So you have wandered this way from God knows where, only to discover more of this “podcasting” nonesense. Great. What is it?

The easiest way to describe podcasting is to compare it to Tivo, but for audio. A podcast is simply an MP3 (audio) file that has been made available by its creator, usually for free, to the general public and distributed over the internet.

What makes podcasting different is the fact that you can subscribe to a podcast using special programs, called podcatchers. iTunes is the most popular podcatcher, due to the popularity of the iPod, but there are a number of other possibilities, most of them free.

Anyway, once you subscribe to a podcast you can load it up on your MP3 player and take it with you, stopping and starting the program to your heart’s content (I would hope that you wouldn’t want to miss a moment of mine, but you can also fast forward past the boring parts.)

To subscribe to this podcast in iTunes, click the purple icon near the top of the right hand column of this page.

If you would rather listen to this show right here on your desktop or laptop computer, bookmark this site and check back to look for new episodes, or better yet, enter your e-mail address in the box below to get a reminder with details of the show each time I release a new episode.

If you would like to learn more, check out the tutorials at Podast 411. For a more in-depth discussion that includes the history and development of podcasting, read this Wikipedia entry. Did I leave something out? Drop me an e-mail with your questions, and I will adjust this page accordingly.