Hawaii Geek Week continues in Honolulu, Hawaii. Yesterday’s Web Weavers Workshop with Lorelle in Hawaii was a tremendous success. A couple dozen people learned how to blog beginning with what a blog is and ending with how blogging is already changing their lives by giving people a platform upon which to speak and share and learn.

Web Weavers Workshop for bloggers by Lorelle VanFossen

The participants ranged from total newbies trying to understand what this “blogging thing” is all about, to business owners and professionals familiar with website technology and development and eager to take it a few steps further into blogging and social media.

Each participant made a plan for their blog, signed up for a free WordPress.com blog, and started filling in the blanks and choosing a WordPress Theme.

Many arrived with the preconceived notion that blogging is hard and complicated, and left realizing that blogging is easy. It’s finding your passion to share with the world that is really the hardest part of the puzzle. A few had set ideas on what they wanted to blog about when they arrived, but through the step-by-step process of drilling down their idea into an actionable plan for their blogs, they realized that they didn’t have the content, nor the commitment, to blog their idea over the long term. A few changed paths midstream and left the day-long workshop inspired and ready to embrace their blog in a new direction.

The next in the natural evolution of a blog came today at the Social Media Club Workshop. read more

Lately, video and podcasting blogs are making a huge inroad in popularity. A common question I’m asked at workshops and speaker gigs is how long a podcast or blog video should be.

I thought I knew the answer: thirty minutes. That is what works for me. An hour long program means that I typically have to pay attention to it in two sections since I rarely have that much free time in one chunk. But that’s not the answer I got from those I talked to.

Most people have told me that they enjoy 45 to 60 minute shows on their favorite blogs with multimedia. They listen to them while driving, running, jogging, exercising, and working, and a few even while relaxing instead of spending time with television.

But what about you? How long is long enough for you for a podcast or blog video? Are you willing to listen to a podcast longer than watch a video? Or the reverse?

If you are a podcaster or video blogger, have you found some trends in time lengths that work best for you and your blog?

PodPress is probably the most used podcasting plugin for WordPress, and the one we’ve been using here at The Blog Herald. However, there have been issues with it since WordPress 2.5, and it doesn’t work with recently released 2.6. Among others that are frustrated are David Peralty, who’s written about the issue.

Luckily, the PodPress developer says that we can expect a 2.6 compatible release within 10 days.

I wonder when WordPress will get native podcasting support, similar to the PodPress plugin? It is about time, I’d say.

Like most bloggers, I use a variety of tools and applications to get things done.

But while many of the tools that I use have me enthralled and singing their praises, others leave me frustrated and seeking a better solution, only to be dismayed that none seem to be available.

The problem is that, as with most things in life, the best solution is not always the most popular one (Ex： VHS beat Beta). Sometimes we get brilliant answers to difficult problems and other times we’re left with something a bit more frustrating.

In honor of that, I’ve decided to highlight some of the tools that I use daily and love, as well as some of the ones that I’m hoping to find replacements for.

read more

Yesterday, I brought up the issue of podcasts in What Makes Podcasts Fun To Listen To? The post asked what makes your favorite podcasts fun and successful in your eyes in format and structure.

Podcasts on blogs are growing in popularity. With portable media players, especially iPods, more affordable and accessible, people are downloading podcasts in addition to music. I’m finding podcasts on file sharing services and media marketplaces beyond iTunes. With the ease of adding multimedia to our blogs improving, it’s natural that we want to explore communication beyond the written word and still photographs.

Today, I want to know if you are podcasting on your blog, or if you are considering podcasting.

If you are podcasting, how is it working for you? Are you finding the experience successful? Is traffic and readership increasing? How are you podcasting? Alone or with a host? More than two hosts? How is that working for you?

What equipment and software are you using? How do you record interviews, edit the audio, convert the audio into various formats, and what is the easiest and hardest aspects of podcasting? We want to learn from you, so tell us how your podcasting efforts are working and how it’s evolved as you’ve learned along the way.

Are you considering adding a podcast to your blog? Why? Have you thought about the format, structure, how to handle the files with uploading, downloading, publicizing, and sharing? Will you add music? From where? Copyright free content, your own original music, or what?

Will your podcast feature just you or will you have more than one host? Considering adding interviews? How? What technology are you considering to add access for interviews and co-hosts? What programs are you considering for editing your recordings?

There are a lot of technical issues that confront bloggers who want to podcast, which keeps many from podcasting. Yet, there is a growing collection of technology that makes the process easier and faster.

Let’s talk about how podcasts work for blogs, or not, and how you can save time generating podcast recordings and publishing on your blog.

I’ve been listening to a lot of blogger podcasts lately covering a wide range of subjects. Most have a fairly standard format of introduction, preview of the show to come, then news, interviews, and a summary, but some just jump right in and wander all over the place.

Well-written blog posts tend to have a single objective which is supported by about three solid points. It includes links to more information or supporting evidence, images and screenshots, and typically encourages comments to continue the conversation.

A podcast is a multi-level conversation that happens within the podcast itself as well as within the blog and back again. A podcast typically covers many objectives, often repeated features with each episode, making a podcast into a combination multiple blog post and link list.

Some podcasters use very little music on their shows. Some use a lot. Some incorporate ads and promos from other blogs and online businesses, just as blogs do, and others do not. Some feature multiple voices led by a single host or many, with interviews, live or recorded questions and answers, and commentaries. Many more feature a single voice.

With so much diversity in podcasting, which podcasts do you enjoy the most and why? What elements do you look forward to in a podcast, and which ones do you wish would go?

As more and more bloggers are discovering how easy podcasting is, adding an audio element to their blogs, what do you think about podcasting? Will you soon be adding one to your blog?

Podcasting service BlogTalkRadio have secured $4.6 million in Series A funding, which sparked a piece in the Bits blog, and an announcement post in the official blog of course:

We simply couldn’t be more excited about how this company is evolving and now we have the capital in place to accomplish many things. We are planning major enhancements to our user interface and user experience. We will invest in content and distribution as well as further developing our ad sales platform. We are also looking at developing many new products including a highly differentiated video platform, audio to text transcription applications and much more.

Congratulations are in order. Now let’s see what they’ll do with the dough.

Eden launches AudioJungle, a community for selling music loops, jingles, and stuff like that. Much like another Eden site, FlashDen, which you might know off. Adrien wrote the launch post, and Collis pimped it even more over at Nettuts, PSDtuts, and Freelance Switch, all sites in the Eden network.

Congratulations on your launch, I wouldn’t be surprised if AudioJungle will be a nice little cash flow for sound and music producers, and a great source for podcasters.

Belkin seems to love both iPods and podcasters, so it’s no surprise that one of their latest products is aimed at budding iPod-owning podcasters.

I took a look at a prototype of the Belkin GoStudio in London a week ago. The product is so new that a production model wasn’t even available, which is a shame as it sounds like a great product and I would like to have had a play with it.

A much cut down version of their four-channel TuneStage iPod recorder, the battery-powered unit will feature built-in microphone and various recording controls, as well as offering full integration with iTunes and other Apple software.

Belkin says that the audio quality will be “superior”, though you wouldn’t expect them to say anything less. What’s great is the price — expected to be around £80 (about $150). Expected to arrive, at least in the UK, in June.

(Via Tech Digest)

The orphan works legislation, last seen in 2006, now has the attention of Congress again with two similar bills, one in the House and one in the Senate. These bills, should either of them pass, could have a drastic impact on copyright holders both within and outside of the United States.

But what should bloggers expect from this bill? How can Internet-based authors work to avoid having their work becoming “orphaned”?

The answer depends heavily on the kind of work you do and how much protection you want for it. However, what is clear is that at least some bloggers have a good reason to be concerned and should consider taking steps now to avoid a problem down the road. read more