What is a Podcast?

[jbc]

I am embarrassed to ask but what is a podcast?

 

[KSoD]

It is basically a short video that people can download to an iPod or other device via their service or website.

Meaning that people can go to itunes and get a podcast of something and download it to their iPod. The Zune has offers for podcasts as well with their software. Some websites also distribute podcasts as well which can be downloaded and transferred to a device to watch on the go.

 

[Yami]

Think of a podcast as a little radio show or talk, which you can download and listen to. They sometimes also have video.

From Podcast - Television Tropes & Idioms

A "podcast" is this: a posting of files, usually audio or video, set up so that it can be subscribed to through a Web feed (RSS) by a aggregator program. That's it. That's all it is. It can be a radio show, or an audio/video blog or pretty much anything.
It's a very basic tool given a fashionable, swanky, yet nearly nonsensical name (which comes from playing them on iPods) to make it seem special and magical. Like pretty much everything else on the internet. On the other hand, it's a simple, catchy name for a common phenomenon, much like 'television' and 'radio', both of which earned howls and jeers when they were new (the names and the phenomena).

 

[Kharn]

For instance Home Of PaulDotCom Security Podcast is a pod cast as is InfoSec Daily think of them like radio shows on a set topic but mostly independently produced and released.

 

[jbc]

CNN.com/podcast is not down loadable, so how does this qualify as a podcast. If what you are saying is correct then these clips are not podcasts at all.

 

[Yami]

Podcasts can be streamed - which is technically a form of downloading, just not permanently downloaded (though for the record you can save anything which is streamed, since it has to be downloaded to your comp for you to see it).

 

[office politics]

i got a question wrong on a quiz that stated a podcast is different from other digital recordings because it is distributes via a method of web syndication; such as RSS. No lie, I was ****ed. This is a college level course.