Other Articles in Podcasting Technology
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Podcasting Blog
Voice Over Training
5/10/2008
One of the obvious aspects of podcasting is using your voice. And using it properly. If you’re looking for some more information about how to improve your voice technique in your podcast, I’d suggest checking out the Voice Over Experts Podcast from Voices.com.
Audacity Updated
5/09/2008
The very popular among podcasters audio recording application, Audacity has received an update. Podcasting News has a full rundown of the changes, including many bug fixes. It is nice to see some interface fixes, too, as I’ve felt Audacity has always suffered on the UI side.
Got a Podcaster Birthday Coming Up?
2/14/2008
Don’t forget that I’ve put together the finest collection of gifts for your favorite podcasting friend, family member, neighbor, or stranger! This isn’t just a list for holiday gifts, but great to find something to buy for a birthday gift or something for yourself, too. Filled with books, hardware and more, the store is broken out into … Continue reading »
Hardware Recommendations
- Kustom KM4 Mic with Cable
- Behringer XM8500 Microphone
- Shure SM58 Mic
- MXL MXL V63MBP Computer Desktop Recording Kit
Masthead
Contact
Ryan Irelan, Editor - listen@podcastfreeamerica.com
Audioblog.com and why you would want to use it.
After I did my first look at Odeo, ClickCaster and Podomatic, Eric Rice brought to my attention that I had left out his service, Audioblog.com, from the review. It certainly wasn’t on purpose. I must say that once I signed up for an account and dug in a little, I was quite impressed with that they had to offer.
Audioblog.com offers the following services:
- Podcast creation and publishing
- Video creation and publishing
That’s makes it sound so simple. Deceptively simple, because Audioblog is a robust, mature media service, unlike the services in my previous entry, Audioblog.com has had these features for a year and it shows.
I’m going to focus mainly on their podcasting support here, for obvious reasons, but certainly encourage anyone interested to go and check out their video services.
One of my first impressions of the service - and it was an important one- was that I didn’t have to look around and “mis-click” my way through their interface. All of my options were conveniently laid out as tabs and I was able to quickly set up my new podcast, including an auto-generated podcast feed. This is where I got a little stuck, but only for a moment. You see, at Audioblog.com you manage your Podcast and the audio content you publish under that Podcast as two different entities. It does make complete sense, but is just different than the other tools and made me step back for a moment to understand how it works.
I like how this separation of audio content from the actual podcast, though, because I can accumluate dozens of audio files and, using a drop-down menu, assign and publish them to any one of my podcasts(or weblogs). Their process is different, but in the end it’s the most powerful, especially when you start dealing with multiple audio files and multiple podcasts. It’s more like a content management system than any of the other three I’ve looked at.
After that little bump in the road, I moved along smoothly, having successfully created some audio and assigned it to a podcast and published it. I then activated iTunes tags for my podcast. This adds special tags to my podcast feed, which allows me to submit my podcast to the iTunes Music Store podcast section. This is an optional setting, but one most podcaster probably want to enable.
To get a run through on the exact process of creating and publishing your podcast with Audioblog.com (including how to submit it to the iTunes Music Store), Eric Rice has a thorough tutorial at their blog.
Unlike the other services, Audioblog is established and mature. Their audio services are not in beta - they are complete and fully functional. That also means that their services don’t come for free. There are significant costs in running a service like this, so in order to use it, you’ll be required to create an account. Accounts start at $4.95/month or $49.97/year and include minimal bandwidth, which is enough for most podcasters with moderately-sized audiences. 7-day free trials are also available.
I definitely encourage you to check out Audioblog.com and support their service which is helping to bring podcasting to everyone.
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