Podcasting: Using Scouta To Your Advantage

American Chronicle has an article about How to Use Social Bookmarking to You Advantage.

Bookmarking is only a small part of Scouta. It’s actually a means-to-an-end, which we hope to make easier or work around in the future. But for now, Liane Bate’s article makes a lot of sense for podcasters and Scouta.

Bate’s suggests that social bookmarking can only help build your web traffic. Well, the same applies for podcasts when you add them to Scouta. I’ve mentioned it to a bunch of podcasters already, but figured a blog post wouldn’t go astray.

So why would podcasters add their shows to Scouta?

Hungarian Mashup

I’m completely serious when I ask that someone do a mashup or remix of this music track.

Anyone musical willing to give it a go? I think it could be a new Internet meme.

Thanks to Simon for finding this one. It must have been a light dev day ;).

Everything is Miscellaneous

I met David Weinberger face-to-face last year at the Supernova conference (I’d previously chatted with him on a podcast about Open Spectrum), and he mentioned the book he was in the process of writing: Everything is Miscellaneous.

I’d read The Cluetrain Manifesto, and Small Pieces Loosely Joined, so I’ve been eagerly awaiting this next book. He’s very switched on when it comes to the Internet, and it’ll be amazing to see how his work applies to Scouta.

Here’s a blurb pinched from Amazon.

In a high-minded twist on the Internet-has-changed-everything book, Weinberger (Small Pieces Loosely Joined) joins the ranks of social thinkers striving to construct new theories around the success of Google and Wikipedia. Organization or, rather, lack of it, is the key: the author insists that “we have to get rid of the idea that there’s a best way of organizing the world.” Building on his earlier works’ discussions of the Internet-driven shift in power to users and consumers, Weinberger notes that “our homespun ways of maintaining order are going to break—they’re already breaking—in the digital world.” Today’s avalanche of fresh information, Weinberger writes, requires relinquishing control of how we organize pretty much everything; he envisions an ever-changing array of “useful, powerful and beautiful ways to make sense of our world.” Perhaps carried away by his thesis, the author gets into extended riffs on topics like the history of classification and the Dewey Decimal System. At the point where readers may want to turn his musings into strategies for living or doing business, he serves up intriguing but not exactly helpful epigrams about “the third order of order” and “useful miscellaneousness.” But the book’s call to embrace complexity will influence thinking about “the newly miscellanized world.”

If you’d like a larger snippet of what the new book will cover, Christopher Lydon interviewed David for his podcast: Open Source: Weinberger’s Miscellany.

We consider David an unofficial advisor to Scouta, and credit him as convincing us for the need to prioritize our Groups feature.

David is also hands-down the single funniest guy on a conference back-channel. If you’re ever at a conference with him, make sure you get to sample some of his humor–he was after all a comedy writer for Woody Allen.

Congratulations on getting to publication David!

Invade Rage Meme

Bronwen from PerthNorg tagged me with a new blog meme today.

The Thinker’s Podium started the meme based on the Invade rage Competition to celebrate the music video show’s 20th anniversary.

The idea is to compile your top 20 favorite music videos, as you’d like them played on the television show rage. If you enter the actual competition you have a chance to guest program and host rage itself.

Paul Montgomery then tagged Bronwen, and she realized that the list would actually be more fun if compiled within Scouta. That way you actually have the chance to watch the videos as well as read the list. So she added her top 20, followed by Perth Music’s top 20.

Watch my selections in the My rage Top 20 Scouta Group.

I’m now gonna tag Simone from Enjoy Perth, Scientaestubique, Michael Specht, Muddyblog, and Meg from dLook (congrats on the dLook.mobi launch as well Meg!).

As for the list:
A HA - Take On Me
Pet Shop Boys - West End Girls
INXS - Need You Tonight
INXS - Mediate
Pearl Jam - Jeremy
Stone Roses - Fools Gold
U2 - The Fly
Prodigy - Voodoo People
Prodigy - Smack My Bitch Up
Oasis - Wonderwall
Goo Goo Dolls - Iris
Kylie - Spinning Around
Eminem - Lose Yourself
Gary Jules - Mad World
2 Heads - Out of the City
Gorillaz - Feel Good Inc.
Green Day - Wake Me Up Before September Ends
Eskimo Joe - Black Fingers Red Wine
Fall Out Boy - This Is Not A Scene
Timberland - Give It To Me

Winer’s “TV News Of The Future”

Dave Winer, the father of RSS, conceived an idea for TV news of the future.

I was drinking coffee, watching the morning news when a story about Virginia Tech came on MSNBC. I really wanted to begin this week without more stories about how they’re coping. I know this makes me an ogre, but after listening to On The Media yesterday, my cynicism is validated. And after watching 60 Minutes about life in Baghdad, the first report I’ve seen to actually go in to get the story, I was aware that people are dying in places outside Blacksburg (and truthfully, the dying is probably over in Blacksburg).

I had a flash, I want a checkbox that tells MSNBC that I don’t want any more Virginia Tech stories.

Dave even has a screen mockup of how he’d like to see the UI.

It’s a great idea. Essentially you’re filtering what you see in the news at any time.

We like to think that we’ve taken the next step in the idea by making the filtering just happen. News will work much better if it understands your interests and tastes intuitively, and provides filtered video or audio automatically. There might be some instances that this won’t work, but as long as you have access to everything and can “browse, surf, or search,” and you can make your own decisions of new filters.

What do people think of Dave’s idea? How do people see “news” working in Scouta?

There Is No Such Thing As Too Much Video Content

Scoble asks “How much video content is too much content?”, which is exactly the type of question we asked when we came up with the idea for Scouta.

Scoble then listed 18 videos, comprising of over 5 hours of content that he released in a single week.

The Scoble Show is high quality geek content, and very worth watching if you’re into technology. But it’s just a drop in the ocean in terms of the amount of video now on the net. Add audio podcasts in the mix, and you’ll fill 7 days of none-stop consumption on almost any topic.

So Scoble suggested two ways of finding which of his shows you should watch: Google and Rocky’s “Editor’s Choice.” Both really valid ways of finding content that you’ll like. But, we reckon scouting is another great way: watch and listen to stuff you like, add them to your favorites in Scouta, and Scouta will recommend other audio and video you like. Like a TV that knows what you want to watch next ;).

So, the answer to Scoble’s question is: there is no such thing as too much video content any more.

Podcasting Boom, Anything But Over

Valleywag, the tech gossip rag, has an article today that’s a little confusing: Battle over — and Apple won.

The article starts by suggesting that the podcasting “boom” is over.

Can we officially declare the end of the podcasting boom? Sure, internet users will continue to subscribe to audio files, the experience will become ever more like interactive radio, and existing broadcasters will supply their programs in chunks — just like the visionaries predicted. But the main beneficiary will be Apple, which dominates podcasting with iTunes, and the window for new intermediaries, between broadcasters and their audience, is fading.

However, the main thread of the argument discusses podcast directories. So, I’m assuming that the first sentence should read, “Can we officially declare the end of the podcasting directory boom?” This makes a lot more sense, given that podcasting itself is still growing: Podcasting Audience Up 18% Since Last Year.

Dave Winer, the father of RSS (and as such probably podcasting), has a few words to set Valleywag straight.

You can find more on the discussion at Techmeme, where a few people weigh in and guess that podcasting is declining by using a few suspect methods of analysis.

Meanwhile, on the same Techmeme page, there is an announcement that Podcast Advertising Firm PodBridge Raises $8.5M More suggesting that VCs agree there is a future for podcasting.

Will Music Videos Replace The Single

Recently I’ve been getting back into music, thanks to a few factors like Scouta, my Apple TV, and music videos.

Music videos had started a slow death in the last decade, I thought. Broadcast television has been taking a back seat for me, and apparently also for generation y. So, who really noticed a music video.

However, thanks to broadband and places like YouTube, music videos have become a way for bands to create a little viral buzz.

I’ve also found that I’ll create a Scouta bookmark of YouTube videos for songs I hear and that I love. It not only helps me remember that I like it (short attention span you see), but I also get to listen to it several times in Scouta whenever I’ve at my computer.

So I’ve started a couple of Scouta Groups for bands that I really enjoy at the moment: Fall Out Boy and My Chemical Romance. The amazing thing is the amount of material that I’ve managed to find through them, such as interviews, “making of” videos, and podcasts.

So, I’m really beginning to wonder if music videos will make a massive resurgence, and potentially replace the single. Why not buy the video so you can listen, and when you have the opportunity, watch it as well (iPod video and Apple TV, etc). They’ll make great background material for parties, that’s for sure, and they only cost a dollar or so extra.

What do others think?

While your thinking about it, create a Scouta Group for your favorite band. It’ll be fun seeing communities grow around music videos and podcasts.

Personalized TV

The other day, Bronwen from PerthNorg, suggested that we should think about describing Scouta as “Personalised TV” and “Personalised audio.”

It’s a great idea, and after using my new Apple TV with Scouta for a few days, it’s making a hell of a lot of sense.

Over the past few months I’ve had to explain what Scouta is all about. The best method I’ve found so far is to ask someone to imagine a television that you switch on, and it automatically recommends some television shows that it knows you’ll like. Then, once you’ve watched a show, it will make another recommendation, etc. Each one personalized to your taste and interests.

Well that’s exactly what the Apple TV and Scouta is like. In fact it’s even better, because combined with my iPod, I can take a bunch of shows on the road - whether it’s video or audio - and I can continue to fill my head with all the stuff I love.

I’ve got so much content on my Apple TV, that I could easily replace my standard daily media consumption - television and radio - with my Scouta Favorites and Recommendations for a few weeks, and I haven’t even added the Groups that I belong to yet.

So, what do you think: Scouta - Personalized Television and Radio?

Ausralian Anthill Article about Scouta

I mentioned yesterday the article that Paul Ryan from Australian Anthill wrote about Scouta. Well, he made sure that it was put on their online version. You can find it at Scout’s Honour.

It’s still worth grabbing the actual hard-copy, because it’s full of interesting material about fast growing Australian companies.