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GCN Home > 09/12/05 issue

Is this thing on? (tap, tap)

By Joab Jackson, GCN Staff

Agencies are embracing podcasting as a low-cost way to deliver audio content to citizens

It started as a hobbyist technology and recently found a foothold at forward-thinking federal agencies. The White House uses it to distribute the president’s weekly radio address. The State Department’s Voice of America exploits it for broadcasts. And hold onto your hats, because House Republicans and Democrats agree on something. In this case it’s that podcasting—a popular new method of publishing audio programs online—provides an efficient avenue for expressing their views via the Internet.

Last month, NASA delivered the first-ever podcast from space. On the day before the space shuttle Columbia returned to earth, crewmember Steve Robinson transmitted an audio file explaining how he’d repaired the craft’s damaged tiles and reflecting on his opportunity to “watch the sun come up over the bottom of the space shuttle.”

Not bad for a technology that’s been in widespread use for less than a year, a technology made popular by Internet hackers who wanted to send out homemade radio shows. But just as other Web-based tools have changed the way agencies operate (think online search, e-business, WebEx, XML) podcasting may prove handy for unique government missions. And getting started in podcasting can be easy.

Not just an Apple thing

The term podcasting is a hybrid of broadcasting and iPod, the latter being the popular brand of portable digital music player sold by Apple Computer Inc. In itself, the name is something of a misnomer because any digital music player or playback software could be used for listening to podcasts, which are commonly created in generic MP3 format, not just Apple’s.

To end users, podcasting can be thought of as a subscription to an audio program in which a list of available audio files is automatically downloaded to a personal computer—or the files themselves may be downloaded. From there, users can listen to the files on their PCs or shift them to their portable MP3 players for on-the-go enjoyment.

For federal organizations already producing audio content, podcasts provide another conduit to their intended audience. Unlike radio programs, podcasts can be heard at the listener’s convenience. In fact, experts say podcasts can tap into a user base of millions.

More news on related topics: Software Applications, E-Government, Management, Web Strategies



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