Podcasting (Thing 20)

My only experience with podcasts are listening to sermons I have missed at church when I teach the 4/5 year old Sunday School class. We only have one service at our church right now so thankfully through the podcasts that they post on our church website, I don't have to miss the message on the Sundays that I teach.

I listened to Chapter 12 of Alice in Wonderland through the Contra Costa County Library story time/chapter-a-week podcast. The audio quality was fine but the narration was very dull. It definitely did not keep my attention long enough to listen to the entire chapter. It makes you wonder if these are the same librarians reading at their story time. I listened to A Big Quiet House read by Denver Public Library. The sound quality was good and they made the listening a little more interesting by using two people to read the book. Last, I listened to several of the teen podcasts on the Los Angeles Public Library website. They do a pretty good job of mixing up there podcast topics by including podcasts book reviews, poetry readings, commercials, news and announcements, and read the book - see the movie reviews. It looks like the story time/chapter-a-week podcasts are a popular theme that some of the local libraries are now offering on their websites.

I looked on our FPL website and I didn't see any podcasts available. I don't know if this is something the library has tried in the past or not. I think podcasts could definitely be useful to our customers if the right selection and topics were offered. It would be great if we could offer a podcast on the Dr. Jim Thomas workshops that are currently running here at the library. I wanted to attend one of his workshops but I couldn't make it work with my schedule. We could also possibly podcast the computer classes that are held by Adult Services. This could be useful for our patrons who need the computer instruction but can't make it to the class times that we offer. After listening to several of the podcasts from the link provided, I believe the presentation and recording needs to be professional and first class for it to draw an audience.