Podcasting Is Not Dead

Podcasting Is Not Dead… In fact, It’s just getting started.

That pretty much wraps up the sentiment most had after PodCamp Montreal 2008 ended for day one a few hours back.

Podcasting Is Dead was the name of an afternoon session with Rob Blatt. He asked us to define Podcasting.

Here’s what I said: "a Podcast is a portable piece of audio or video content that is delivered by RSS subscription."

Here’s what Wikipedia says:

"A podcast is a series of audio or video digital-media files which is distributed over the Internet by syndicated download, through Web feeds, to portable media players and personal computers. Though the same content may also be made available by direct download or streaming, a podcast is distinguished from other digital-media formats by its ability to be syndicated, subscribed to, and downloaded automatically when new content is added.

Like the term broadcast, podcast can refer either to the series of content itself or to the method by which it is syndicated; the latter is also called podcasting. The host or author of a podcast is often called a podcaster."

They both seem to make sense, but Blatt’s presentation challenged the notion that the word "podcasting" has no real value any more. In what turned into a debate on semantics (are you a Podcaster or a Producer?), I came to realize that Podcasting is, indeed, not dead… but just beginning to really see some uptake (whether you like the nomenclature on this new audio and video media or not).

First off, Podcasting is not like any other media form because while you can listen to a Podcast in many different ways (via subscription, directly in iTunes, downloading the MP3 file, listening to it right off a Blog, etc…), what makes a Podcast a "Podcast" is the the subscription (RSS) component.

Secondly, according to the eMarketer news item from September 2nd, 2008 titled, Podcast Usage Still Skews Young: "eMarketer predicts that the growth of the podcast audience in the US and the migration of content toward portable devices will help the channel mature and produce healthy increases in ad spending through 2012. The US podcast audience will grow from 18.5 million in 2007 to 65 million in 2012 — an increase of over 250%."

After watching the nearly 400 people today dive into social media and the power of Podcasting, it’s clear that more adoption is beginning to take hold.

What do you think? Is Podcasting dead?