podcast

I often find information - here at Educause Connect, or elsewhere and want to see if it's what I'm looking for, and get some idea of what it says.

If I reach a web page - either text or also with pictures, graphs, ..., I can look it over very quickly. I can skip paragraphs or more, and quickly see whether or not I want to peruse it more thoroughly. If the web page really isn't what I want, I can likely assure myself of this in a minute or less.

What about the podcast? I do a search and find a podcast - the title hints that it will be useful, and the usual teaser sentence or two doesn't do more than that.

So I need to listen to the thing! It may be 45 minutes, or maybe an hour and a half. I listen much slower than I read! :-) I can't even speed up the blasted thing*, and often can't skip ahead. When I can skip ahead, I can't see anything about what I'm skipping.

So how long does it take for me to find out that the 90 minute podcast isn't helpful? It could well be 10 or 20 minutes.

That's 10 or 20 times longer than for a text/graphics web page!

That's inefficient!

EDUCAUSE Now is a new monthly audio podcast that covers news, resources, people, and events related to IT in higher education. The premier episode, launched last week, focuses on topics such as future learning, peer-to-peer file sharing and big broad band, the help desk in higher education IT, and more. Listen now or subscribe to the EDUCAUSE Now RSS feed.

I’ve been preparing for the video storm that has been approaching our campus for a few years now. The infrastructure part has been easy, bigger Internet pipe, video servers, disk arrays, file format and player strategies. We worked out security issues with VOD content from PBS and production issues by producing Chapel Podcasts. So we know how to do it, but should IT be the leader of this video explosion?

Last week our president returned from the NCAA meetings inspired by how many institutions are using YouTube for recruiting and marketing their programs. Combine that with our interviewing for a new VP of Marketing and we have final validation that video via your website is where we need to be. Now I’m fearfully aware that IT is the only group ready to manage all of these video production and distribution issues. Something tells me that this will be just like IT driving the early web and I have a feeling I will be just as happy to turn it over to Marketing when they are ready.

Starting this month, we are offering schools a chance to deliver audio to the masses and to the classes.  Every school will be able to store all MP3's on their own server while delivery of on-demand and podcasting is delivered by Blogamp U.   For regular podcasts, up to 10 courses, we will be making our system available at no charge for the first semester.  For more information, please contact us. 

 

In this podcast, we present a panel discussion from the EDUCAUSE 2007 Enterprise Conference, entitled "IT Matters!". The panel is moderated by EDUCAUSE Vice President Richard Katz and includes:

David Koehler, Director of Enterprise Systems, Cornell University

James S. Roberts, Executive Vice Provost, Finance and Administration, Duke University

Susan E. Thorin, University Librarian, Dean of Libraries, Syracuse University

Here's a quick collection of my favorite illustrations of the different forms a podcast can take:

- A way to learn something new: http://www.radiolingua.com -- learn Spanish, Italian, German in weekly classes

- A multi-format delivery of goodies: http://www.makezine.com/podcast -- audio, video, pdf files, all about MAKE'ing stuff. MAKE magazine takes a DIY/hacker approach to every aspect of life and technology, from robots/rockets/games to furniture/food/clothes.

- Another way to blog: http://www.zefrank.com/theshow -- week-daily for a year, Frank blogs whatever is on his mind. New episodes are no longer being producted, but it's hilarious (or maybe that's my twisted sense of humor....).

- An "independent" radio show: http://www.cuisinefromspain.com/ -- a monthly "cooking show", put on by a couple in Spain, one Spanish, one British.

- A source for audio books: http://www.podiobooks.com -- lots of great stories available this way, released on a schedule you specify.

These podcasts are my favorite sources of audio content related directly or semi-directly to what I do every day in the office -- innovation, ideas, management, perspective, etc.

The HBR IdeaCast
This is from the Harvard Business Review -- each episode is generally composed of an interview with an author or researcher about a particular set of ideas or advice about management and business, as well as a short "tips" segment toward the end.

Escape From Cubicle Nation
Pamela Slim focuses on creating a work life that you're passionate about -- for many, this may mean starting your own business or otherwise leaving corporate culture. For me, however, the focus is on creating a work environment that is appealing to people and gives them space to grow inside a larger organization. In addition, I find her reflections on marketing, discovering your own strengths, and developing services to be extremely relevant in an academic IT environment. She has a great blog, too.

Startup Nation

The third Learnitology Podcast of the year is out. Episode 203 asks a "burning question," about Wikipedia, There are also technology updates on Second Life, Apple TV, and XMAS. Follow-up links are at the accompanying blog.

Kim Mooney and Sondra Smith from St. Lawrence University in the north country of New York State talk about "Building Community Among Faculty: Best Practices Online." Recorded during their poster sessions at the ELI Annual Meeting in Atlanta.

Attached is an unedited recording of Robert Wright's poster session,"Interactive PowerPoint for Collaboration and Engagement" from the ELI 2007 Annual Meeting. Many of the major sessions are being podcast, so I thought it might be interesting to share a poster session, and Robert agreed. There's a lot of background noise, but that adds to the realism, and his message comes through clearly.