Ethos by Randy Elrod - How To Create Culture

Colorado Day 5...

so far...blogging early..more to come later...

Two quotes:

"To those whose hearts beat a little faster in the wild..."

"It is not the mountain we conquer, but ourselves."

-Sir Edmund Hillary

This photo of the moon last night is absolutely unretouched, no photoshop..it is the real deal just as it looked...amazing!!!

Podcasts Coming Of Age...

A year ago podcasting was just a fad with a cool name. In recent weeks, the format has taken several steps toward becoming big business. The audio blog phenomenon that began as free, grass-roots rantings is being commercialized through advertising and subscription fees.

In early March, for instance, the creator of the British sitcom “The Office” began charging $2 a pop for his comedy-themed podcast after generating 250,000 downloads per week from Apple’s iTunes Music Store.
Media companies like NPR and Clear Channel now sell 10- to 30-second commercials for their podcasts, prompting the emergence of startups formed to insert ads into amateur podcasts whose creators are unable to sell the ads themselves.

The trend has even expanded into the mobile space. On March 27, Mobile podcasting service Pod2Mobile introduced an automated advertising program that inserts 20-second audio ads at the beginning of participating podcasts.

The motivation is clear. A recent eMarketer report predicted that podcast advertising spending will increase from an estimated $80 million this year to $300 million by 2010. Venture capitalists at Sequoia Capital—which participated in the $8.85 million funding of podcasting pioneer PodShow—say the market could grow to as much as $2 billion in the next five years.

Of course, to reach these figures, podcasts need listeners. According to Bridge Research, there are about 9 million podcast listeners today. Conservative analyst projections peg that the audience will reach around 12 million in the United States alone by 2010.

The “corportization” of podcasts is contributing somewhat to this growth, as the big media brands take over the format from the geek fringe. But almost every pundit agrees the biggest killer app for the format is the one most difficult to obtain—music.

To date, the major labels have been reticent to license full-track songs to the podcasting community because podcasts are downloaded files free of digital rights management protection.

But there has been some movement. Noncommercial radio station KCRW Los Angeles has posted audio podcasts of its programming since last March, and in January expanded into video podcasting.

On a case-by-case basis, KCRW has scored permission from major labels to podcast the in-studio performances of acts that appear on its “Morning Becomes Eclectic” show. Such acts as She Wants Revenge, Medeski Martin & Wood and Robbie Robertson are included. KCRW plans to soon launch a new “Song of the Day” podcast, featuring music by emerging bands.

But the music in these podcasts is limited to what is recorded in the studio or from independent acts. Getting full-track studio cuts of major-label content is next to impossible.

“The major labels aren’t interested in digital distribution or promotion through podcasting,” KCRW assistant GM Jennifer Ferro says. “I think they’re waiting for it to go away.”

Emerging to meet this challenge are firms focused on distributing podcasts over wireless networks. NPR, with KCRW, made a splash March 27 by becoming the first major media company to contribute its podcasts to the Mobilcast wireless podcast service from Melodeo.

Mobilcast, like Pod2Mobile, streams podcasts to mobile phones. Because there is no download, labels do not have to worry about distribution of unprotected files.

Melodeo’s service even adds a direct-purchasing option. The company also operates a full-song download service for Canadian wireless operator Rogers Wireless and others. So songs streamed via the mobile podcast can be purchased over the air.

Others include startups—like PodSafe and the Independent Online Distribution Alliance’s Promonet service—that aggregate libraries of tracks that participating labels have cleared for widespread use in podcasts.

But aside from the case-by-case exceptions, major labels are still not onboard. Some artists signed to these labels are beginning to express frustration.

“Podcasts are this big unknown to them,” says Brandon Curtis, vocalist for Reprise act Secret Machines. Tracks from the band’s album “Ten Silver Drops,” due April 25, have been sent to MP3 blogs and leaked to file-sharing sites as part of a pre-release buzz campaign, but not included in podcasts.

“Meanwhile, they’ll license this s*** out to ‘The OC’ for pennies,” Curtis says. “Record company people have agendas. The music can go on some ESPN sports highlight program, but it can’t be on a podcast? Whatever.”

By  Antony Bruno, Billboard
SOURCE:  Billboard

My Best Christmas Present...

My first downloads:

Music Videos
U2  "Original Of The Species"
Trans-Siberian Orchestra "Christmas Canon"
John Legend "Ordinary People"
Wilco "Box Full Of Letters"

Podcast
"RocketBoom"

Movie
Pixar "Boundin'"

Podcasting Gold Rush Is On...

The podosphere may be virgin terrain for the online world, but already the race is on to figure out whether there's any real money to be made through the new medium.

Consider the vast variety of approaches that have cropped up since Apple's iTunes upgrade this summer started delivering
thousands of new listeners to podcasters who once toiled in obscurity.

GrapeRadio podcaster Brian Clark is now gulping down about $1,000 a week from sponsors of his show for wine hobbyists. Grant Baciocco of the fiction serial The Radio Adventures of Dr. Floyd sells show-themed buttons and T-shirts and offers guest-voice roles for $50.

Josh of Josh in Japan is asking for PayPal donations from fans of his tales of expatriate life, though so far only $14 has rolled in. And Jimmy Diggs uses his Vegas-based Daily Noise as a traffic generator for his internet radio site, LVRocks.com, where sponsors pay for banner ads. (Editor's note: LVRocks.com hosts the author's podcast, Vegas S&M)

"There isn't much information out there on how to do this," said Tim Bourquin, producer of the sports-themed Endurance Radio podcast. "It's a work in progress, how this all works."

Endurance Radio was sponsored for a time by Gatorade and is now carrying ads from Fleet Feet Sports, a chain of running-shoe stores. Buoyed by their success, Bourquin and his brother Emile now offer tips on how to profit from podcasting on their weekly Podcast Brothers show, and their website provides a boilerplate contract for podcasters to use with advertisers. Bourquin is also organizing the Portable Media Expo in November in Ontario, California, to teach other podcasters how to "monetize" their shows.

One of the biggest challenges, says Bourquin, is that most potential sponsors don't even know what a podcast is.

"I've learned not to go in and say, 'We have a podcast and you should advertise,' because their eyes will glaze over," said Bourquin. "Instead, say, 'We've got this online radio program.' It's not quite correct, but people understand that a little better. And then you tell them the neat thing is that people can get the show automatically downloaded onto their MP3 player."

More HERE.

NEW WVRS-P MAKES BROADCASTERS PODCASTERS AND PODCASTERS BROADCASTERS...

The WorldVibrations Radio Station & Podcaster (WVRS-P) is the first all-in-one professional quality "radio station and podcaster in a box." It integrates the functions of an internet or conventional automated and/or live radio studio with the ability to create and upload podcasts simultaneously. The unit offers a fully-automated “on-air” studio, streaming media encoding and production and podcasting tools in one fanless studio-quiet package. Podcasts can be captured from live programming originating from the WVRS-P or independently produced, edited and uploaded while the radio station operates uninterrupted in automation mode in the background. The device is simple to operate, making it easy for people with no previous radio experience to schedule and broadcast anything from local arts performances, sporting events, church services or town council meetings to a professional 24 hour a day music or information radio station while producing on-demand podcasts. It also opens up new opportunities for podcasters, letting them repurpose their individual programs into a 24 hour radio format with music, promos and other features added.

More HERE.

Podcasting Support in TypePad...

 

This post is in a series of interviews with TypePad engineers describing the new features in TypePad, how to use them, and what motivated us to develop these features. Many of these features were developed as part of our recent Scratchathon.

Q: How can you do Podcasting on TypePad?

A: It's easy. Once you have created your podcast, you can simply upload your Podcast file (MP3/AAC) - in the same way you upload photos. All the rest is magically handled by TypePad.

If you want more details, here they are:

• Record a Podcast and create an MP3 or AAC file – I guess this is the hardest part :). Ipodder.org has some handy links on how to get started podcasting.
• Go to "Post > New Post" screen and upload the file by clicking the "Insert" toolbar on the WYSIWYG editor. This will create a "Download .mp3" link inside the post.

That's it. A Podcast feed will be created as an "rss.xml" in your weblog directory. Optionally, you might want to go to "Weblog > Design > Content" screen and turn on "Podcast link", so your weblog now has a link to an RSS 2.0 feed on its sidebar. You can drag and drop the link to Podcasting client software like iTunes. This new functionality was created by our TypePad engineer Mark Paschal.

Technically, you can upload any type of media files as an enclosure to the RSS/Atom feed. That means uploading .mov files will turn your feed into a Vlog/Vodcasting as well.

Q: What motivated you to build this feature?

A: Podcasting is becoming increasingly more popular. iTunes, one of the most popular media players, recently announced support for Podcasting and many broadcasting stations like CNN and MSNBC have started podcasting as well. I wanted to make sure that TypePad customers could share their Podcasts without needing have any technical knowledge about feeds. And I think Podcasting is a very good way to fill up your increased storage and bandwidth as well. :)

Podcast Conversation with Poet Laureate...

Here is the podcast conversation with Maggie Vaughn (Poet Laureate for the state of Tennessee). SEE APRIL 23 BLOG FOR MORE INFO and PICTURES. Come and join us for lunch at the Bell Buckle Cafe in historic Bell Buckle, Tennessee and let's talk about the power of story, the IFC Actor's studio questions, writing with both the heart and the brain, and much more.

New Podcast...

Scene 3 of the "Take 5" podcast features Garry Hood. Garry has served as the head stage manager for The Academy Awards, The Grammys, The Tonys, The Kennedy Center Honors, Christmas at the White House, the Opening ceremonies of the Olympics, as first assistant director for the BET Awards, and associate producer for the ALMA Awards.

To listen to the podcast, simply click the "Take 5 Scene 3" orange XML button, go to the bottom of the page and click Scene 3. To upload it to your iPod or aggregator enter this url into your program such as iPodder: http://feeds.feedburner.com/Ethos

How To Podcast with Typepad...

Typepad does not currently support Podcasting. This makes things more difficult, but it is possible. My journey was quite difficult, so I feel compelled to help those who want to podcast with typepad but are novices. I am not a programmer nor a computer geek, so my explanation will lean to the novice, and some things I don’t understand, they just happen to work. If you need a technical explanation, go to Google and read other articles/blogs.

Oh, this is also a PC user’s take on things. I hear Mac is much easier.

I gained invaluable help from the following links:

How to Create an RSS Feed With Notepad, a Web Server, and a Beer 

Making An RSS Feed

Easier Podcasting with SmartCast

RSS Validator

First:

Create a new link: I called mine “Podcast”

The link title is the name of your specific Podcast for that date.

The link URL points to the location of your actual RSS/xml file that also contains your actual mp3 file. I put mine on my personal website, since I have much more room there for multiple mp3’s and it doesn’t eat up my typepad storage limitation. It is an htm file that contains an XML file that supplies the RSS feed…(hmmm, that sounds good anyway)

My Link URL is:   http://www.randyelrod.com/Podcast/Audio.htm

Next, this code is placed in your “Podcast” link notes to point to your Feedburner “feed” -–explanation about Feedburner below—but for now, (Simply replace my blog title “Ethos” with your blog name.)

<a href="http://feeds.feedburner.com/Ethos" title="Subscribe to my feed"><img src="http://www.feedburner.com/fb/images/pub/xml_button.gif" alt="" style="border:0"/></a>

Then  go to “configure”;  then “advanced configuration” then “display notes” and select “as text”  then save this typelist.

Second:

Create a folder in the location that you wil store your mp3’s, that contains a file that functions as an RSS file and also in that same folder, for simplicity put your actual mp3’s.:

Here is my actual RSS file: (This is what you would find at: http://www.randyelrod.com/Podcast/Audio.htm)

-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

<rss version="2.0">

<channel>

<title>Ethos</title>

<link>http://randyelrod.typepad.com</link>

<description>Randy's Podcast</description>

<language>en-us</language>

<image>

<title>Ethos</title>

<url>http://randyelrod.com/images/Ethos.jpg</url>

<link>http://randyelrod.com</link>

<width>36</width>

<height>48</height>

</image>

<item>

<title>Trivial Pursuits Talk</title>

<link>http://randyelrod.com/Podcast/3-13-05.wma</link>

<description>

Rick White

</description>

</item>

</channel>

</rss>

Substitute your info in place of mine and be PRECISE (it is case sensitive) with the code.

The title, link, description, image and item are explained well at the following

Links.

How to Create an RSS Feed With Notepad, a Web Server, and a Beer 

And/Or here:

Making An RSS Feed

After you do this, make sure to validate it using this or any RSS validator:

RSS Validator . Fix any mistakes it points out.

***Notice the link in the code is my typepad url link that points to my Feedburner feed.

(The pointing is the important part-- we are pointing from the RSS file and actual mp3 to my typepad link and then to the feedburner feed)—all this because Typepad does not support Podcasting.

Third:

Feedburner provides a “third party” site to provide your Atom & RSS feed to aggregators such as ipodder. To do this…

Go to: www.feedburner.com

Create a feed:

My source feed URL is: http://www.randyelrod.com/Podcast/Audio.htm

(the location of my RSS feed and mp3’s)

My burned feed title is: Ethos (the name of my blog)

So then my burned feed url becomes: http://feeds.feedburner.com/Ethos

This is generated by feedburner.

You then must choose from quite a few options- The important one for me was choosing “SmartCast”

Then save feed.

Then click publicize.

It takes a few seconds or sometimes several minutes to appear, but you should

have  a page at: http://feeds.feedburner.com/your blog name that contains your image at the top left and at the bottom: your podcasts.

Fourth:

Create the actual mp3.

I use audacity (free download) and a USB mic with headphones and mic with an adjustable volume control to record my mp3’s

But you cannot export a recording as an mp3 in audacity unless you also find the program: Lame 3.97 …the dll file included enables you to export mp3’s from audacity to your computer. The Lame I found was zipped with a RAR zip program (which I had never heard of-only WinZip) so I also had to find the RAR zip program to unzip Lame)-but then---it worked!!!

Download ipodder or similar aggregator and enter in your feedburner url.

Happy podcasting!!!

Extensive Kyrgyzstan News and Updates Below...And New Podcast Added...

Here is a chance to eavesdrop on my Tuesday Morning Mentoring Group for Artists. We are gathered around a noisy table at our favorite breakfast haunt. Discussing anything and everything. This past Tuesday, conversation seemed to focus on "colors"- i.e. taking time to smell the lavender and the book "Blue Like Jazz". Artists around the table are Mark Lee of the multi-Grammy award winning group "Third Day"; Jeremy Theissen of GMA Award winning band "Down Here"; Ben Davis of the GMA Award winning group "By The Tree";Chad Jarnagin front man for the band "Among Thorns"; Ryun Hovind of the electronica dance band, "Spektral Motion" and myself. To join us simply click the XML button on the right column, and then click Take 5 Scene 2  at the bottom of the Ethos page, or add this feed url to your aggregator: http://feeds.feedburner.com/Ethos    Enjoy and tell your friends to load their iPod or Mp3 players.