Podcast Tutorial

We talk about pod­casts a good deal around here. But giv­en that only 12% of inter­net users have ever down­loaded a pod­cast, and only 1% does so dai­ly (see this Pew Research Cen­ter study), we want­ed to pro­vide an overview of pod­casts and how to use them. In a few min­utes, we want to get you up and run­ning and explor­ing our rich col­lec­tions of edu­ca­tion­al and cul­tur­al mate­ri­als.

What is a pod­cast?

Here’s the basic answer. Pod­casts are essen­tial­ly radio shows avail­able for down­load over the Inter­net, and you can lis­ten to them on your iPod, oth­er portable mp3 play­ers, and com­put­er. Instead of being broad­cast over the air­waves and even­tu­al­ly lost, as hap­pens with tra­di­tion­al radio shows, pod­casts can be stored and played at the user’s con­ve­nience. Think of it as a TIVO in audio.

How do I down­load and lis­ten to pod­casts? The iTunes Way

Giv­en the preva­lence of Apple’s iPod/iPhone, dis­cussing the Apple way of down­load­ing pod­casts is unavoid­able.

To access pod­casts through iTunes (down­load for free here), you have sev­er­al options:

Option 1:

  • Open iTunes,
  • Click on “iTunes store” on the left side of the screen,
  • Next click on “Pod­casts” with­in the area called “iTunes Store,”
  • Search and find the pod­cast you want,
  • Then either click “Get Episode” to get an indi­vid­ual pod­cast that inter­ests you, or click “Sub­scribe” to auto­mat­i­cal­ly receive each new install­ment with­in the pod­cast series.

Option 2:

  • Find a pod­cast that you’d like to explore. (You may encounter them while surf­ing the web),
  • Locate the pod­cast’s rss feed, which sites usu­al­ly adver­tise on their home­page, and are often accom­pa­nied by this sym­bol,
  • Click on the “Advanced” drop-down menu along the top of the screen,
  • Next select “Sub­scribe to pod­cast,”
  • And then paste the feed link (for exam­ple, http://www.abc.net.au/rn/podcast/feeds/mind.xml) into the box and click “Ok.”

NOTE: This option works well when you find a pod­cast that’s not already list­ed on iTunes.

Option 3:

  • Some­times when you’re surf­ing the web, you’ll find a pod­cast that you like, and you’ll have the option to sub­scribe direct­ly to the pod­cast on iTunes from the web page. (On Open Cul­ture, we give you this option when­ev­er we see a link that says “iTunes.”)
  • Click on the link and it will help you launch iTunes, and from there you’ll be giv­en the option either to sub­scribe to the ongo­ing pod­cast, or to down­load indi­vid­ual episodes.

Lis­ten­ing to the Pod­casts

Final­ly, when you sync your iPod, your pod­casts will be auto­mat­i­cal­ly down­loaded onto your iPod. And you can lis­ten to them by:

  • Turn­ing on your iPod,
  • Click­ing on “Music” at the main menu.
  • Scrolling the wheel down to “Pod­casts,”
  • And then select­ing the indi­vid­ual pod­casts that you want to play.

Are there alter­na­tives to iTunes?

Yes. And you have a cou­ple of options here.

If you own anoth­er kind of mp3 play­er (e.g. ones by Microsoft, San­Disk, or Cre­ative), it will come with soft­ware that per­forms essen­tial­ly the same func­tions as iTunes. And you’ll want to fol­low the same basic direc­tions that we out­lined in Step 2 above. That is, find the rss feed (which we always try to pro­vide) and use it to sub­scribe to the pod­cast. Then sync and lis­ten.

And then there is an inter­est­ing sec­ond option: Life­hack­er recent­ly rec­om­mend­ed a free soft­ware called “MyPod­der” (down­load here). It is a cross plat­form soft­ware for down­load­ing pod­casts direct­ly to your MP3 play­er, no mat­ter what kind you have.

Can I Make My Own Pod­casts?

Sure, check out our pre­vi­ous fea­ture that directs you to good resources.


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Comments (12)
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  • Carol A says:

    Using pod­casts so fre­quent­ly it came as rather a shock to find I am in a “minor­i­ty”, in fact, being mid­dle aged and female a rather small minor­i­ty! But it does seem that many peo­ple who have good broad­band access at home and at work fail to use the poten­tial of the WWW. I have been edu­cat­ed, amused and amazed by some of the pod­casts list on your won­der­ful site — one of the inter­net’s best resources.

  • It is amaz­ing how such a great tech­nol­o­gy such as pod­cast­ing is still in its nanseant stage. I’ve got a pod­cast at Odeo: http://www.odeo.com/channel/276463/view

    I love to lis­ten to pod­casts. Stand­ing in line, at the doc­tors office any­where there’s a wait. Even dri­ving down the road as I can’t stand the Jack radio for­mat many sta­tions have adopt­ed.

    You can lis­ten to lec­tures, books, music, and if you hae the play­er you can even watch videos while wait­ing any­where.

    Your arti­cles on pod­cast­ing are amaz­ing and I’m glad to have found your infor­ma­tive site. What a trea­sure.

  • […] If you’d like to learn about dig­i­tal pho­tog­ra­phy using pod­casts, check out Dig­i­tal Pho­tog­ra­phy Tips from the Top Floor (iTunes — Feed — Web Site). And, for that mat­ter, if you need to learn how to use a pod­cast, spend some time with our Pod­cast Primer here. […]

  • Thanks for a great expla­na­tion and a rich direc­to­ry. I am try­ing to sup­ply some of the need myself. Not by mak­ing pod­casts, but review­ing them in my blog. Try­ing to con­cen­trate of the bet­ter edu­ca­tion­al ones…
    http://anneisaman.blogspot.com

  • ipod learn french…

    This makes France the only West­ern Euro­pean nation (exclud­ing microstates) to have only one offi­cial­ly recog­nised lan­guage. Oth­er mas­sive build­ings…

  • […] Pod­cast Tuto­r­i­al | Open Cul­ture Here’s the basic answer. Pod­casts are essen­tial­ly radio shows avail­able for down­load over the Inter­net, and you can lis­ten to them on your iPod, oth­er portable mp3 play­ers, and com­put­er. Instead of being broad­cast over the air­waves and even­tu­al­ly lost, as hap­pens with tra­di­tion­al radio shows, pod­casts can be stored and played at the user’s con­ve­nience. Think of it as a TIVO in audio. (tags: pod­cast tuto­r­i­al how­to) […]

  • Emma Dipietro says:

    I am new to pod­casts, myself, and I am enjoy­ing them more and more. I am espe­cial­ly inter­est­ed in their appli­ca­tions to a muse­um set­ting. If any­body else is inter­est­ed, you should read this arti­cle on pod­cast­ing in muse­ums. It gave a lot of info on what muse­ums are doing today. Real­ly inter­est­ing!

  • Tonya Putnam says:

    I love pod­casts. I sub­scribe to four main pod­casts and then have a few oth­ers that I occa­sion­al­ly lis­ten to. It’s a nice break to have some­thing to lis­ten to out­side of reg­u­lar music (even though some that I do lis­ten to talk about and play music). I like to lis­ten to them with in ear head­phones while I’m run­ning. Since it’s get­ting nice out­side, it looks like I will be doing more of it very soon!

    Tonya Put­nam

  • Allan Hunkin says:

    Pod­cast & Talk Host Mas­tery is a Resource Guide, Indus­try Direc­to­ry and ‘How To’ Hand­book focus­ing on two areas:

    * The skills, knowl­edge and equip­ment need­ed to become a pro­fes­sion­al pod­cast­er, video­cast­er, talk show host, web­cast­er, or tele­sem­i­nar leader.

    * Assist­ing these “talk pro­fes­sion­als” to develop/expand their knowl­edge and capa­bil­i­ties in the busi­ness aspects of being a host, con­tent pro­duc­er, and info­pre­neur.

    Vis­it http://talkmastery.info 

  • HiGH GLOBULIN…

    […]Pod­cast Tuto­r­i­al | Open Cul­ture[…]…

  • I believe blogrolls are of sup­port for your view­ers in find­ing added blogs to check out inside the spot you are com­pos­ing inside

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