History

Overview

Time: 10 min

Objectives

Understand the evolution of Podcasting

Evolution of Podcasting

The RSS connection : In October 2000, the concept of attaching sound and video files in RSS feeds was proposed in a draft by Tristan Louis. The idea was implemented by Dave Winer, a software developer and an author of the RSS format
The first on-demand radio show and the first podcast : The New England Patriots launched the Internet radio show PFW in Progress. It was a live show that was recorded and made available for on-demand download to visitors of Patriots.com
Blogger Con Harold Gilchrist presented a history of audio blogging, including Adam Curry’s early role, and Kevin Marks demonstrated a script to download RSS enclosures and pass them to iTunes for transfer to an iPod. Curry and Marks discussed collaborating
Pushing audio to a device : After the conference, Curry offered his blog readers an RSS-to-iPod script (iPodder) that moved MP3 files from Userland Radio to iTunes, and encouraged other developers to build on the idea.
The name : Writing for The Guardian in February 2004, journalist Ben Hammersley suggested the term “podcasting” as a name for the nascent technology. The first documented use of “podcasting” in the definition known today (i.e., broadcasting rather than downloading) was mentioned in a podcast episode of the Evil Genius Chronicles on September 18, 2004, by Dave Slusher
Wider notice : Detailed how-to-podcast articles had begun to appear online in various articles of USA Today, BBC etc. In October 2004, “Podcasting” was first defined in Wikipedia. This was the same month that Podtrac started providing its free download tracking service and audience demographics survey to the podcasting industry.
Apple adds podcasts to iTunes : In June 2005, Apple added podcasting to its iTunes 4.9 music software and building a directory of podcasts at its iTunes Music Store. The new iTunes could subscribe to, download and organize podcasts, which made a separate aggregator application unnecessary for many users. Apple also promoted creation of podcasts using its GarageBand and QuickTime Pro software and the MP4 format instead of MP3. Prior to iTunes’ seamless integration, acquiring and organising podcasts required dedicated “podcatching” software that was often clunky and intimidating for the average user.
Expansion : In February 2006, following London radio station LBC’s successful launch of the first premium-podcasting platform, LBC Plus, there was widespread acceptance that podcasting had considerable commercial potential

Podcast Timeline

2004 - Adam Curry and Dave Winer are credited with inventing the medium
2005 - Apple iTunes 4.9 is released, fully supportive of podcasts
2005 - George Bush becomes first President to deliver his weekly address in the form of a podcast
2005 - Podcast is declared “word of the year” by the New Oxford American Dictionary
2006 - Steve Jobs demonstrates how to record a podcast using Garageband during a keynote speech
2007 - Ricky Gervais sets world record for most downloaded podcast with an average 250,000 downloads per episode in the first month
2009 - 2011 - Andrew Carolla’s podcast receives 59,574,843 unique downloads
2013 - Personal Audio sues high profile podcasters, claiming they have a patent on podcasting
2013 - Apple announces 1 billion podcast subscribers
2017 - Court rules against Personal Audio, declaring they did not invent the medium of podcasting and could therefore not claim royalties
2019 - 165 million people have listened to a podcast, with 90 million Americans listening monthly.