Speaking about pod / videocasting, Boinx software, the makers of iStopMotion, have posted a pretty good little tutorial on how to create podcasts with .Mac. The tutorial walks you through 3 basic steps: recording the podcast, uploading the podcast to .Mac, and then creating and uploading an RSS feed to .Mac. For step number 3, they use a program called Feeder, which will set you back $30. That sounds kind of steep to me. If anyone is interested in hearing a how-to on hand-rolling your own RSS feed, let me know in the comments and I'll tell you a sad sad tale of how I put such a beast together once upon a time...Of course, after you have everything set to go, you still have to take into account bandwidth issues that may arise from offering podcasts over .Mac. Also, considering how hot-to-trot Apple is on podcasting, I wouldn't be surprised if step number two and three in the Boinx tutorial become collapsed into something like, "Upload the recorded file to the podcast folder on your iDisk." Until Apple steps up, this tutorial will suffice. Check it out.
Reader Comments (Page 1 of 1)
7-21-2005 @ 3:53PM
Harry Richman said...
one problem seems to be that Feeder doesn't provide all the iTunes specific tags in the RSS feed.
So those 2 hours I spent doing them dont feel so horrible.
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7-21-2005 @ 4:03PM
andy said...
Ooh. ooh. Tell us the sad, sad story... please? Because, I've been thinking about doing the same thing, and now you have me nervous.
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7-21-2005 @ 4:10PM
A. Jordan said...
Well, I just paid for Feeder a few days ago and it seems to help with getting the podcasts out there...what's the easier way then?
Thanks!
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7-21-2005 @ 5:50PM
Harry Richman said...
Well, Andy. Many years ago, when I was only a young man, and far more naive than I am today, I saw a new piece of software, they called it iTunes. They said, put these in, it will make your Podcast better, oh and of course, not knowing what I do know, I said yes.
And on that fateful day I spent many an hour or two pondering why oh why iTunes kept telling me the feed didn't work.
Basically its that iTunes appears to be slightly more pickey than other apps ever were, but it has made it all better.
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7-21-2005 @ 6:08PM
Callum said...
I use .Mac for my 'podcast' and have written to the support team many months ago asking questions on bandwith (limits?) and possibly making podcasts integrated with the service - I believe I also brought up using iTunes to create and manage podcasts more intuitivly (damn I wish Steve would stop stealing my ideas :D).
Anyhoo- I did get a reply, nothing too interesting but there are no stated limits on "Bandwidth"... that is "through-put" although Apple did cover their asses with something along the lines of "we reserve the right to disable an account if there is excess usage..." - I don't know what that MacWorld story is about (email dated 11th May).
No mention of podcasting, those coy Cupertino kids.
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7-21-2005 @ 8:20PM
Victor Agreda, Jr. said...
A cursory glance at Feeder shows me a nice little tool for coding those feeds... Now "back in the day" when I did my one pathetic little podcast ( http://davincinotebooks.blogspot.com for more info) I just put all the necessary stuff in there by hand. BY HAND! Egads. It's like writing a web site using a text editor-- which I hear people still do.
Here's what I did:
1. Recorded on my iPod using iTalk
2. Transferred the audio to my mac, then tried to use Audacity to edit things together. Audacity kept crashing when trying to convert the WAV to an MP3 (don't even get me started on how it handled different sample rates, ugh). So I found another MP3 converter...
3. It sounded like garbage. So I re-did everything in Garageband, exported to iTunes, and we were all sounding better.
4. Using a simple text editor (gasp) I created all the RSS goodness needed to feed my 'cast to the world. Sad but true. Actually, my code is probably horrible (don't shoot me Mr. Winer), but it works.
5. I did upload my mp3 to my .mac account, and never heard a peep from Apple. Of course, I don't have the bandwidth needs of say, Dawn and Drew, but it did admirably.
Lesson: the whole process was a royal pain. One show later and I had to give it up. Ah, to be a pioneer struggling to find food on the Oregon trail... Later I used Feedburner to assist me (and clean things up a bit).
In fact, my podcast is still up. Don't listen. I'm having surgery to remove that rod.
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