For about two months I have been really looking forward to the 4.9
version of iTunes – I expected seamless podcast support and most
importantly auto conversion to bookmarkable aac files. When you listen
to number of podcasts I do you want a good podcast receiver. So what
did I find:
- Intergration with iTunes is OK – a true GUI directory is sweet
although it is more basic than corporate GUIs I churned out in 1994 on
16 bit 386 machines - No bittorrent support – this means podcast providers hosting bills will skyrocket if many users move away from iPodder
- We cannot paste custom urls when a podcast is not in Apple’s directory, like My’lanta for instance
- There is no Auto conversion to bookmarked files (aac) -aargh, bookmarks are why I bought an iPod in the first place
- No playlist per podcast – all podcasts are dumped into the same
playlist. Do Apple not realize many people use their iPods solely for
podcasts and don’t want to be scrolling through 100+ files at 90mph on
the highway while simultaneously riding the bumper of a 911
and flipping off the SUV that they just cut up?
Ok enough of a rant already. I tried the Primetime Podcast Receiver
a month ago which looked promising but turned out to be a little
buggy with no bittorrent support either. Hopefully it will improve or
iPodder will add auto bookmarkable aac conversion. It is quite tempting
to write something myself building on my two week hack of my MP3 Jukebox (it looks rubbish but functionally was better than any commercial MP3 Jukebox in 2001) .