I think podcasting faces four main obstacles when it comes to recording presentations:

1. Lack of a second mic to grab audience questions/feedback.

2. Presenter not repeating the audience’s questions.

3. Presenter heavily relying on visuals of a PowerPoint that the listener can’t see.

4. The conference organizer’s fear that recording and distributing the presenter’s talk for free would devalue the conference. Even though it it relatively inexpensive to provide podcasts of every talk at STC, and every talk at Doc Train, and every talk at every conference, only the people on the edge of technology (like SXSW) are moving forward into this medium.

Karen, are you starting to listen to a lot more podcasts? I haven’t heard you approach this subject. I have a carcast that I recorded that I plan to post soon — I would love to hear your feedback on it.

Yes, I am speaking up so all you podcasters can hear us! Well put.

I was listening to a (very excellent) podcast from IT conversations today with Caterina Fake (http://www.itconversations.com/shows/detail1755.html), which was from a conference. They set a microphone up somewhere so questioners could be heard. Of course, this was a conference (Adaptive Path) so they have a bigger wallet than a local chapter of a non-profit society, or any other small group who wants to dive into this thing called podcasting.

That is indeed why I am speaking up – in the hopes that podcast evangelists like you and Tom and others can teach best practices to all the little newbies out there, both the newbies who want to stay small and intimate and the newbies who want to grow. It’ll be so much nicer for us listeners if they “do it right” from Day 1.

Thanks for listening.

On his blog Blogarithm, I just read his attempt to develop a sort of algebraic view on this.

“The absolute need for quality is inversely proportional to the underlying value of that content. For example, if we had the only recording of Dr. Martin Luther King’s “I have a dream” speech, I’m sure we’d publish it regardless of the quality.

……

“My instinct is to implement something similar to the Loomia-based rating system we’re using on IT Conversations and Social Innovation Conversations. It’s essentially the same as is used by Amazon or Netflix: a five-star rating. One thought is to apply one rating to content and a second to the technical quality”.

Anyone who has special interest in this can follow on:

http://www.blogarithms.com/index.php/archives/2007/04/24/the-algebra-of-quality-part-1/

We have come a long way from the old video conferences with jerky images and terrible sound, but this still needs a lot of attention – and skills.

Many conferences have already engaged a company to provide sound for the audience, and with some planning ahead, these people can easily provide the audio for podcasting afterwards. And if organizers at venues like this realize how valuable the content can be – not only for the peolple presen, but for ten times more the number of people after the event, maybe they would even work harder on recording in a good quality.

But this is a new medium – speak up, listeners, so we can hear you

And this will change, I´m sure.

I hope that those who venture into podcasting realize there is more to the process than just having the technical aspects in place. If they consider the entire process and plan wisely, they can provide an enjoyable listening experience. This is not to say that they need to plan for hours and days. They just need to remember a slight variation of the usual “know they audience” mantra for technical communicators: “think of thy audience”, or perhaps “respect they audience”!

I refer people to your own blogs for more details about podcasting. I know that if I share these issues with you, you take them seriously and incorporate such gems in your posts, making your site an even richer resource for all of us to share. (Another way of saying you have a great site!)

I should add that I also have a problem with telephone conferences, something I participate in a lot, where some participants are in a room with a conference phone, and they forget to consider whether those listening in on the phone can hear the comments from the person talking softly in a far corner of the room! Some of my frustration with that has probably spilled over into this discussion.

Setting up a second microphone is much more difficult than it seems. To do this, you need a microphone ($150), a mixer/preamp ($150), and then something to plug it into (a laptop or a digital recorder that accepts XSL jacks). Plus our room is kind of cramped and it’s not easy for people to just walk up to a mic. In short, it’s hard to arrange this affordably, and would require about $600 more dollars in equipment.

This is part of the reason I like phone interviews better. There is no issue about gaps. But thanks for the feedback. I didn’t realize how much of a bother it was, so next time I’ll try to come up with a better solution.