Catching up with Podcasts and IMs

Today I took a day off and spent some time working with applications that were either impoIssible or impractical at work. I listened to several podcasts. Denver Public Library uses podcasts to retell folktales; I found a folktale I was able to hear it very clearly as I cleaned house. Cheshire Public Library has a podcast that is a teen culture magazine. Loading it was time-consuming and quite difficult. I had to try to do it twice. Once I got in, I discovered it was run by the teenagers with that library. The young hosts introduced a girl who interviewed C. Leight Purtill. I had to play the podcast back three times before I was able to understand the name of the author or the book being discussed. This was followed by a chorus of tone- deaf teenaged boys who have apparently been Rick-Rolled one time too many, and a satirical piece in which several boys argued the existence of ankles. A girl gave a book review, and then a young man read an original story. Then came original poetry, and some fairly creative credits.

I think this is a creative use of podcasts, in that it gives the young people an opportunity to contribute to the website of their library system. While the quality of the contributions was understandably inconsistent, it sounds like a good and easy way to provide programming for teenagers. It sounds more work-intensive than expensive, too. This can be duplicated.

Podcasts from the Infopeople Project in California give a forum for Michael Cart, who has several pods about graphic novels (will girls ever discover them?) and for George and Joan, two librarians who give lectures on various different topics. The one I listened to was called "One for the Heart", in which they talked about what their professional code was an what they valued in the profession and the tasks they see ahead in providing services for the future.

Podcasts seem to be pretty interesting. How to get people to listen to them?

And now, there is only one application I have not tried: IMs.