Darren Barefoot has an interesting take on Podcasting and why he’s ‘Not Smoking the Podcasting Dope‘. He raises some good points which are similar to some of the concerns I’ve written previously. He writes that podcasting has a shorter tail than blogging and that its less accessible to podcasters than blogging is to bloggers (to paraphrase just two of his main points).
I agree (with regret) with a lot of what Darren says but still hope that with time Podcasting will take off – I especially think it does have potential to be a powerful medium in some niches and that it has some fascinating applications especially internally within businesses – but overall I think it going mainstream could be a while off (if ever).
Two of the books that come to mind when I ponder the differences between Podcasting and Blogging are The Tipping Point by Malcolm Gladwell and the Unleashing the Idea Virus by Seth Godin. Both of these books talk about how some ideas spread like viruses whereas others do not. I wonder if some of the principles in these books might add to what Darren Barefoot has written. I guess the question I am asking today is ‘Is Podcasting Virus Like?‘
