One of my listeners asked if I could put the transcripts of my show directly in the feed in addtion to posting them on my website.
Given the other discussion going on about how many episodes you should leave in your feed (and Apple blocking your feed if it is over 250K), I was wondering if there are any issues I'm not considering.
Do people have opinions about whether or not it would be good to put transcripts directly in the feed?
Mignon
Full Version: Putting Transcripts In The Rss Feed?
I dunno how well that will even work exactly in the feed, you will need to make a PDF more and likley if you are wanteing to do that. You could give them the RSS feed for your posts on your site.....
...Or you could just throw the PDF files into the feed. iTunes plays with that, I believe...
Yes it does but making a PDF is more work. It all depends on what you want to do.
I'm coming in at the form an educator's point of view. Transcripts in a feed would be great, especially for language learning. Having the optin to read as you listen has numerous benefits for students. Gramar Girl would definitely fall in this category.
I’d vote no for most podcasts. For instance, I like listening to Matt’s Today in History, but I don’t need or want the transcripts. It’s great that he has them, but it’s not much trouble to go to the site for them. OTOH, if they were in the feed, it would be a pain in the ass, because I’d have to manually remove them before burning them to a CD (which is how I listen to podcasts.)
For the very few shows were a transcript might be important, a better approach would be to have two RSS feeds, one for the audio and one for the transcripts. That would give people the choice to get what they wanted, with a minimum of hassle.
For the very few shows were a transcript might be important, a better approach would be to have two RSS feeds, one for the audio and one for the transcripts. That would give people the choice to get what they wanted, with a minimum of hassle.
At the risk of being the obstinate guy (really?), if my show's going to have transcripts, it'll be because somebody else makes them. I'm in it to podcast, and I do (I think) good show notes because it makes me able to do the kind of show I do. (Whereas The Whole Truth has basically no show notes, because it doesn't need them.) Doing transcripts is, well, too much. I'd rather actually get shows done.
The Slate Explainer podcast has the entire transcript in the "information" field at iTunes (the little "i" in the description field). Is there a special trick to doing that?
I do already post the transcripts on the website, and there is a separate feed for them. I think the listener wanted to read them on his iPod while listening.
I would normally agree that transcripts are a pain, and I rarely make them for Absolute Science, but Grammar Girl is such a short and precise thing that I write out a transcript for myself that I use as a script for the show, so I've already got it.
On the other hand, I'm not entirely certain I want to do it. Writing the transcripts is one thing, but proofreading them is quite another. I'm usually working on this late at night, and every time a typo slips in, boy do I hear about it from the listeners/readers! Proofreading the transcripts until they're perfect and deaing with the fallout when they're not probably takes up 1/3 of my production time. I'm not sure I'll keep posting them forever. On the other hand, there are people who seem to REALLY like them, and having them on the website stimulates great discussion in the comments. (I'm actually afraid if I put them in the feed some people will stop coming to the site.)
Mignon
I do already post the transcripts on the website, and there is a separate feed for them. I think the listener wanted to read them on his iPod while listening.
I would normally agree that transcripts are a pain, and I rarely make them for Absolute Science, but Grammar Girl is such a short and precise thing that I write out a transcript for myself that I use as a script for the show, so I've already got it.
On the other hand, I'm not entirely certain I want to do it. Writing the transcripts is one thing, but proofreading them is quite another. I'm usually working on this late at night, and every time a typo slips in, boy do I hear about it from the listeners/readers! Proofreading the transcripts until they're perfect and deaing with the fallout when they're not probably takes up 1/3 of my production time. I'm not sure I'll keep posting them forever. On the other hand, there are people who seem to REALLY like them, and having them on the website stimulates great discussion in the comments. (I'm actually afraid if I put them in the feed some people will stop coming to the site.)
Mignon
Only slightly related, but kinda cool...
On my iPod when I click the center of the thumb-wheel repeatedly during a podcast eventually the show notes will come up on the screen. I don't know if this is a new feature with the firmware update (1.2 on my 5G) or if it was always that way and I've been too self-absorbed to notice.
That said, I don't know that I'd pull up a transcript and read along.
Aren't there some on-line sites that can scan your mp3 file and do the speech-to-text thing? Podzinger can index, but does it produce transcripts?
On my iPod when I click the center of the thumb-wheel repeatedly during a podcast eventually the show notes will come up on the screen. I don't know if this is a new feature with the firmware update (1.2 on my 5G) or if it was always that way and I've been too self-absorbed to notice.
That said, I don't know that I'd pull up a transcript and read along.
Aren't there some on-line sites that can scan your mp3 file and do the speech-to-text thing? Podzinger can index, but does it produce transcripts?
In my case, it makes a lot of sense to include transcripts of the 100 word stories in the feed.
1) Many people read just the feed and don't go to the website behind it. Saves a click.
2) Including a transcript is helpful if the reader mumbles or there's a quality issue in the recording.
3) It allows people to search based on keywords or look for other stories in the archive based on a theme.
If people really want to comment on the stories, they'll follow the link to the web site and open a comment there. But comments tend to be rare.
1) Many people read just the feed and don't go to the website behind it. Saves a click.
2) Including a transcript is helpful if the reader mumbles or there's a quality issue in the recording.
3) It allows people to search based on keywords or look for other stories in the archive based on a theme.
If people really want to comment on the stories, they'll follow the link to the web site and open a comment there. But comments tend to be rare.
You may already have considered this.
But how about posting the transcript on a seperate blog site and generating the RSS feeds from there?
You can tell your listeners in the show the blog URL and direct them there if they want the transcript.
But how about posting the transcript on a seperate blog site and generating the RSS feeds from there?
You can tell your listeners in the show the blog URL and direct them there if they want the transcript.
An alternative is to include the transcript inside the <guid> tag. This works well in Safari's RSS reader (the transcript link appears as the "Read more..." link), but not so well for Firefox.
From what I can tell, there seems to be no clear-cut solution regarding including the transcript in the RSS feed. The consensus appears to be that most podcasters who create transcripts simply make them available on their Web sites only (not in the RSS feed). Because the transcript is only a click away, it's not a bad solution. Of course, you can also include a "transcript" as "lyrics" for iTunes podcast listeners.
From what I can tell, there seems to be no clear-cut solution regarding including the transcript in the RSS feed. The consensus appears to be that most podcasters who create transcripts simply make them available on their Web sites only (not in the RSS feed). Because the transcript is only a click away, it's not a bad solution. Of course, you can also include a "transcript" as "lyrics" for iTunes podcast listeners.
QUOTE(KevinLeeC @ Oct 5 2006, 07:39 AM) 
Only slightly related, but kinda cool...
On my iPod when I click the center of the thumb-wheel repeatedly during a podcast eventually the show notes will come up on the screen. I don't know if this is a new feature with the firmware update (1.2 on my 5G) or if it was always that way and I've been too self-absorbed to notice.
That said, I don't know that I'd pull up a transcript and read along.
Aren't there some on-line sites that can scan your mp3 file and do the speech-to-text thing? Podzinger can index, but does it produce transcripts?
On my iPod when I click the center of the thumb-wheel repeatedly during a podcast eventually the show notes will come up on the screen. I don't know if this is a new feature with the firmware update (1.2 on my 5G) or if it was always that way and I've been too self-absorbed to notice.
That said, I don't know that I'd pull up a transcript and read along.
Aren't there some on-line sites that can scan your mp3 file and do the speech-to-text thing? Podzinger can index, but does it produce transcripts?
Kevin, this isn't a new feature. And I think Podzinger produces a transcript when it indexes, but I've been unable to figure out how to access the transcript to copy and paste it onto my site.
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