First of all, I mean the word “amateur” in the post title in the purest sense: one who does an activity out of love for that activity. In that sense I am an amateur podcaster, since I do it out of love (so far); and I’m even an amateur magician and musician, even though I do both of those things for money rather often.

As consumers of mediated information (“mediated” being, of course, related to “media”), we have long been used to, and willing to, pay for media content, including the print media. Now, with the explosion of blogs and podcasts, absolutely everyone with a computer and decent internet hookup can and may publish.

Will there remain a place for “professional reporters” or “journalists” in the future? Even in this blogpost, I can link to a related article in the Washington Post and cause the Post to point back to my blog–thus undermining the privileged position of the “professional” journalists who are paid to write for that great newspaper. (See? I just forced the Post to link back to me by linking to a blog entry by Howard Kurtz, their media writer.)

When everybody can create content, will there remain a demand for “professional” content that people will be willing to pay for? Will there be a way to earn a living in the future as a journalist? (This question was posed by Annik Rubens to Steffen of the Süddeutsche Zeitung in edition #315 of Schlaflos in München. If you understand German, it’s a great discussion.)

Lately I have become a fan of a charming husband-and-wife podcast called Me and the Bean, produced by Chad and Amanda (“me” and “the Bean”) in Mt. Airy, North Carolina. I don’t think I am showing any disrespect to them when I say that their podcast is a modest project. They don’t line up celebrity interviews or discover new musical artists (although one of Chad’s projects, Locals Only, features independent music from around northwestern North Carolina). All they do is talk about their friends and their lives as parents of young kids.

Me and the Bean is like a semi-weekly newsletter to friends. We all listen, from all corners of the globe, and respond to them via email, voicemail, and MP3 audio files. It is nothing like “regular radio,” nor does it aspire to be.

When I wrote down the notes from which I’m writing this entry, I was listening to the show. Chad had just read an email from somebody who was listening while doing one of those mind-numbing survival jobs, like cleaning offices or something.

It occurred to me that podcasting beguiles the time in an empowering way. Not only is there a customizable content stream to listen to, but it’s a kind of content anybody can create. So you listen to your own special list of podcasts, and then you create your own audio files and respond back.

An audio podcast is essentially much different from a blog. With a podcast I can take the content with me; for a blog, I generally need to be online and hooked up to the Internet to truly get the essence of it (links and trackbacks and comments). To read a blog on a web-enabled cellphone, for example, would be just too tedious. I cannot participate in a blog, even in receptor mode, while riding on a subway train.

But while writing the notes for this blogpost, I was hearing (i.e., consuming) Me and the Bean (and Schlaflos in München and all the other shows to which I subscribe) on the Orange Line of the Washington Metro while riding home from an afternoon in DC.

Categories: blogging, podcast, media, annikrubens, meandthebean