25 May 2005 No Comment

I had a good discussion by phone yesterday with Steve Page, from KYOURadio in San Francisco. Michael Butler also had a discussion with him. He hits the high points in his latest podcast. He contacted both of us after listening to Michael’s Rock and Roll Geek Show episode from Sunday – the one in which Michael and I pretty much laid into the station for its current practices. In essence, he called to express that he understood our concerns and to find out what it would take to correct them.

During the call, I got the impression that the folks at KYOU do understand that there are some serious flaws in both their business model and in the technology they’ve chosen. My human nature judgement was that they do want this experiment to work both for the station and for podcasters.

As I’ve now been through the submission, airing and listening process with them, I feel a bit more qualified to speak to the issues. Given that I’m a much better writer than speaker, I asked Steve for a day or two to formalize my concerns in an email. That email went out a bit ago. It was very, very long and contains what I see as the biggest personal concerns regarding their process and model. I also tried to address many of the issues I’ve seen in the abundance of discussions around this topic.

Importanly, I’ve asked Steve for his permission to publish the email in its entirety here. I hope to invite further public discussion by doing so. It’s time for KYOURadio/Infinity to actually open the doors on this experiment and to be aware firsthand of the concerns of the podcasting community as a whole. If the decision to allow publication of the email is Steve’s to make, I hope he’ll support it. In any event, you’ll know first right here.