Podcasting

I have been listening to Podcasts for while. It has been a rather cool experience. I really like the idea of subscribing to audio files and listening to them in my spare time. We live in an on-demand society and there is something cool about subscribing to data, getting it when it is available, and then listening to it when you have a chance. I wish TV was like this (it is moving in this direction with Comcast's video on demand and TIVO). Imagine being able to go home, sit in from of your TV, and watch the latest episode of Stargate (I like Stargate); without having to record it or without having to wait for the episode to air. Just be able to subscribe to Stargate and then see if a new episode is available and watch it.

Podcasts do have one down side, they are not regulated and so you have to be careful about all the locker room humor and other offensive material. Free speech is good but at the same time is this the kind of thing we want our children listening too. Well, it is not all bad and as time goes on it seems to be getting better. Now that .Net Rocks has cleaned up its act, I would recommend it.

If you would like to get started Podcasting, download iPodder. iPodder is a tool that allows you to easily subscribe to different Podcasts and will download them to your computer. It works with iTunes and will work on Windows or Mac. Even though it is called iPodder you don't have to have an iPod, as long as you have iTunes you will be find. Most of the files are MP3. This makes it possible to download them to your Pocket PC, Palm or other portable devices.

Avalon 3D

Microsoft is working on some really cool stuff. If you don’t know what Avalon is, it is a code name for a project at Microsoft that has to do with creating displays on Windows forms using an XML language called XAML. With “Avalon 3D” they have added light sources, camera angles, textures, brushes, and mesh support.

This stuff looks really cool and will raise the bar on application development. This has the potential to change the way we interact with computers. It could make the user interaction with computers a much richer and pleasurable experience.

I really think this is cool stuff. Watch the MSDN Video to see the demo of Avalon 3D.