What is a PodCast or PodCasting?

For those of you who haven't heard about podcasting yet: this is a new phenomenon that can be described as audio-blogging. A podcast is basically a radio-like program in mp3 format, made on many different subjects, by people all over the world.

You can download podcasts one-by-one from the websites they originate from, or better yet: download every new episode automatically to your iPod or any other mp3 player.

http://www.riverterrace.org/podcast/rss.xml

Place your pin on our Frappr! Map.

Podcasting in a Nutshell

First of all, podcasting is not just for iPods. Podcasts are compatible with all MP3 players, since they're encoded in the widely compatible MP3 format. Like any other kind of broadcast, podcasts can be talk, music, or a mix of the two. The main distinction is that you can listen to them whenever you want to (think TiVo for your MP3 player).

The technology that drives podcasting is the RSS feed. Basically, these are Web-based information documents that allow developers to syndicate data from one site to another. This can get tricky, which is why applications such Juice or WinPodder are integral in making them easy enough to be used by nonprogrammers. Amateur and professional broadcasters around the globe can now produce their shows at their leisure using a PC, digital music files, and a microphone, and then upload them as MP3 files that get sent directly onto the MP3 players of any subscribers.