Podcast Suggestion

Jeff,

I love the podcasts, and I know that a large file size is part of the territory of a 1/2 hour audio recording. Given the proliferation of CD burning technology, would you be able to offer the podcasts on CD? Not so much as for profit, but as a courtesy to those users who might want to listen but for whatever reason don't/can't wait for the download over a slower connection.

You wouldn't need to have the CDs professionally pressed - you could just burn them "to order" with all of the podcasts that exist at the time (up to whatever fits on a disc, of course). As for price? Perhaps something along the lines of $5 to cover the cost of the disc and shipping/handling.

Note: I'll be honest with you - I most likely would not purchase the CD(s) (I'm patient and will just wait for the download), but it'd be a nice courtesy for other people who aren't as patient and prefer to just pay a nominal fee.

You could fit 2 episodes on a "regular" audio CD, and obviously a lot more in mp3 format (the first 4 total just under 54MB, so you could probably fit a year's worth of podcasts on one CD in mp3 format. Also, if done on an as-needed basis, there really wouldn't be much (if any) cost outlay to add this option. You could even offer it at a discount (say, $4 instead of $5) to coasterbuzz club members. Not that you need to create club benefits, but it would be another benefit of joining. :)

I could pretty easily (from what I understand) pop them up in the Cafe Press store, but honestly, these days a 10-20 MB download is a drop in the bucket. I clocked downloading the latest episode in under a minute. Is there really a market for this?

Sure, dialup users.

Jeff, if you're considering offering this, perhaps offer it in the format of Blank(s) & Postage (B&P) used commonly by the legally recorded concert trading crowd (found, for instance, at www.etree.org).

Basically what B&P means is that you provide an address to interested people either publically or by individual request, and they send you a blank cd, including a self addressed return envelope with necessary postage already included. All you do then is take their cd, burn it, and send it back to them at no cost to you. It's quite simple and has proven itself effective a thousand times over in audio trading land, so I think it might be equally effective in this situation.

Just a thought,

- BB

If your a dial up user, I know that it's not aviable to everyone, but switching to Cable is the BEST thing you can do. Trust me, you won't see how you lived without it. And for me, it takes maybe 2 minutes to download the podcast, just so you can compare.

Keith:
#1 it is not available to everyone and

#2 in some places it is drastically more expensive and

#3 there is always going to be something better than what a person uses.

Why CD's? I use audio tapes.

How is that for an example?

Dialup user? That's okay.

Get a podcast aggrigator that can connect to the internet at 3am, download your shows automatically, then disconnect.

I think Doppler and iPodder (lemon) both will do this.

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Neuski said:
Why CD's? I use audio tapes.

How is that for an example?

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Blank CDs are a heck of a lot cheaper than blank tapes these days.

I just didn't think that 15 MB was a big file even in the dial-up days.

I looked at Cafe Press. The base price for CD's is $5. Do you really want to pay five bucks plus shipping to hear a bunch of coaster dorks talk for an hour?

when you could spend what... 15 minutes downloading (a small) file?

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Get a podcast aggrigator that can connect to the internet at 3am, download your shows automatically, then disconnect.

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I've been on broadband for a while, but those stuck on dialup here have to pay for access by the minute; a 15MB download will cost them about $1.50 to receive even at 3:00am, assuming the line doesn't drop midway through. Cafepress might well seem a reasonable option in that situation especially if they can get a month or two of episodes in one go.

No one is going to purchase a CD of "coaster dorks" that they can get for free.

I have dialup at home (and it is terrible) because we can't get DSL on the mountain yet (or, at least we couldn't last time we tried).

Thankfully, work has a T3 connection, and I work on Sunday nites :).

Clint, you sure you don't want Jeff to send it in 8-track format? Hick! ;)

P.S. Clint knows I'm messing with him...he loves it...

Neuski,

You can't put data on tapes.

My suggestion was 2 types of CDs - one that has "raw" audio that you can pop into any CD player (which would be able to hold, at maximum, 2 whole podcasts). The other would be able to hold an entire year's worth of podcasts in mp3 format (which you can only play on computers or mp3-reading CD Players)

15 minutes of download * 4 current existing podcasts = an hour. And this grows every week. Let's say someone comes into the enthusiast community and discovers CBuzz exactly 1 year from now.. that's 56 episodes of the podcast.. or 14 hours of downloading on a dialup connection. Or, I can give Jeff $5 to burn the first 52 to a disc and mail it to me, thereby supporting the site in the process (the actual cost for shipping and a blank CD I'd estimate to be a little less than $5).

Instead of waiting for the whole year to be finished to offer it, you can offer it "in progress".. that is, they'd get as many podcasts as exist at the time they order it. Also, I think it would be cheaper/easier for you to do it in-house than to worry about CafePress's markups.

Or, if you don't want to offer in-progress options, I still think that a year from now, having the first year of podcasts on CD (in mp3 format) would be good.

Heck, if the only roadblock to offering it is that you don't want to bother with the burning/mailing of CDs, I'll do it. :)

If however, you think it's just a stupid idea, that's ok too.. it is, after all, your website and your business.

Maybe we should re-investigate this in 2 months or so. Jeff could look into doing a quarterly cd threw cafe press. The problem with looking at it now is that you will have the users who cannot get the podcasts currently thinking it is a good idea. However, many things can change in 2 months and those same users might be able to find a way in the mean time, to get the casts.

Right... I have a hard enough time dealing with tickets, club cards and other physical items. I certainly don't want to spend time burning CD's.

Richard: Are dial-up providers per-minute in the UK? That sounds insane. Everyone here in the states is unlimited.

Actually, I think there are still a few per-minute ISPs here. They're for the folks who are afraid of the internet and just want to check their Yahoo! email once every few months.

Last I knew one of them offered a pre-paid plan that allowed you to use the internet "anonymously."

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dannerman said:
Neuski,

You can't put data on tapes.

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Are you kidding me? Give me some credit. I was referring to audio, not data.