How to find good podcasts

Robert,
Why does one need a podcast?

www.irin.co.uk

Cause the average iPod user has gigs of free space!

but robert the ipod has nothing to do with podcast, or has it, cannot podcast be heard on other devices.

Jean: of course! But it's easier to talk about the iPod. Everyone gets what an iPod is and what it does.

My cell phone has a gig of free space. I gotta find more stuff to put on it.

"Gigs of free space" is not gonna win the day, just cause it's there, doesn't follow that it's somehow automatically going to be filled -- such is a quite common economic fallacy, aptly termed 'Hallucinogenic Optimism', as capacity potential doesn't ever equal a market.

Compelling quality content, that is somehow relevant to said individual -- relevant enough to overcome the seriously difficult interia required to seek such media out...is the only hope (assuming there is any hope at all).

A better answer to "why does one need a podcast?" would be...

Because all sorts of interesting and detailed subjects, mainly focusing on specialized markets are wholly under-served by the current media infrastructure (or words to that effect, leaning less lawyerese).

The media are generalists, find about said indiviual's particular niche interests, and match some podcast/vlog to that, it's really going to be case by case, as micro-broadcasting, but always will be.

thepodcastnetwork.com is a good one.

While I don't think it's ready for prime time, I like the new (and not much talked about) Pluggd site (http://www.pluggd.com/). It looks like it has a clean, easy-to-use interface that could attract users other than early-adopters. And that's something podcasting needs to accomplish if it wants to get deeper acceptance.

For anyone who uses ASP.NET then a great podcast called the ASP.NET Podacast (www.aspnetpodcast.com) is really great and humerous too oddly.

Dunno how I came across it but its great...the only podcast I really download all the time.

jean: people need podcasts like they need videogames, music and movies - they're not a necessity but they are nice to have.