With today's release of Apple iTunes 4.9 and its podcasting directory coupled with the recent beta launch of Odeo, podcasting is set to build on its already tremendous growth. Both iTunes and Odeo provide additional information about podcasts above and beyond what's included in a basic podcasting feed. For the more than 7,000 podcasts currently running through FeedBurner, we will very soon (really soon) provide the ability to enter additional podcast description data via our SmartCast service, which we will ensure gets delivered with the appropriate RSS extensions to iTunes, Odeo, and others. What does this mean? It means that your podcasts will have complete descriptive data in all the various directories and subscriber services without having to manage that data in each location. It means that all podcasters are on equal footing, regardless of whether or not you have the ability to edit your podcast's RSS feed to add the various different RSS extension tags. As we already provide integrated Yahoo Media RSS support, and we anticipate other podcasting services with additional descriptive extensions will emerge, FeedBurner will continue to provide a one-stop shop for podcasters who just want to record, publicize, and go. Simply run your podcast through us, and we'll get your categories, photo links, and other descriptive information distributed and publicized to the right services. This will be a free enhancement to the free SmartCast service.
Posted by Dick at June 28, 2005 01:39 PM | TrackBack | Post A Comment | Email This PostThanks for the update. You guys ROCK! We really appreciate all the service you provide us - FOR FREE. - what a great thing that I do not take for granted.
Adam Tinkoff
TINKOFF RADIO
http://www.tinkoff.com
Thank you! This is really great news. iTunes support is going to bring a much bigger audience to podcasts. I can't wait for the iTunes support in feedburner.
Posted by: Adam Behringer at June 28, 2005 03:49 PM
Thank you so very much for helping us through this the mess. :) :)
I sent an email requesting the i-tunes RSS feed be taken care of by these cats and I got 2 responses in SECONDS!
These guys are why I podcast... This is the community I want to be associated with.
GET THEM A BIG FAT S TO WEAR UPON THE FEEDBURNER CHEST!
Thank you so much SuperCats!
Keeme has spoken
Posted by: Keeme at June 28, 2005 05:37 PMKick ass. Thanks guys!
Posted by: Walter at June 28, 2005 08:42 PMFantastic,
Toby Mack
Home of a great podcast called:
Jonathan Boss Agent fourteen and a half ......licensed to commit justice and in service to his country brings terror to those with hearts of evil. This is a new comedy series in the same vain as the famous "Chickenman" radio series of years ago.
Mental.
I come here on the off chance that you ,ay have added support for the new Apple extensions and find that you have done all this.
Superb.
Posted by: buono at June 29, 2005 02:38 AMThank you so much. This is really going to help me. Thanks.
Posted by: Jim at June 29, 2005 05:09 AMUnbelievably helpful! I can't say enough good things about you guys!
Posted by: Bill Thompson at June 29, 2005 11:07 AMHey thank!
I noticed that I have no album art on Itunes and that the most recent 'cast (from last nnight) is still not there. Is this dependent on the changes you are making? If so, when can we expect this to happen?
Thanks a lot for the excellent service that makes Bikescape possible!
-jon
Posted by: jon at June 29, 2005 01:29 PMJon, we will be updating the smartcast service so that you can point to cover art and add a bunch of descriptive details about your podcasts that Apple uses to create its directory listings. you can manually create these entries yourself by adding a new RSS namespace and related tags to your feed, but we'll do all that for your automatically and rationalize the overlap between iTunes, Yahoo Media RSS, and others. In short, stay tuned and as soon as we have this added capability in SmartCast, we'll post here and you can update your feed settings and all these descriptive extras will get picked up by iTunes by just adding your podcast to their directory. We''re working on it!
Posted by: Dick Costolo at June 29, 2005 01:36 PMYes! This is why I use feedburner. Thanks for keeping on top of things!
Posted by: Jeff at June 29, 2005 01:44 PMThanks Guys! I was beating my head against the desk today wondering how I was going to get it setup! Can't wait to see how it works when it's done.
www.frankwit.com
Posted by: Andy at June 29, 2005 02:56 PMWe're working on a hacked version of the WordPress 1.5 rss2.php script for people who are interested.
I'm excited that Feedburner will be providing better data. But I also think we can automate some of this stuff by making our applications smarter. I'd rather not have to make another edit to our feed after we post it out of WordPress.
Expect an update on our site on June 30th.
Rob
------
http://geekspeakradio.com
I was wondering if you were doing anything about the new iTunes podcast update, I come to find you're all over it! GREAT JOB!
Us Podcasters thank you!
I already started on the mod before hearing about the Feedburner future updates so I decided to plow forward. It's not clear to me how Feedburner would glean the meta-data from the feed so I'm going to continue to modify this WordPress file. Like Rob said above, I would rather make a mod in one place then have to maintain meta-data in multiple places.
http://geekspeakradio.com/?p=40
I don't have keywords or categories working for items yet, but most of the other meta-data is there. I've tried to draw as much as I could from the standard WP interface. There are still a couple of things that need to be hardcoded though.
Let me know what you think and any ideas you guys might have.
Michael
---------------------------------
http://geekspeakradio.com
I've been busy with other obligations. Though I'm excited about the potential of iTunes support for podcasts, currently I was viewing this as a bunch of extra work for which I didn't currently have the time.
Fortunately one of the first places I checked for quick info was feedburner.com, and I am excessively relieved to know that the cats here are on top of it.
There are no hands in which I'd rather be.
You guys rule, thank you feedburner.
BLUE
The Simian Syndicate
PodCast.SanityCheck.net
Feeds.feedburner.com/simiansyndicate
I know "soon", but does anyone know how soon!?
The reason I ask is this...
It seems as though the iTunes podcast directory has been frozen since launch...it would be really nice if we could all get our stuff updated with proper tags before they start ramping up again...
I am confused about the iTunes integration. iTunes calls for at least 13 different fields that need to be filled out such as: , , etc.... how do we fill these out so that everything gets filed properly?
That's the only part where I am stuck. Any help is appreciated.
Posted by: Shawn at June 30, 2005 04:58 PMShawn, that's what we're working on! making it easy for you to come to FeedBurner, and as part of the smartcast service, just give us some additional info that we can then parse into iTunes, Odeo, and yahoo media rss meta-data that you don't have to put into the right tags in the right way on your own, and we'll roll all that into additional podcasts that you add to your feed in the future too. Coming next week! Hopefully midweek.
Posted by: dick costolo at June 30, 2005 05:20 PMThis is exactly what I have been wanting. Thanks.
Posted by: Jim Williams at July 1, 2005 02:18 AMdick,
While it's good to see you're going to incorporate the new iTunes extensions to the RSS standards, might I ask that you also ensure that in the process you don't 'munge' a valid feed that already has those new tags?
Right now I'm testing Michael's modified Wordpress RSS feed http://geekspeakradio.com/?p=40 - it's working flawlessly, however the same feed via feedburner is breaking, iTunes is having a ceasure and insisting the feed is invalid.
I'm about to turn off every feature (including smart cast) to attempt to work out what is happening, but after resyncing the feed, checking the source feed (which again works flawlessly) I just can't get the 'burner feed to play ball - it was working fine minus the new tags.
Something for the guru's to have a look at, perhaps.
Posted by: Brendan at July 1, 2005 06:42 AMHi Brendan,
When we burn the geekspeakradio feed, it validates correctly and does not remove any of the Apple iTunes tags (check out this version, which i'll delete tonight to avoid confusion)
http://rss.scripting.com/?url=http%3A%2F%2Ffeeds.feedburner.com%2Fgeekspeakradio%2FZvgL
We can also upload this to iTunes and then download it from iTunes. We certainly will work hard not to remove any additional meta-data already added before running a feed through us.
Can you shoot us a note via email with the FB url of any podcast feed that's not working for you, and we'll take a look in more detail at that specific feed.
Posted by: Dick Costolo at July 1, 2005 09:26 AMIt's Media RSS, *not* Yahoo Media RSS. Ourmedia announced support for it two months ago. Google may, too -- but not if it's called "Yahoo Media RSS."
Posted by: JD Lasica at July 3, 2005 12:35 AMThanks so much, Feedburner! Our band has been podcasting for a while now, and your free services are absolutely amazing. I can't wait to use the new tags for iTunes!
Posted by: Gavin at July 3, 2005 11:35 AMHow do I add an image to my podcast/feed so it replaces the iTunes default image/icon?
Alexis
--
love LARGE!
http://www.mxlpodcast.blogspot.com
Yeaaaa!!! Odeo and iTunes Podcasting support!!!
Posted by: Raymond Brigleb at July 5, 2005 12:01 PMI updated my podcast info for iTunes in SmartCast and my show which was listed on iTunes disappeared from the directory... why?
Thanks for your support.
Alexis
--
love LARGE!
http://www.mxlpodcast.blogspot.com
Alexis, we don't submit anything or remove anything from iTunes directory, we just enable you to provide them with additional data about your podcast. Is it possible that prior to using our iTunes support, you had not correctly categorized your podcast with their tags and Apple moved or removed it from the directory? I have no idea if this is the case, but you might simply try resubmitting your podcast to iTunes now that it's correctly tagged. Again, nothing we do would cause you to be removed from the directory.
Posted by: dick costolo at July 6, 2005 11:21 AMThis is Awesome!! You guys are good...
I came over to check and see if by chance anything was new in this whole iTunes format mess, if I had to do anything special; and you've got it sorted!
Little guys like me can't thank you enough.
Posted by: Krash Coarse at July 7, 2005 09:04 PMShare this Burning Questions post with someone you know.