Tama’s eLearning Blog

Adam Curry’s Daily Source Code is undoubtably the flagship podcast, the exemplar of the podcasting movement. So the significance of Adam’s shift today in DSC 275 is one well worth noting. Adam was contacted by the dutch equivalent of the RIAA and told in no uncertain terms that either the DSC become 100% non-copyright music, or he’d face a future in court (it was through the Dutch agency since he hosts his files there). So, as of today, the Daily Source Code is “100% podsafe music” and nothing that will infringe. Sadly, that also means that mashups won’t be appearing, at least not mashups of copyrighted songs … I suspect that both the BackTracks podcast and Hit Tests might disappear as well. BUT, it is also worth noting that this will mean that everything on the DSC is legally redistributable from now on. So podcasters, start looking for podsafe and creatively copyrighted music and ONLY those sources!

For educational podcasters, Adam’s experiences serve as a reminder that we need to make sure everything that appears in any sort of edupodcast – be it from lecturers, teaching and learning developers, students, or anyone else – must conform to copyright laws and not infringe or we’re inviting a whole world of hurt! That said, the Podcast Music Network is probably the quickest growing collection of cool music on the planet. There are plenty of nifty songs that make great intros and background music as well … just remember to acknowledge them!

Also worth thinking about is the implication for podcasts of lectures, such as those rendered with the iLecture/Lectopia system. I suspect any lecture which includes commercial music or, say, a film excerpt will also have to be removed from a podcast feed (or not made into a publicly accessible one). I’m sure it’ll be a lot of fun implementing that one …