So I met some real live podcasters in the flesh today... some folks whose work I've listened to for the last few months. Don't think they've listened to me (yet) cuz I'm kind of a small fry... but based on my Feedburner stats, that may have changed after today. It was a fun meeting. It's interesting how quickly a group of people who haven't really interacted can just get to work on a common task. That's the pod/blog effect, though -- we have interacted, by being each others' listeners. Having an agenda helped, too... What did that agenda entail? Mostly deciding what we were going to do with our exhibition booth at the upcoming Portable Media Expo in November. Yes, I'm going to be a conventioneer. Crazy. See you there -- booth 313, November 11th and 12th, Ontario, California. It was invigorating, being around peers who do what you do. It was way worth the two hour drive "down the hill," and a great start to a day of socializing with old friends and new!

It was an interesting morning at the lush and lavish studios of MWS Media. First, a sprinkler valve on the expansive and well-appointed lawn burst, leading to a few hours' of repair work and no water for cooking or showering for the on-site staff. While waiting for pipe seal to dry, I pursued a very active thread at the Podcasters Yahoo Group. The essential question: would listeners donate money to offset the costs of podcasting, and would they do it often enough to avoid traditional advertising and sponsors? Or are we doomed to have commercials in our podcasts? During the course of the discussion, I checked in with the Boing Boing newsfeed, and discovered a new site called PledgeBank. Essentially, this site encourages folks to pledge their support of something on the condition that others do so as well. This dovetailed nicely with the discussion I'd been having all morning. So here it is: I will contribute $5.00 each to five podcasters who are not supported by paid sponsors or paid advertising... if and only if twenty five other podcasters or listeners to podcasts do the same thing before July 14th, 2005. Who's game? Full details.

It's all over the blogsphere today: Infinity Broadcasting, owned by Viacom, is going to change the format of an underperforming AM radio station in the San Francisco area to all podcasts. They're calling it "Open Source Radio." Don't you believe it. From their Terms of Service: You also grant the Site, its owner and operator, parent company(s), affiliates, successors and assigns, the royalty-free, worldwide, perpetual, irrevocable, non-exclusive right (including any moral rights) and license to use, reproduce, modify, adapt, publish, retransmit, translate, create derivative works from, distribute, communicate to the public, publicly perform or display such content (in whole or in part), and/or to incorporate it in other works in any form, media, or technology now known or later developed, for so long as any rights exist in such content. Translation: they can use whatever you upload to their site (like podcasts!) in any way they chose, whenever, forever, and you won't get paid for it. And no, you won't get paid for your podcast being broadcast on their AM station, or on their webcast. Not a dime for helping fill twenty four hours of airtime every single day. But they will have advertising! Nice one, Infinity / Viacom: prey…