Podcasts provide information, but only if you're willing to listen to the podcast. Like many other people, I'm not willing to listen to a 15-minute podcast just to find out if it has information I need. I want the podcast to be searchable, just like a web page; if the phrase I'm looking for is in the podcast I will take the time to listen to the relevant section, and then perhaps the entire podcast — just like I do now with a web page.
And the search engine has to be very good. A web page takes only moments to skim after it loads into my browser, but audio is linear; I cannot listen to a few words here and there or skip to a summary paragraph at the end. Podcasts must overcome a huge burden if they are to become archival sources of web-based information.
Several companies offer search engines for podcasts using speech recognition technology. A new offering by Pluggd introduces a couple of new twists. First, Pluggd offers search suggestions based on your original search, and indicates where all these search terms appear in the file. These results provide context to the audio file and should help you determine whether the file you've found has the information you'll need.
Pluggd also says they'll disaggregate any user-created information from the audio file:
Users can click to listen to the file at that point, or select another option to tag, describe and share a particular section of the file. Castro says the company aims to set that data free, not keep it trapped in Pluggd.This proposal takes Pluggd one step along the path to disaggregating information from audio, but as far as I can tell that's one step further than anyone else has taken.
Topics: · technology · web
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