A Guide to creating podcasts using Podium
Learning Services Guides
Contents. Introduction.
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1.
Give the new podcast a title, author and description.
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2.
Enter a title, author and description for the podcast episode.
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3.
Add a sound file.
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4.
Save the podcast project.
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5.
Publish and promote the podcast.
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6.
Subscribe to the RSS feed.
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7.
Adding an Episode to a Podcast.
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8.
Publish the podcast including the new episode.
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Glossary.
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Creating a Podcast Using Podium.
Introduction. Podcasting allows you to create regularly updated audio content that can be ‘broadcast’ via the web. This guide will show you how to create a podcast, publish it to the web and promote it. Also covered in this guide is how to subscribe to an RSS feed so that you are automatically informed of any updates made to a podcast. The application used to create, publish and promote the podcast is Podium
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1.
Give the new podcast a title, author and description.
Click in the text box next to the green ‘podcast’ button in the top left of the Podium screen below the toolbar and type in a title.
Located opposite the ‘podcast’ text box is the ‘by’ text box, click in the text box and type in the author of the podcast.
Click in the text box located underneath the title and author you have entered, and type in a description of the podcast.
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2.
Enter a title, author and description for the podcast episode.
Click in the text box next to the green ‘episode’ button and type in a title for the episode.
Located opposite the ‘episode’ text box is the ‘by’ text box, click in the text box and type in the author of the episode. This may differ from the author of the overall podcast.
Click in the text box located underneath the episode title and author you have entered, and type in a description of the episode.
The green ‘image’ box can be used to include an image with your podcast. Not all podcatcher applications can view this image, so for the purposes of this guide no image will be added.
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3.
Add a sound file.
Click on the ‘Import a sound’ button located in the ‘Sound’ toolbar.
From the file selector window, navigate to your sound file. Click on the file and click the ‘Open’ button. .
Click on the ‘Play’ button to preview your sound file.
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Save the podcast project.
Before publishing your podcast to the web, save it by clicking on the ‘save current project’ button. In the pop-up file window, give your podcast a name and then click ‘Save’.
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5.
Publish and promote the podcast.
Click on the ‘Publish’ button located on the top right of the main toolbar, this sends your podcast via FTP to the podcasting server.
Once the podcast has been published, click on the ‘Promote’ button.
The pop-up ‘Promote’ window offers you option to ‘email’ or ‘copy’ the web address to the podcast. Click on the ‘copy’ button.
Close the ‘Promote’ window by clicking the ‘X’ in the top right corner.
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6.
Subscribe to the RSS feed.
Minimise Podium and open Internet Explorer. Click in the address box and delete the address. ‘Right click’ in the address box and select ‘Paste’. This will paste the address that links to the podcast that you have just published.
Click on the ‘Go’ button to load the RSS feed page.
To listen to the podcast, click on the ‘Episode1.mp3’ link. This will open Windows Media Player and load the episode.
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In order to ensure that you are kept up-to-date with any episodes that are added to the podcast, you must subscribe to the feed. Click on the ‘Subscribe to this feed’ link and then click the ‘Subscribe’ button in the pop-up window.
To view a feed that you have subscribed to, click on the ‘Favorites’ button and then click the ‘Feeds’ button.
Choose the feed you wish to view from the feeds list.
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7.
Adding an Episode to a Podcast.
One of the major features of podcasting is the ability for a podcast to be regularly updated by adding additional episodes.
Open an existing project. Click on the ‘Open project’ button located at the top-left of the main podium window and choose your podcast from the file selector window.
Add a new blank episode. Click the ‘Add episode’ button located in the Episode toolbar.
Give the episode a title, author and description. Fill out the episode title, author and description as described in section 2.
Add a sound file to the episode. Add a sound file to the episode as described in section 3.
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8.
Publish the podcast including the new episode.
The updated podcast needs to be published to make the new episode available for downloading. Follow the instructions given in section 5 to publish and promote the podcast. To view the updated podcast, open Internet Explorer and follow the instructions given at the end of section 6 to view the feed. The feed is only automatically checked for updates every 24 hours, so your updated episode my not be listed. To view the updated podcast, click on the ‘Refresh’ button and then select the ‘Show all items’ link.
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Glossary.
Episode
A podcast usually consists of one or more episodes. A podcast is analogous to a Television serial, consisting of periodically broadcast episodes. When an episode is published to the Internet the RSS feed is altered to reflect the update and inform subscribers.
Podcast
“A Web-based audio broadcast via an RSS feed, accessed by subscription over the Internet.” (Webster’s, 2007). A podcast consists of an audio file and RSS feed. The RSS feed is used to automatically inform a subscriber of updated content usually denoted as episodes.
Publish
A podcast (and subsequently updated episodes) is uploaded to a Web Server via FTP (File Transfer Protocol). This action is known as ‘publishing’ and makes the podcast available to subscribers.
Promote
Promoting a podcast within podium enables an author to either e-mail subscribers with a direct link to the podcast or to copy the web address of the podcast for use on homepages etc. for allowing visitors to subscribe to a RSS feed. Examples of the homepage method of promotion can be seen on the BBC news homepage.
RSS Feed
Really Simple Syndication. RSS feeds enable a publisher to easily syndicate new material. Initially used as a mechanism for delivering regular news bulletins, it has since been embraced as a mechanism for informing subscribers updates to a wide variety of web-based content including podcasts and blogs etc. Subscribers use a Feed Reader (traditionally known a News Aggregator) to subscribe to the feed, the reader then periodically checks to see if a publisher has submitted updated content and informs the subscriber of any new items. (Sullivan, 2003)
Subscribe
In order to be informed of regular updates to podcasts (and other we-based content) you must subscribe to a RSS feed. This ensures that any changes to a subscribed feed are automatically picked up by the feed reader.
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References.
Webster’s (2007) Webster's New Millennium™ Dictionary of English, Preview Edition (v 0.9.7). Lexico Publishing Group, LLC. In Dictionary.com http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/podcast [accessed 15-11-2007]. Sullivan, D (2003) ‘Making an RSS Feed’ Search Engine Watch. http://searchenginewatch.com/showPage.html?page=2175271 [accessed 15/11/2007] .
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