|Absolute Value|

Apple, this is getting really old. iTunes is constantly losing podcasts. I plug my iPod in, and iTunes comes up and says “XXX was not copied to the iPod”. I check the podcast listings and the podcast has downloaded, but the file is missing (and iTunes doesn’t have a re-download option which to be honest is just plain stupid). Can I ever have this working properly on my PC? All I want is to plug in, sync and play. Last time I did an international flight, I knew I had about 20 podcasts lined up so I plugged the iPod in, left it for a few hours while packing, came back and unplugged and left for the airport. I sat in my seat, turned the iPod on and found…… most of the podcasts missing.

This is what iTunes is giving me on sync:

The .NET Rocks podcast  just hit their 200th episode.  Congratulations to Carl for all his hard work and keep them coming!

Click here for the 200th episode.

Following on from these posts, I’m giving up my iPodder.org editorship. Anyone who wants to take on the job is free to do so, please leave a comment and I’ll get in contact with you as soon as I can. The categories that are available are Hacking and Technology.

This is all down to the lack of support from iPodder.org and Podshow but I still feel the podcasters must have the most help that they can. Therefore I’m hoping someone can come forward and move this directory forward.

Thanks for all the support!

Thanks for all the comments and the emails I received from my previous post regarding iPodder.org. It seems a lot of people are missing the point slightly. I am not too concerned by the lack of communication, even less so now that Adam commented in my blog saying he would hand the communications over to someone with more time.

My main gripe is being trailed along by the Curry/Bloom promises on how the directory would be “given” to the node editors where they would make their own playground. Tools, abilities, anything to make the directory your own and this has never happened, nothing that makes life easier for the editors. Tools, Tools, Tools!

Secondly. If this is a business venture which I believe it is, then the role of the editors need to change. How many other companies have a backbone of employees in effect paying to work for them?¹ Name me 5. And I am not necessarily speaking about money at all. If you’re making money from the directory or leveraging the directory for commercial uses, put something back into the “directory”². This ties in with the request for tools, or better control over your node. Hey, I’ll gladly do this for free if I had some better support.

Adam completely missed the point in his comment. If you read this post, please can we have some word on the directory. Will anything change? Are you willing to provide us with the abilities to do the things you promised not so long ago?

I do not feel as if I stand for other editors, but the emails I have been receiving point in this direction.

Again I ask - Is this important anymore?

1. Even if the bandwidth cost is low, its still there.
2. I hesitate to use the word community because it just doesn’t fit in at all.

Warning: Rant Alert

iPodder.org. The starting point for all podcast lists. The “Ultimate” directory of all things podcast. Lists and lists all in pretty OPML files all nicely linked to editors’ servers to reduce load. Seems like a paradise for podcasters to make sure more listeners come their way. But there is trouble in paradise and I have had enough.

I currently manage 3 nodes. Hacking, Games and the mother of all nodes, Technology. Lets go through the steps that podcasters must take to get listed:

• The podcaster fills in the form on the iPodder.org site and submit it
• I then receive an email from the site stating the URL of the podcast (not neccesarily the RSS feed), a description and a contact email address
• I then take this email, validate the feed
• Check that it is a good enough podcast for the node
• Open up a copy of your OPML file
• Add the entry into the file
• Upload to your own server
• Rinse and Repeat

Thats right, you are the person paying for the bandwidth. iPodder.org takes the credit for a great directory when its your servers that are doing the grunt work. This I don’t mind as I feel part of a community keeping a great service up and running.

So, I start getting really busy at work. I can’t spend as much time on the directory as I would like and the requests are starting to pile up. I send out an email out to the Gaming nodes’ podcasters asking if anyone would like to take the job as editor. Once we setup the OPML file on the new editor’s server, we now have to change the original OPML file to reflect the change. Who controls this? Adam Curry. Does he answer emails requesting the change? No. Is there any other way of changing the URLs? No, not a single one.

I remember a great little podcast done by Adam saying how wonderful iPodder.org editors are. “Thanks for all your hard work” was what came out of the podcast. “Tools are coming” was another comment. Where are they? I have put HOURS into the directory keeping upset podcasters happy, modifying URLs for their RSS feeds, helping with validation and even CREATION of RSS feeds just so the directory works well. iTunes uses this directory for their podcasts to some degree. Winamp’s podcast support uses the iPodder.org directory greatly. A large amount of other directories are using the original OPML file. I even tried to find the podcast done by Adam regarding the directory and it’s editors as discussed above but the website that held the podcast (http://podshow.com/editors/) is down. Strange that. Do I feel like its not important anymore?

So this is where I am. Frustrated, feeling used and haven’t heard a single word in ages. This is the turning point and I give up. I can’t contact anyone to hand over my feeds and I feel that its pointless to be a slave to a money-making business. So as of today, the Technology, Gaming and Hacking nodes will no longer be updated. The Technology node, one of the most active nodes with submissions constantly coming in, is really going to hurt. I apologise in advance to anyone podcaster or listener affected by this change.

Being the editor of one of the larger nodes in the directory, I feel like this should have some effect. I hope anyone reading this can get behind me and force to issue forward. Please help me to bring the directory up in the priorities and give us, the editors the tools and support we need. Adam, if you are reading this, please put some word out. Answer my emails, let us know what is happening with the directory. I have no problem that this has turned into a business for Adam. That is life. However, I refuse, point blank, to work on this if there is no benefit for me and my fellow editors if this is no a commercial venture.

Is it important anymore?

***UPDATE****
I have the DSC from March 15 2003 where the editors are discussed a little. Does anyone still have the original and only podshow editor’s podcast?
Link

I think this is big news for the podcasting community. The first podcast from space! Steve Robinson, one of the astronauts compiled this podcast which is available today from NASA. Pretty impressive!

Link to story via NASA.
Link to podcast.

With iTunes going to be supporting podcasts in it’s next version (4.9), iTuners (heh, I thought that one up all by myself ) will be able to browse directories such as iPodder.org as well as podcasts that have been registered by Apple themselves. This will really bring podcasting to the masses.

So as an editor to some nodes on the iPodder.org directory and iPodder.org being a decentralized structure, I host OPML files for the directory. Every hour or half-hour iPodder.org pulls my files, checks for updates and updates the directory if necessary. However, applications such as iPodder and most other podcasting applications allow their users to browse the directory directly, which means that whenever a user opens their podcasting client and browses to the nodes I manage, I take a bandwidth hit.

My concerns revolve around whether iTunes will be doing the same. If iTunes allows users to browse directories directly will the browsing take place on their servers with a periodically updated offline copy or will it be a real time browse? I seriously hope that they will host an offline copy of the directories or the day iTunes releases; I will unfortunately have to stop hosting my nodes.

As iTunes 4.9 must be close to completion, they must have done some testing. Therefore some traffic is going to have taken place against my server by iTunes. So a quick look in my access_log reveals this:

17.201.36.13 - - [23/Jun/2005:10:35:04 +0000] “GET /opml/technology.opml HTTP/1.1″ 200 12677 “-” “iTunes/4.9 (Macintosh; N; PPC)”

As you can see, iTunes 4.9 is requesting the files. There are multiple entries going back some time and disturbingly, the entries are from different IP addresses and different IP address ranges. This does not make me feel too happy.

Is there anyone who can confirm how iTunes will be browsing the directories?