Proof that I was awake on Friday morning and not just sneaking  time off work  Leo Laporte veteran broadcaster ( Radio and TV ) Tech author and pod/vid caster  opened up this years expo with four or five main points,  five were enumerated but the crossover between a few of them makes it seem like four, maybe three interelated items.   In short.

1. Podcast is not a name we should stick with. He proposed "netcast" which is causing a furore on his site as well as Digg and many other locations.The idea is to form a consortium that will  obtain that name, though likely one similar to is since   Netcast is a phrase that predates podcast  by many years, heck I used to listen to  a "netcast"   David Lawrence's personal netcast , and still do , religiously.  Why change?  A case of sour grapes? nope sour Apples.  Apple's recent moves to enforce trademarks it believes is has to  have taken a swipe at companies that  fit their current definition of  what would be confusing to the consumer and constitute a  loss of value on their trademark.    Podcast has issues, people often confuse the need to have an iPod(tm) with their ability to listen to podcasts  and the name will change despite so many people being of the belief that the name is popular beyond redemption. Seen any Whigs lately?   Also tying yourself to a name that has forseeable legal implications is not a smart move.
2. "We're in this together"   Podcasting is too small to start infighting and  while there's a huge wealth of talent and theory on audio production, which is about to be resold to those that want it,  there's not a lot to speak towards this nascent media's ability to target people  in a manner that point 3 addresses.
   
3. "measuring your audience"  that currently applies.  Here we have a convention of many people trying to work out alternate ways to monetize a media that's yet to find a valid primary source of funding.  This idea showed up  in comments made by Andrew Baron of Rocketboom  and expanded upon by Paul Colligan here  that one day  "Disney will be comfortable with an audience of ten thousand.” for one of their shows.  CPM ( cost per 1000) from ye old media is mostly irrelevant to niche programming.   After all if I have the best ,possibly the only , podcast that talks about all the advances in  retinal tomography  there may be less than 2000 people , total , that would care to buy these machines so the need to find a new metric  is pretty obvious  which ties into
   
4. We need to grow the audience:   Podcasting is still a very small part of the mediasphere and the main challenge is to show people what they are missing. There really is a podcast for everyone ( with their senses intact) and if you know someone with a hobby that maybe dying  out,  not that popular where they live or quite frankly odd  take the time to find them a show, burn it on CD or  surprise them when you next drive them places.  ( I suggest you save Keith and the Girl for your second journey to church)  Point is  most of podcast promotion is  promotion to the "podderati"   Mainstream media are still in the geewhiz "fad" stage and  seem to believe that  receiving a paycheck is a measure of competency .. They pay congressmen.. point made? 
   
5. "This is a new Media:"  Experiment, have fun and try not to fall into the cradles of convention that dog mainstream media to this day. When all you have is a mass to sell to the LCD is pretty damn L. It's  so L  that the pan-galactic prize for right angles is usually given out to  every year,  much to the chagrin of H and E  , as an example of just how bent the mainstream media is.   
   

Not exactly a mass call to action more a reminder that just like every other revolution that was going to kill media  x y or z  the way to go about this may be a hybrid ( and I wish I could afford a good one )  of  we're in this together  learn from  what's passed (good and bad)  I don't care how radical you are sucky sound quality SUCKS and is disprespectful to your audience , if you want to get in my head, take your audio boots off first.

Next up:  Keynotes  2 and 3 . Battlestar Galactica and  Rocketboom


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