As I scroll through all the choices and listen to more of them than is probably healthy, I’m increasingly confused about what this medium of podcasting really is. An outlet for new talent? An outlet for the painfully untalented? A real threat to traditional broadcasting? A promotional tool for mega-corporations? The biggest waste of bandwidth yet created? Probably all of the above. What it isn’t, at least not yet, is much of a business.

The Year of the Podcast (Slate)

A trade show seemed dangerously close to breaking out here over the weekend, as vendors lined up to tout the latest podcasting wares to the milling masses. But nifty products and gizmos were ultimately a sideline at the Portable Media Expo and Podcasting Conference, where attendees wrestled with a far more fundamental point: whether this podcasting thing is — or even should be — a business.

Profits May Rock Podcasting World (Wired)

Yahoo Inc., the Internet giant, on Monday unveiled plans to get into podcasting with a test release of a service that will let users download and review online radio programs… Yahoo’s new service will allow users to download shows from National Public Radio, the weekly presidential address, and independent shows with subjects ranging from sports to knitting, the company said.

Yahoo launches new podcasting service (Reuters)

The podosphere may be virgin terrain for the online world, but already the race is on to figure out whether there’s any real money to be made through the new medium. Consider the vast variety of approaches that have cropped up since Apple’s iTunes upgrade this summer started delivering thousands of new listeners to podcasters who once toiled in obscurity. GrapeRadio podcaster Brian Clark is now gulping down about $1,000 a week from sponsors of his show for wine hobbyists. Grant Baciocco of the fiction serial The Radio Adventures of Dr. Floyd sells show-themed buttons and T-shirts and offers guest-voice roles for $50.

Podcasting Gold Rush Is On (Wired)

There is no doubt in my mind that podcasting is not only here to stay but will also shortly threaten established media broadcast systems. It’s not so much that they will all be destroyed by homebrew networks, but podcasts will be taking away just enough listeners to be a major concern.

Podcasting: The Next Big Thing (PC Magazine)

Amid the general anxiety that afflicts both the broadcast radio industry and other old-line media companies, the podcast — an audio program that you pull off the Internet and download onto an iPod or similar device for listening at your leisure — seems as big a threat to radio as the Web poses to print media. But podcasts thus far seem to be more a device for time-shifting — saving radio programs to listen to them when you want to, rather than when a station tells you to — than an audio revolution. Thousands of podcasts are available, and many are indeed homemade shows of a sort you’d never hear on the radio. But many of the most popular podcasts are simply a new way to listen to popular programs from National Public Radio, the BBC and other big radio producers.

Podcasting’s Potential, Beyond Two-Fer Thursday (Washington Post)

Podcasting has done what no new technology that I’m aware of has ever accomplished: It’s gone mainstream and underground at the same time. I don’t know any other word to use besides “mainstream” when I hear from the White House that President Bush’s radio addresses will be offered via podcast. And I have no other word at my fingertips than “underground” when I read a recent Los Angeles Times opinion piece that suggests that podcasting is the biggest tech craze that most of us have never heard of.

The Paradox of Podcasting (Washington Post)

Also known as “podnography,” sexcasts are audio clips that anyone can record by using a computer… Along with shows on music and politics, you can now hear porn reviews, kinky storytelling sessions and interviews with porn writers… A recent Google search for the phrase “adult podcast” showed 6,850 results. Compare that to the category “rock podcast,” which had only 3,890. In one sexcast — available at www.podcastdirectory.com — a San Francisco man describes a lurid rendezvous with a “gorgeous” woman he meets on Craigslist.

Hot, steamy and now downloadable (San Francisco Chronicle)

Two podcasting startups have won venture capital funding, a sign that both the promise and the hype is building for a grassroots broadcasting phenomenon that started just about a year ago. Podshow, led by former MTV host Adam Curry, who helped invent podcasting in July 2004, received $8.85 million in funding from Kleiner Perkins and Sequoia Capital, Private Equity Week reported Wednesday… The second company to announce funding Wednesday was San Francisco-based Odeo, led by repeat entrepreneur Evan Williams, who created the Blogger service which is now owned by Google. Charles River Ventures led the round; the sum was not disclosed. The round also included Amicus Ventures, and individuals including Mitch Kapor, Joe Kraus, Tim O’Reilly, Ron Conway, and HotorNot’s James Hong.

VCs Invest in Podcasting (Red Herring)

Packing list for your next city break: clothes, cards, passport, camera… guidebook? No, leave it at home. Just remember your MP3 player — and make sure you’ve loaded the latest podcasts, of course… Because podcasting is shaping up to be the next big travel trend… While they could never be as comprehensive as a guidebook, [podcasts] a lot lighter, easier to use, more personal — and they don’t cost anything. You can wander the streets with your earphones in, and when you want some local knowledge on, say, choosing a restaurant, or interpreting the public sculptures, you scroll to the relevant podcast, just like choosing a song on your MP3, and listen in.

Podcasting: the beginning of the end for guidebooks? (The London Times)