"What's a podcast?" you might be wondering. It’s a term that's a bit misleading, because it has nothing directly to do with Apple iPods. In simplest terms, a podcast is an audio file that, through automated means, is downloaded for you. Further muddying the waters is the fact that some people use the term podcast for both audio and video content. There are other terms too—blogcast, vodcast, and even unique terms such as ThoughtCast. If you see a term "somethingcast," odds are good that it's some form of audio or video content that you can subscribe to and get on a regular basis. For the purpose of this article, I'm going to use the term podcast to mean any form of audio or video content that you want to put on your
Windows Mobile powered device.
Audio broadcasts, spoken word and musical, have been available on the Internet for years, but the recent combination of RSS (Really Simple Syndication) and audio files have made the process much simpler. When a site has an RSS feed, it means you can subscribe to the content—if there's new content, you'll get a notification in your RSS reader (usually a software program or a Web site). By wrapping an audio recording inside an RSS enclosure (special XML code), the RSS software knows it's audio or video content and will download it automatically to a location that you specify on your hard drive. Then, when you connect your Windows Mobile powered device, you can sync it to your device for listening or viewing. Those are the basics of how it works—though it's important to note that a lot of content can be viewed or listened to inside your browser, as well. In fact, since I don't have a commute to work, I tend to access content like this in "real time" rather than downloading it onto a device.
Now the question is, where do you find the good podcasts? Here are two sources that are good places to start.