Quick PM Learning Via Cell Phone

Situation: No bandwidth for brown bags. Need a simple way to sharpen the saw.

Podcasts are all about time shifting.  They are typically bite-size snippets of learning or entertainment that you can listen to whenever you like.  They are nice because you can listen while you work on your PC, which works really well if you can multitask on that level.  iPODs and other MP3 players give podcasts portability, but not everyone carrys an iPOD wherever they go.

We ALL carry our cell phones everywhere and now there are new services that let you dial a number and listen to podcasts over the phone you have now, with no additional software, and at no charge.

Let's say you want to listen to podcasts put out by our friends at the PMI IS SIG, perhaps the one on Mastering IT Requirements.  Just take 2 minutes to sign up on Fonpods and add the podcast you want to your subscriptions.  Then dial up one of their access numbers               (712)432-3030        or               (712)432-3031        and drink in the knowledge.  If you need to take a break from all of that learning, I'd recommend the Onion Radio News feed.

A similar service is Podlinez, where the process is a little different.  Instead of a single access number and episode codes, you have a different phone number for each podcast.  One advantage of Podlinez is that you can easily add podcasts that do not exist in their catalogue - provided there is an RSS feed available.

The interfaces for each of these sites suffer from the same strip mall approach that most podcast portals currently follow.  They just add a feature that is not commonly available from podcast providers themselves.  Hopefully one day every podcast provider will offer this functionality directly and streamline the process, but for now these sites make it more convenient to tune in.  Just what you needed - one more reason to spend time on the cell!

Note: The Web 2.0 guys would refer to this as software above the level of a single device.