There was a bit of a kerfuffle recently (a kerfuffle is a little smaller than a brouhaha) over whether v-logging or video blogging is worth it or not. I wrote about it here after Alec Saunders brought it up, and everyone from Jeff Pulver to Robert Scoble has weighed in on it over the past week or so. Lots of discussion about whether video is the right way to get certain things across, is it too much bother, etc.
Now we have noted VC blogger Fred Wilson of Union Square Ventures announcing that he has given up podcasting. Why? Fred says that basically it was too much trouble to put together a show, with all the equipment and getting guests and editing it down, and so on. He also says something similar to what I think Alec and I and others were saying about vlogs, which is that a big audio file is not necessarily the best way to get information across. My friend Stowe Boyd concurs.
That’s not to say it isn’t worth doing for other reasons — a podcast like This Week in Tech with Leo Laporte is fun to listen to for the entertainment value, especially when someone completely deranged like John C. Dvorak is on. But to me it’s more like a talk show than something you do because it has a huge amount of value to it. So it’s fun to listen to on the train or while you’re running, but it’s not something I would consider a must have.
I know my friend Mark Evans has been doing a podcast with his former colleague from the National Post, Kevin Restivo, and I know that podcasting consultant Leesa Barnes is probably going to call me crazy, but most of the time I just don’t see the point of some of the podcasts that are out there. Of course, I should probably add that I don’t see the point of many of the blogs that are out there either 🙂