The modern podcasting climate has changed considerably since its mainstream launch in 2005. Many podcasting giants have risen and fallen within the period but still the technology trundles on. The issue that many people have now is not maintaining a podcast, but actually creating one and successfully launching it.

When the iTunes Podcast store opened its gates in June 2005 the online world exploded with podcasting fever. It wasn’t too long before the technology caught the eyes of the big players within the old radio and television industry, from that point on independent podcasts were doomed.

The independent podcast circle used to be a buzzing pace full of enthusiasm and community. Perhaps I’m painting an idyllic image of the past, as one often tends to do with hindsight, but my point is valid nonetheless. There was talk of commercialising podcasts, in order to maintain them and break even, but making millions wasn’t on the agenda. There was a time when I was a big advocate against the commercialisation of podcasts, but that time has passed and I’ve joined the dark side. Commercialisation of podcasting has, if anything, improved the overall quality of content available.

Something changed after the Summer of 2005. Suddenly it became very hard to launch a podcast and gain the amount of an audience as one would have achieved in June. There wasn’t an issue of over-saturation of the market at all, the issue was that big corporate companies started to move in.

The BBC effectively killed independent podcasts when it started to regurgitate its own radio content. The BBC didn’t come up with new content for podcasts, they recycled the shit that came out of the mouth of Chris Moyles in the morning to turn it into what they called a podcast. “The Best of the Chris Moyles show” quickly became one of the biggest podcasts on the web, the BBC saw the success of this and soon began to recycle the rest of their shit from across their radio network. Soon the market was flooded by other broadcasters doing the same.

Take a look at the front page of the iTunes Podcast store today and you will not see a single independently produced podcast. It’s either crap recycled from the BBC, or other network providers, along with one or two “celebrities”. If fun, independent content is becoming hard to source from the world’s number one podcast store the industry is doomed.

Small little networks and communities used to exist that would serve as directories for independent shows, but they’ve long since died out. The Britcaster forums closed their doors way before I even found a slight moderate success with The Podzone. Mevio are no longer promoting the independent content that’s hosted on their network. They’re plugging the shows that they produce, they’re not even supporting the independent producers with promotion on their front page or channels.

If the big old media networks are tainting what was once hailed as he saviour of high quality entertaining content, what’s the next step? Podcasting was created by pioneers who were frustrated with the blatant commercialisation and dumbing down of mainstream content, it’s sad to see it go the same way as radio.

The only way that we shall see the continuation of podcasting and the saving of independent content within that is for a new network to be built. A united front against all of the shit and trollop that is being pushed out and into our ears by old media companies. If there is one thing that could possibly save podcasting, it’s Twitter. Someone just needs to come up with a way to make the two work together.

We need a community, a new directory, a fantastic piece of software and integration that will save the independent podcast industry before it really is too late.

Chris Leydon.

Twitter is the social network that half the world is going crazy about right now. The British media can’t seem to get enough of social networks, such as Facebook, but Twitter appears to be the favourite of the month. Hardly a day goes by when the BBC doesn’t have an article on their Technology News site where they don’t mention Twitter.

Just incase you have been living under a rock for the past few months, here’s a bit of background behind Twitter. Twitter is an online social networking application that just asks you one question, “What are you doing?”. The premise behind this is to keep those who want to know what you’re up to, informed. As it has once been described, Twitter is what happens between blog posts and emails.

In all honesty Twitter has been around since 2006, it’s only recently that the traditional broadcast media has cottoned onto it. A few months ago some celebrities, such as Stephen Fry and Jonathan Ross began to use the service; with their media influence there has been a sudden explosion of interest in Twitter. This fresh explosion in the social network has unearthed the age old question that has been plaguing Twitter since its initial conception. How on earth is Twitter going to monetize?

Personally I hate the word “monetize” but I think it’s perfectly apt for this post. “Monetize” is a word that’s been floating about since the .com boom of the late 1990s. Business men and women see a new technology and start to wonder how they can make money out of it, how they can “monetize” an existing technology or service.

Usually, with online social networks and services, the typical way to monetize is through selling premium rate advertising on the network or service. Many current social networks already adopt this form of funding, in fact advertising is pretty much the biggest element that’s keeping the internet a float. Google makes money out of advertising, Yahoo supposedly do, Microsoft are attempting to, Facebook is leaning in the direction of selling advertising and many blogs and podcasts have adverts littered throughout them (although not THIS blog, for various personal choices).

The general feeling amongst the online tech world is that Twitter shall eventually follow the rest of the crowd and monetize using advertising. Current suggestions of how Twitter could implement advertising include displaying targeted adverts, that pick up on key words or traits, in between tweets on a user’s personal stream; very much like Google does with their search results (which leads onto another rumour about Google buying out Twitter). However many feel that this will disrupt the way Twitter works and that it wouldn’t really be an effective way of monetizing the system.

Twitter is unique in the fact that it has one massive obvious way that it can make money. People implement Twitter EVERYWHERE by using Twitter’s extensive API. The API that Twitter provides means that third parties can create applications that integrate with the social network. Whether it’s to build a simple Twitter desktop app, to analyse stats, or a plethora of many other possibilities, the Twitter API allows a third party to do this. So many people are coming up with exciting and fresh ways os using Twitter, through the API, that a single way to monetize Twitter seems to have appeared.

Thousands of dollars a day are poured into Twitter to keep it functional. Their server farms require electricity, cooling, security. They have to pay their engineers and keep their shareholders happy. A few months ago Twitter was struggling to meet with the demands of their ever expanding audience; servers were failing left, right and centre and the service became awfully unreliable. However, very few people were actually logging on to Twitter.com and actually using the site. The increase of traffic was coming from third party applications making use of Twitter’s API.

An interesting solution to monetizing Twitter is to charge for the use of their API. If Twitter were to start charging developers to access their API, Twitter might have a viable financial solution on their hands. An entire universe of third party applications that make use of the Twitter API exist, it’s part of the reason why Twitter has managed to survive when other similar social networks haven’t. Twitter integrates with everything and has become an incredibly powerful tool. It seems incredibly silly not to start charging for API access, now that the network behind Twitter has built up. Other companies and services are making use of the API, which is currently losing Twitter money. This would also be an effective way of avoiding charging users of Twitter for accounts. To me, it all seems perfectly logical. I have no idea though how much, or how, one would charge for API access; it’s just an idea.

Chris Leydon.

[See post to watch Flash video]

[See post to watch Flash video]

Blogging can be a chore at times. This is not the post that I originally intended to write this evening, however, how were you to know that until now?

A new type of Podcasting network is being launched by a young entrepreneur, Lewis King. Citrus 7 Media promises to deliver clean, fresh new media podcasts 7 days a week. Although it’s early stages and the project hasn’t hit the public yet, I can tell that it’s going to create some waves in the industry.

Podcasting companies, such as Mevio or Revision 3, are fantastic; however, they all seem to have their avoidable faults. They’re too focused on commercialisation, making a profit, and not on the actual content itself. Now whilst content may be king on some other podcasting networks (such as the Teen Podcasters Network) the lack of production values lets the overall presentation down. There needs to be a middle ground, great looking and sounding content with substance. That is what Citrus 7 Media aims to create.

Now, sceptics would have probably worked out by now that I have some sort of vested interest in Citrus 7 Media; this is not wholly untrue. I personally am fed up and frustrated with the ways that certain podcasting companies carry out their business. I, once again, want to see producers creating great content for the love of doing so. This did happen, and was a regular occurrence, during the early stages of podcasting; this practice seems to have faded away. I want to see Citrus 7 Media succeed because I want great fresh high quality content.

I have already become involved with Citrus 7 Media, more or less from the off. I’m excited to see the kind of buzz that this small network can produce. All one has to do is look at the Twitter results for “Citrus 7″ to see what I mean. My role, so far, in this budding venture, has been to create the Citrus 7 Media ident; the animation of the network logo that will play before a show (See video above). I have also been reviving my old concept of a video production show; a show based around teaching the basics of video production, in a fun way.

Vidproquo will be THE video show for any wannabe video producer. The show will advise, inform and entertain… most of all it will be fresh high quality content. Filming for the first season is due to commence in December. The introduction video for Vidproquo is above.

Citrus 7 Media promises to deliver fresh content 7 days a week, let’s see if it can live up to its promise when it launches sometime very soon.

Chris Leydon.