After ABC, NBC Jumps Onto Podcasting Wagon

In what’s far too reminiscent of a round of Spy vs. Spy, ABCNews.com and NBC News/MSNBC.com both announced podcasting initiatives today. The biggest difference: The ABCNews podcasts officially launched today, all five of them, while the NBC News/MSNBC effort is scheduled for a June launch. I wrote a little about the ABC News efforts earlier this week, when the only podcast appeared to be “The AfterNote,” a sort of “Hollywood Minute” for politics. ABC News.com will offer RSS-accessible clips from “Good Morning America” and “Nightline”, and entertainment including “The Daily Dish”, “The Bill Diehl Movie Review” and “Talkin’ Racing”, a NASCAR/INDY interview show. In addition, next week the site will post four hour-long podcast specials: “Real Life Desperate Housewives with ABC’s John Stossel,” “Behind the Wheel: The ABC News Radio/Court TV Safety Challenge,” “Star Wars: Revenge of the Sith — The End of an Era,” and “The ABC News Radio/Consumer Reports Summer Guide 2005.”
NBC News is tacking in another direction to start by offering hourly podcast updates with news and business headlines, political bits from “The White House Beat,” and tech and science news from “Techwatch.” It also will include segments from MSNBC shows and podcast exclusives.
NBC News has been testing the technology with segments from “Today” and “NBC Nightly News.” More content across the NBC Universal properties is on slate in coming months. I have to think NBC News would have preferred to wait until launch — and might have even preferred to postpone a pod-launch — but didn’t want to let ABCNews.com bask in the trend spotlight.
Related: ABC News Dips Little Toe Into Podcasting Waters

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