6 billion different 'casts...

The impact of blogs and podcasting on the "formal" media domain is an interesting debate that will be running for a while, and I'm fascinated to see who wins, or if an equilibrium is found (check this out for one case where a balance was found). The whole debate even made it onto 5-Live the other day, and I found myself less than convinced that more formal media broadcasters will be able to survive without adapting to a far more dynamic stream of info, or more effectively "chunking" what they produce with...wait for it...appropriate metadata surrounding that. You see, what I want if my own "smart" channel to really leverage the podcasting effect. Like I can with my RSS reader (and Sky+, an equally interesting model), I want my podcasting/radio/media stream to filter the noise so I can create a single channel, truly personalised for myself which is also timely in its presentation of info to me. I'd want news (world/local) which is of interest to me, to hear the latest tunes from bands that I like rather than that top 40's mush, with articles on movies and games and gadgets and IT and software dev and hifi and science and travel and sci-fiction/fantasy, etc (sorry - blokeness showing there), interviews with people who I find interesting, etc. I could "dip" into this channel (prioritises itself on my previous listening) or leave it playing so it can create, on the fly, the ultimate broadcast. And to do this, we need effective personilisation, and effective (controlled? folksonomy?) metadata surrounding the broadcast chunks. Maybe we're there already, and I'm not looking close enough, but I have a feeling it will be a bit of a wait before we have 6 billion different broadcasts out there, each one unique to the consumer...