Podshock - My Entry into Podcasts - via Doctor Who

Bill Gates wants everyone to call them Blog Casts, but it's a little too late for that.

In everyone's mind, possibly forever, the term podcast seems to have taken hold, even though you don't have to own an iPod to listen to one. More on that later.

Podcasts are here and are growing in number and type because the technology to record and send them is here and mature and lots and lots of people are hopping on the bandwagon. Possibly The Peter Files will join them too with simulcasting these files as a Podcast.

Of course simulcasting misses the point, because podcasting is a different medium, essentially equivelant to radio, except that once your podcast is out there, it might as well be out there forever. Well, maybe. But probably. Something you should think of before podcasting. Something I try to think about before hitting publish but as Samantha Stevens would say, "Weeeell" this is supposed to be a blog of comedy and satire right?

With the free iTunes 6 available from the apple.com's Apple Store, you can look for and subscribe to Podcasts which load up like lemmings, er, freebies, just waiting to be listened to.

There are lots of individually focused ones. If you've been suitibly Pottered there's one called Muggle Cast for those who love Harry Potter. If you are a News Junkie, there are any number of Podcasts out there, including ones for 60 minutes, and a separate one for Andy Rooney. Maybe they are trying to tell him something. I hope not, sometimes Andy's 3 and a half minutes are the best thing on the show, brightening what has been frightening thus far. Without him I might have defected to Disney years ago.

There are quite a few NPR streams, and a few good ones for PBS too, like Science Friday for NPR and NOVA for PBS. And if you think NPR thinks too much of itself, there is always the NPR parody IT'S ALL RELATIVE. Funny stuff there. Funny, funny stuff. We'll get back to that 'cast after this pledge break.

In fact, there are so many 'casts that you can subscribe to, even video casts, that you can quickly burn up oodles, say it quickly and arf, up oodles of hard drive space. That's because if you like a podcast you can go back and get all the old ones. Or just get them one at a time. But beware. The video casts can use lots of hard drive space, so be sure to delete or burn them if you don't want to run out of drive space mucho pronto Tiki Bar officianados.

Tiki Bar? Oh, that's the Video Podcast that pretends to have a plot but always at least features one drink recipe a week down at the old Tiki Bar. Makes me wonder if any involved are from Hyde Park in Chicago where there was a Tiki Bar...

But my favorite of all Podcasts so far, because of subject matter, style and general laughs has been DOCTOR WHO - PODSHOCK which comes out every Thursday.

Now there have to be a few of you out there going, "Doctor Who?" wasn't that cancelled YEARS ago? I know they had that movie and it does have cult status, but how many people could be interested in a weekly hour long podcast.

Well, lots of them it turns out, because Doctor Who has been regenerated by the BBC once again in its most lavish special effects and acting effort yet starring Christopher Eccleston and Billie Piper as the Doctor in his ninth regeneration and Rose Tyler, perhaps his hottest and gutsiest companion yet.

The BBC is just about to launch Season 2 with the Christmas Invasion special on, interestingly enough, December 25th.

Over on this side of the pond we have been oblivious to the ratings firestorm of British Tele that makes Desperate Housewifes look like well, can't push it too far down, Law and Order? CSI? But it is HUGE over there and with a phalanx of Whoites on this side of the pond drooling over the desire to see it.

And oh, is the drooling worth it. I was lent a copy that a friend over there recorded on his DVD recorder and so have seen the whole first season, which has reluctantly already made its way homeward. Oh, man what we Americans are missing! If we only knew!

That's where podshock comes in, without giving too much away, at least some information comes over from across the pond as the Podshock crew 1 Brit, 2 Yanks, do a 3-way conference Skype(?) to bring you a very entertaining show.

The little album cover window in the iTunes player often shows morsel photos from the show which are very tempting and even more are to be found on their website from which you can subscribe to the feed.

See the links to Podshock and the Podshock feed in the sidebar to your right!

Oh, if this show is so brilliant why hasn't American TV picked it up?

Possibly because there are only 13 episodes so far, and so the standard 26 will only be available until the end of this BBC season.

Possibly because the Movie, which did not do that great and did not have nearly so good a storyline or special effects or acting, was not a huge sucess, did not have huge ratings.

Possibly because DDoctor Who is seen as PBS material.

In any case, if PBS is its rightful place then WHO fans should unite and contact their PBS stations and remind them how much in pledge dollars Doctor Who brought in over the years. It is time for that revenue source to Regenerate!

Well, back to my Tardis.

Peter



Peter

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