Several months ago I realized that the iTunes on my MBP was no longer updating the podcasts to which I subscribe and, well, I could no longer connect to the iTunes Music store. As a lifelong skeptic of the iTunes product (and a devoutly stubborn consumer of only non-Apple mp3 and portable media players and phones) I immediately looked elsewhere instead of seeking some ass-backward solution that likely would have required me to download one of the hundreds of iTunes “upgrades” released each year. This took my back to an old friend, Odeo, which I remembered to have an easily navigable and fully-loaded index of audio and video netcasts. I noticed a new beta version was being offered and I immediately signed up to find an attractive UI and easy-to-use embedded players and download tabs, as well as new subscription tabs. Now, I still keep my Zune — yes, that’s what I use — updated with podcasts via my PC at work, but when I’m not at work — or when I’m WATCHING on my work PC — I use Odeo. Hey, I also through a bit of extra faith into the product because it was originally launched by Blogger founder (and later Twitter co-founder) Ev Williams.
There are a few things I WOULD like to see on Odeo — I have a login and limited profile. I’d like to have the option to make my profile public and — similar to Last.fm — network with my friends to share recommendations and fave listens and keep tabs on what those in my network watch/listen to so that I can discover new netcasts of interest without having to look too hard. Also, I’ve noticed that Odeo can be a bit slow — quite often i wait around for the Olbermann netcast, only to find it arrive late at night tagged “4 hours ago.”
Do you use Odeo? Have you tried it since the relaunch? What else have you tried as a netcast portal?
Andy: thanks for checking out the new Odeo! I'm happy to hear that you like the new site and are finding it useful. We are working on speeding up our crawler so that shows are found closer to the time they are published. We also do have some social features; for exmaple, you will see a listing on your dashboard when a friend subscribes to a new podcast. We're also planning integration with social networks (Facebook, etc.) which should make some of this easier as well.
Thanks again for the post, if there's anything else I can do, or if you have any other thoughts/suggestions/critiques, just let me know (greg AT odeo DOT com).
It is so awful and soooo slow. They should have stuck with audio only.
I love Hulu for the true speed and the same content?
Off my bookmarks 4 sure.
thanks, gummib. I hear you re: Hulu being better / faster for video content…. but I can't watch my favorite web shows like Epic Fu, Tekzilla, or Cranky Geeks there…
gummib: which aspect of the site is slow? We're working on speeding up the episode/channel pages; if you have any thoughts, let me know. Thanks!