|
'Podcasting' goes professional |
|
|
|
|
Sunday, 27 February 2005 |
'Podcasting'
goes professional
International Herald
Tribune - France
SAN FRANCISCO The primarily amateur Internet audio medium known as podcasting
took a small, hopeful step on Friday toward becoming the commercial Web's next
big thing.
That step was taken by Odeo, a five-person start-up that is based in a walk-up
apartment in the Mission District of San Francisco and was co-founded by a
Google alumnus. The company plans to introduce a Web-based system that is aimed
at making a business of podcasting - the process of creating, finding,
organizing and listening to digital audio files that range from living-room
ramblings to BBC newscasts.
Audio files on the Internet are nothing new, of course. But the recent
proliferation of iPods and other portable devices for storing and playing audio
files has created a mobile audience on whom podcasters are counting to listen to
much more than downloaded songs and the occasional audio book. In the United
States alone there are more than 11 million people with portable digital audio
players.
The question for Odeo, and for the many other entrepreneurial efforts almost
certain to come, is whether there is any money to be made from podcasting.
Recall that the dot-com boom was full of start-ups betting on one or another
notion of the Web's potential. But for every felicitous pairing like Google and
keyword searching, there were dozens of broken marriages like Pets.com and
online dog food sales.
There are already a number of small commercial efforts to create audio programs
especially for listening to as mobile downloads.
Only registered users can write comments.
Please login or register. Powered by AkoComment 2.0! |
