The Greater Serves for the Lesser?

Yet another thing about online audio and video. Okay, I'm game. After perusing the audio archives of a couple of progressive libraries, I noticed more than anything that the files were, for the most part, formatted with the MP3 codec. For the uninitiated, "codec" is short for "compression-decompression", in other words the method used to cram the sound into a tiny chip and later release it back into the world.

Apple uses AAC format for its Ipods. MP3 is the industry standard for music and is compatible with most players, thus the term "MP3 player". There are dozens of codecs, most propriatary in nature. So, "podcast" should not apply to MP3 files, which are incompatible with an IPod. MP3 files must be converted to AAC to play on the fashionable player, losing information (read: sound quality) in the process.

None of this really matters much for online audio productions. Most are voice only, and would be better served by different codecs anyway, ones more suitable to the spoken word. These are probably incompatible with any digital music player but would sound great on your cell phone. Okay, enough pedantry today.

What about the content? That is beyond the scope of this post, but I'll give it the Old College Try. A given organization will have to judge for itself what should be shared with the public. A story, just as audio or even as streaming video, read aloud and posted on the library's website would be cool. A catalog of library events that can be downloaded and played on a portable player might be useful for the blind or busy (or both).