The code does not create a podcast. It DOES create an RSS feed with links to streaming media, hits to which are recorded in your artist stats. I've been consuming feeds for a long time, and this isn't a typical use of feeds, but one which I think is a very cool element for Jamroom owners.
Once again, a podcast is a very specific thing, which requires that the linked files must be DOWNLOADABLE. However, being able to create a feed which will both stream music from your site AND record those streams within your artist stats seems to me to be terrific way to further propogate the music from your site. Podcasts can not be automated in Jamroom without bypassing artist stats, which is an important consideration. Stats are an important part of how your artists view your site when they are considering where to throw their support, since the typical artist promoting through the internet is on dozens, if not a hundred or so sites. If you are a new site owner, you know that the majority of bands drop their music off and don't return unless they are really seeing good results on the site.
Feeds are big right now. They have been big with geeks for years, but with the advent of Web 2.0 and personal content aggregators like PageFlakes and Netvibes (personally, I LOVE Netvibes - it allows all of my feeds, bookmarks, e-mail addresses, etc. to be available to me no matter what computer I am on), more and more non-geeks are becoming voracious feed consumers.
The consumption of RSS feeds is actually higher than the consumption of Podcasts, despite all the buzz about podcasts right now (that buzz is mostly from people who are podcasters!) Many feed readers have auto-discovery built into them which alert a visitor when a feed is available on a site. This makes it pretty effortless for people to find your feed and add it to their subscriptions when they visit your site, adding a great deal of "stickiness".
While I'm really stoked that this all got worked out and functioning so everyone can use it, don't call it a Podcast. If you do, people will expect to download the files so that they can listen on a portable device when not connected to the internet. (Podcasting was coined from "iPodcasting" - this feed can not be taken with you on your iPod.)
I've been podcasting for a couple of years, and now will be able to add feeds to my site as a complement to podcasting, which I think is fantastic, because I didn't want to do any feeds for the music where it couldn't be streamed - who would be interested in that?
I do hope to write that blog article for Brian that helps to delineate the differences betweens feeds and podcasts and get a little bit more into their relative strengths and weaknesses as a promotion tool, and maybe it's time I stopped whinging on and got something off to him for his consideration.
And obviously, if anyone needs any help with how the RSS part of this feed functions, I'll be happy to help when I can, although I think Kyle has really used the cool stuff built into Jamroom to make the creation of any kind of feed with streaming easy as pie (that pre-processor is just elegant - kudos to Brian!)
Kyle, as a moderator here, perhaps you could take the instructional parts of creating this feed and consolidate them into one post under a more accurately titled heading (For instance - "How to create an RSS feed with streaming music")...that way people won't have to wade through several pages to get to the part where we got it working AND I can then stop whining that it's not a podcast
I do think that it would benefit people wanting to use this to have a clear step 1, step 2, guide at the top of a post AND also, make clear which folder the various parts of the feed should be placed in. I'm clear on all of that now, but it took A**me a while and I helped with the darn thing! If you edit the top post with a "go here" kind of link for the final product, that would probably help everybody out right now as well as make it more accessible as new people join the forum looking for tips.
Do you think I should move it over like you mentioned, or retitle this thread?
Well, since it's meant to be a "how to", and this current thread is really more a bit of a ramble than an organized creation, I think that a fresh new "how to" would be the best idea.
Just my thought - didn't mean to be ordering you around!
Kyle, if you're looking forward to that blog, you have a much greater tolerance for excess verbosity than any sane, normal person. I mean that in an appreciative way.
Joined: 27 Apr 2006
Posts: 22009
Location: Southern California
Posted: 08/09/07 22:34
Will do then, just gotta get my act together real quick and clean up my room :/ lol.
And hit me with the verbosity. I've been told that some of my prose is a bit verbose myself before, and have spent many an essay over the past 3 years in college trying to smash the 1250 word essay into the do-not-exceed-1000-word essays, etc., my teachers assign, leaving me to spend just as much time searching through my papers shortening words into contractions (although I know that's poor style), hyphenating words that probably would not need hyphens, etc....as I did on the actual essay itself... (how's that for a run on? but punctuated well, don't you thing? in spite of the excess...)
The feed that we posted the code for will show a specific radio station that you create (I'm using mine for "The Best New Songs" - I will hand pick them so it isn't filled by ten songs by one artist, etc.) However, it can be adapted and we sort of put it together as an example of what you can do with a little creativity.
)