into technical challenges as the url had changed. When I went to the Arizona University site I had to hunt around for the subscription url. I ended up using the google link and just copied the link into my bloglines account. I really like how bloglines makes it easier to look at the podcasts. It also means one less account and password to remember.


Create a blog post about your discovery process.
Podcasts can be very useful for providing additional learning experiences for people. However, finding good material is the difficult part.

I tried the extra credit to create a podcast using gcast.
It turns out it is harder to make a podcast since they don't tell you how to create mp3 audio files and they don't use wav files which is a Windows sound recorder format. Of course you create a telephone podcast but that doesn't give you the ability to save your files on your computer to use on other podcast sites.

I decided to use the telephone option to record a podcast. The recording posted to my site, but when I tried to play it I got the message "error on page" I''ll have to come back to this later.

The library application for podcasts is excellent for provding training material and announcements.