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If you have been reading this blog you will know that I have been slowly getting more and more incensed by the lack of support for some kind of simple “played” flag for podcasts. In my mind the most significant criterion for deciding which podcasts to listen to (or load onto a player) is whether I have already listened to it or not. It seems common sense. Other kinds of applications support this basic concept - I can’t think of an email program that doesn’t make the distinction between read and unread mail of primary importance.

So, spurred on by the video I mentioned in my previous post, I took a look at two free MP3 tag editors: Media Monkey and MP3 Tag Tools.

Media Monkey came recommended. When I started it up it was very reminsicent of iTunes in look and feel. Unlike some other MP3 tag managers it also includes a player and some sort of synchronization facility for transferring files to a portable player. Initial impressions were good, it allowed me to correct things like dodgy Genre tags both individually and in bulk, and has a pretty flexible browsing system so it’s easy to find tracks of interest. Looking across the information about each track I even found a “played” column! “Cool", I thought to myself. “I’ll just go and mark all the ones I’ve already listened to as played…”

Umm. No. I can’t understand the logic. Just about all the other fields are directly editable, but the “played” field is read-only. And it gets worse. Although Media Monkey will set the “played” counter if I play a track using its built-in player, it never stores that information in the file itself. The software even has a table in the help to explain:

Note the “Times Played” tag, and the way it claims that it can not be stored as a tag in any of the formats. Now take a look at the “frames” defined in the ID3 V2 standard, in particular about 2/3 of the way down the page, where it states:

Play counter
With this frame you can count how many times a file has been played.

I’ll probably keep Media Monkey around for manipulation of other tags, but I won’t be using its “played” tracking. I also won’t be using its player. The player component has the immensely irritating habit of disappearing from the screen whenever the track list window loses focus, which means that my most common way of working (set up a podcast or playlist, then minimise all but the progress indicator and control buttons) is simply impossible. I tried it, and when the phone rang It took me about 10 seconds to find the pause button.

A very pretty, professional-looking application, which misses the point a bit.

Mp3 Tag Tools, on the other hand, has the look of a more bare-bones tool. No multiple, “skinned” look and feel, no pretensions to be iTunes. So far so good. Unfortunately its tag support is also bare-bones, though:

Of the nearly 80 “standard” ID3v2 tags, and the ever-present option for creating custom tags, MP3 Tag Tools supports just 7. And none of them is the play count.

Of the two applications, Media Monkey is the most capable, but it lacks flexibility where it counts for me. And I find all that strangely-implemented “integrated solution” stuff to be a bit overpowering. So I’m still looking.

If anyone reading this knows of an application that can set and reset the ID3v2 PCNT tag on one or more files, please let me know.

The more I look around, the more important proper use of ID3 tags in podcasts appears. It seems that others agree. I found a 41MB movie demonstrating good use of some ID3 tags. It’s a good run through (despite a few very minor techincal misunderstandings), although doing it as video seems a bit wasteful when one of the flash screen-capture programs would probably have resulted in a much smaller file.

Download the movie from the internet archive at Program Details for The Importance of ID3 Tags in Podcasting

Doug Kaye tells it like it is:

A few minutes ago I was sitting here in the studio, taking a break, and listening to “Wait Wait . . . Don’t Tell Me” on NPR. I had the FM tuner playing through the studio monitors when the phone rang. My immediate reaction was to look for the Pause button. TiVo and podcasting: I’m converted.

Here’s a strange on-line thing. A web interface to a reverb chamber. Simply record and upload an MP3, OGG or FLAC (anything up to 60 seconds), and it will process it to add reverb and offer you a download. Cool, if you like that sort of thing …

Tank-FX - a natural reverb effect

Over the last week or so, I’ve been listening to a few audio book podcasts to see how well they work. I’ll try and review them as I go along, so here’s the first.

Independent author Steve Whan has written several books in his “Autumn Jade” adventure series. The books are aimed at children (the protagonist is a 12-year-old Canadian/Chinese girl). Steve has made two chapters of his first book in the series “Bullets on the Bund” available as podcasts I assume it’s Steve reading, as there don’t seem to be any other names associated with the MP3 file.

The story is certainly interesting enough that I’m looking forward to the next chapter. I find the reading voice a little strange, though. I guess the Canadian accent is “aboot” right, but I do find the way that a first-person story from a young girl is spoken by a deep-voiced male takes a bit of getting used to. A related problem is the way that two of the main characters “Autumn” and “Adam” have names that no doubt look quite different in print, but sound a little too similar when spoken.

Some of the conventions from written speech can also sound a little contrived when read aloud, and I did find that some of the scene-setting exchanges in the first chapter came over as a little stilted and unrealistic. It could be that that’s the way kids in BC speak, though. The second chapter seems to have more feeling to it, so it looks like Steve is getting into his recording “stride". If I have a particular suggestion it would be to try and vary the voice a bit more to add some more pace, feeling and tension to the dialog. Maybe listen to a few professional audio books for tips.

In general I’m very impressed. It takes a lot of grit to write and publish your own books, and even more to open yourself up to the world by blogging and podcasting. I really hope it goes well.

Grab the chapters so far at Autumn Jade Publishing Podcasts, or read Steve’s blog with it’s insight into his life and the progress on his next book.