A podlet is a small digital media file that can be embedded in one or more podcasts for playback on personal computers or portable media players.
Podlet’s vision
Closely related to the concept of article sharing, podlets are a way of bringing an otherwise unique burst of inspiration to the global web.
Maybe you wake up in the middle of the night and have a “WOW” experience. You have a lot of inspiration to create something, you work on it, you push it and then it’s happened. Once your creativity has been kicked out, how do you make it see, how do you show it to others?
If you start your own blog, this inspiration may be one of the only posts you write. Maybe someone will notice it and others will reference it, and it will be popular, but how will it be noticed in the first place?
Podlets are a way to put your inspirational idea, joke, funny quotes, or just comments in a condensed format. You can think of it almost like article distribution, just with a multimedia (audio / video) twist. You don’t have to come up with an amazing idea every day. You only need one or two ideas each time they occur to you. Submit your original creative idea to a central location. Podcasters collect this information and mold it for their podcast and viola.
Which podlets are not
Podlets are not intended to convey marketing / promotional messages. Although it is recommended that some kind of fair attribution be given to the author of the podlet. Podlets should not be confused with advertising. A podlet should enhance the listener’s experience of the podcast. Provides an opportunity to joke around, give feedback, and interact.
Podlet examples
* A trivia question, posed to a podcaster, with pauses for the podcaster to answer and guess the answer and then an answer, “were you right?”
* A joke or limmerick inserted between the reproductions of two songs within a podcast
* A short story, perhaps used as a segway between the podcast sections.
* A pre-recorded review of a movie or book as part of a “review” section of an existing podcast
Podlets are not limited to just audio media, and can be used to distribute small videos to a wide range of podcasters as well.
Adding flavor to your podcasts?
Just like the right spice can make your food tastier, a podlet can help spice up your existing podcast. To get started, just grab this OPML file that contains a list of podlets that you can subscribe to.
Do you want to add your own podlets?
