iPod Platform

ZDNET -- Steve Gillmor cites the emerging iPod Platform as a direct competitor to broadcast channels of television and radio. This is a very advanced Alpha version of Personal Optional Digital entertainment (tip of hat to Doc). As Adam Curry has shown, iPod's software-hardware bridge delivers radio-on-demand, some of it hand-rolled, other parts running on an Open Source Frontier system. Curry uses a single PowerBook and one outboard sound processor to produce content that sounds grand playing back on the iPod. Interesting times lie ahead on the heels of this seismic event because music is the sound track of our lives. Many are listening. (Cue RHS.)

Apple's next operating system should let users produce broadcast-quality shows without external devices. Gillmor reports about exciting things on the delivery side as well.

Curry and a group of open source developers are bootstrapping scripting languages, iTunes, RSS, and BitTorrent to automate the capture, meta-data tagging, and transfer of MP3 files to the iPod from both the Mac and Windows machines. Server-based aggregators such as Feedster are getting into the act with RSS enclosure services. Third-party adapters such as Belkin's TuneCast II Mobile FM transmitter pushes content to car or stereo speakers. Or skip the iPod completely at home with Airport Express and AirTunes.

Apple is looking over its shoulder at phones such as the new Nokia 6620, which supports at least 75K downstream -- plenty of bandwidth to enjoy the Gillmor Gang at AT&T Wireless' $29 all-you-can-eat flat fee data rate. It's a small step from there to a hybrid iPod that caches Wi-Fi-enabled BitTorrent feeds with news, event notifications, and traffic data.

These are wonderful developments for the broadband generation. An always-on iPhone will serve up information as it develops, not as you schedule its downloading. Gillmor thinks the market is moving towards "an RSS console that automates the capture, consumption, and routing of strategic information. Just as blogging drove the initial adoption of RSS aggregators, so too will moblogging drive the addition of rich media capabilities to the RSS information router. Whether it's Dave Winer's imagined "big red record button" on a future iPod, a suite of audio mixing tools that mix iChatAV, VoIP, microphone, MP3, and GarageBand feeds, or an intelligent router that uses attention data from aggregator services to predict where BitTorrent caches need to be positioned to allow reliable and scalable feed distribution, the resulting blend of these tools will certainly be a killer app for information professionals and consumers alike."

The super-sized information generation is sauntering up to the fast-flow counter. The ones with the iPods are back for top-ups.

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Steve Gillmor -- "If RSS ain't broke ..."
Adam Curry -- "The iPod Platform"
Doc Searls -- "POD Pong"
Dave Winer -- "Introducing Frontier 10.0a1" (Frontier kernel released) and Trade Secrets Radio with a string of referrers.
IT Garage -- "DIY Radio with PODcasting"
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