One challenge that many of the PodCamps have been faced with is session concurrence and the inability of the community to organize sessions into logical tracks (note many, not all, PodCamps!). This means that if you attend a PodCamp, chances are good that being part of one session means missing another — or several others — that you want to attend at the same time. Thankfully, all of the PodCamp Toronto sessions were videotaped and are available in the media archive of that event.

I have been slowly working through the archive and this past weekend found a nugget of gold. During his session with Connie Crosbie on What To Podcast, Jim Milles said “If something is worth doing, it’s worth doing badly” — which is very different from what my father told me when I was growing up. What a perfect way to frame that the only true barrier to becoming a podcaster is one’s own conscious mind.

There are many reasons why people start their own podcast(s) and just as many reasons why people delay or refuse to do their own podcast(s). Don’t let fear of “doing badly” be one of them. Every podcaster I know (myself included) cringes at the thought of listening to their first five episodes — possibly more.

In everything, we have to do something “badly” to do something else well.

Photo: rhyndman

ZeroFootprint is launching an energy-saving-meets-social-media initiative called DarkGreenPC.

The project combines efforts to protect the environment, save energy, promote the open-source movement and the passion people have to connect by developing an application that (and I hope I have this right) turns off your computer screen when you’re not using it, records the amount of time that the screen was off and makes it possible to “promote” how much energy was saved when your monitor was off when not needed.

There is a short video which explains the project and announces the need for a project manager at DarkGreenPC is looking for an open source project manager.

On May 9, Ajay tagged me in a post he did about seven songs he’s into right now — or, at the time anyway. Here is my long overdue list:

• Soldier Machismo - Fiction Plane
• Waste Our Time - The Between
• Pump It Up - Elvis Costello
• Love Slip Up On Ya - The Funky Meters
• The Road Not Taken - Bruce Hornsby
• Walking In Your Footsteps (live 2007) - The Police
• Can You Picture That - The Muppets

I wonder what Bob Goyetche, Jeff Parks, Terry Fallis and David Jones, Chris Brogan and Sage Tyrtle are listening to.

I’m honoured to be the guest of Joe Thornley’s first podcast on the ProPR blog site (Mark Blevis previews this year’s Podcasters Across Borders). Joe and I met to celebrate the Thornley Fallis sponsorship of Podcasters Across Borders 2007 a few weeks ago and he decided to put his new portable recorder to the test.

I’ve been waiting about twenty-four years for this. The Police are kicking off their sold-out world tour tonight in Vancouver. Last night they played a dress rehearsal for 4,000 people and by all accounts, they proved themselves a force to be reckoned with now as much as they ever were.

While I’ve seen Sting and Stewart Copeland live (not on the same stage), I’ve never seen The Police. I’m anxiously awaiting my chance to see them in Montreal.

Photo: Kris Krug (see his Police photos here) — Great photos, Kris! Thanks!

I wonder how Roger Waters feels that his concert performance in Ottawa was bumped because of the Stanley Cup playoffs.

About a month ago, Charlie lamented that content licensing is still a bottleneck for Web 2.0 folks (Top Ten Reasons Why Web 2.0 Sucks). One of the reasons that podcasting shot to popularity the way it did is that it is not, nor should it be, mainstream media. Getting caught up in the inability to play today’s top 40 on a podcast suggests otherwise.

The apparent impatience for a licensing solution reinforces our dependency on what some people call “Internet speed”. However, most of the world doesn’t work that way — particularly those parts of the world that have been doing things a certain way for a long time. I don’t think farmers abandoned their horses for expensive tractors when they first rolled off the assembly line; when home computers first became the rage very few homes actually had them; and, it took a long time for the masses to adopt ATMs as a new way of doing business with banks.

The licensing issue will be addressed. The solutions will take time, input and a commitment from stakeholders to work towards a long-term fix that is a win for all involved. Until then, take advantage of the vast pools of quality independent content that can be used without cause for concern about licensing.  If we don’t take care of them, they’ll dry up.

I just went through my notebook and stumbled on some scribblings I did a few months ago — scribblings that I sometimes read and reflect on. This one resonated strongly with me today and I offer here as the thought of the day.

At the time of writing the note, our two daughters were engaged in an elaborate dance performance for Andrea and me in their bedroom. After being repeatedly chastized and “corrected” by her older sister for her freestyle approach, our youngest daughter announced:

It’s not all about knowing what the dance is; it’s about dancing and having fun.

Today, dance and have fun — forget about the choreography.

Suppose you were building an empire of great online communications technologies. You’d probably have your eyes on Feedburner, right? Do you have Google’s money? Google does, and according to reports it has taken your $100-million idea.

It’s an obvious fit and you can read a good analysis of the deal on Paul Colligan’s blog.

The print edition of Canadian Living magazine’s June issue includes a brief write-up about the Just One More Book! children’s book podcast.