Width or without you

There are 3,000 podcasters in Indian including celebs like Sunil Gavaskar who hosts a cricket podcast, writes Sneha Mahale.

There are approximately 3000 podcasters in Indian including celebrities like Sunil Gavaskar who hosts a cricket podcast.

Some of the earliest include Podmasti, Indicast and PodioIndia. With the podcasting culture catching on in India, it is big with the youth as an interactive mode of communication.

Podcasting is similar to radio programmes. Twenty-four-year-old advertising student Prachi Ganjedra says that the medium is "kind of cool" and has also started attracting commercials.

A podcast is a digital media file that is circulated via the Internet. There are two types of formats — audio and video, ranging from five to 30 minutes. In India, though, the video format is still in its nascent stage.

Ashish Chakrabarty, follower of Podbharti, the first Hindi podcasting site in India, believes that technology is the main reason for this culture's slow growth in the country. Bandwidth is an important aspect in pod casting and low bandwidth means the files have to be optimised.

Content counts
Despite teething problems, it is an easy means of getting connected. Aditya Mhatre, co-founder of Indicast, points out that all one needs are a computer, mike and good content. Bandwidth, he asserts, is a secondary concern. Quality in content is the first. Plus podcasting faces tough competition blogs which are easy to write and read. In pod casting, a 15-minute episode could take three days to complete.

Never mind the glitches because the youth is viewing pod casts as a way to build a sense of community. Karan Mehra, a pod caster notes that the sites have an active following pretty much on the lines of a Facebook or Orkut.