Getting started with podcasting

The Educational Meda Services team within University of IT Services can help you create an audio or video podcast and deliver it to the public. To do this we provide the MediaPub publishing portal where you combine your media files, descriptions and artwork to create a podcast series. Podcasts are then made available on Apple Podcasts (formerly iTunes U) and our own University of Oxford Podcasts website (podcasts.ox.ac.uk)

For information on making your podcast meet new September 2020 accessibility regulations, and to understand the accessibility features of the University of Oxford Podcasts website please visit our Podcasting and Accessibility page.

If you are a member of staff at University of Oxford and wish to discuss how you can contribute a podcast from your department, college, or faculty please contact podcasts@it.ox.ac.uk

Creating your own podcast is a straightforward process but does rely on you having the right equipment and software available first. The workflow you need to follow is outlined below.

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For anyone involved in podcasting at Oxford, we recommend these beginner courses run by IT Services:

  • 'Podcasting: An introduction' - technical advice on podcast recording and hosting
  • 'Audio: Recording the spoken word' - technical advice focused on recording voice
  • 'Digital Media: 5 ways to get started with podcasting' - how educational podcasts fit into the new media landscape

Check availability and book via the COSY Training search.

You can also download the free Steeple Podcasting Booklet PDF which offers more detailed information and guidance.

Additionally, it is worth reading our Podcasting FAQ help section, which provides a good description of what podcasting involves and how podcasts function on the Internet. It also describes case studies of podcasts published on University of Oxford Podcasts and provides good podcasting links in case you wish to find more information.

Any podcast made available through the Apple Podcasts portal for the University of Oxford has to have a signed speaker release form and will also be vetted to make sure it adheres to our legal obligations concerning copyrighted material, etc.

The following guidance document contains the contribution form that you will be required to sign if you wish to publish your material on the University of Oxford Podcasts site or on Apple Podcasts: University of Oxford Podcasts Speaker Release Form and guidance

Read more about copyright and permissions in the Steeple Podcasting Guide PDF

Podcast media are not special files. Any traditional MP3 audio file or MP4 video file (two of the most common multimedia formats) can be used as a podcast. You may create your own recording, or request that Educational Media Services professionally record it for you.

If creating your own podcast, you need to record your lecture, presentation, or other content and save it to a computer. For information about equipment and software for creating your own recording, please visit our page Podcasting - Recording Recommendations.

You may find the podcasting video tutorials on the Steeple project site helpful. Topics include: 

  • Introduction to Audacity for sound editing
  • Introduction to Apple Podcasts (formerly iTunes U)
  • Introduction to Photoshop for Album Covers
  • How to do screen capture
  • Editing Video
  • Top Tips for Podcasting

If you prefer to have professionally produced audio-video content, Educational Media Services can professionally record it for you, see how to request Educational Media Services to produce your podcast.

The 2020 Web Content Accessibility Guidelines 2.1 make it a legal requirement for universities and other public sector bodies to make their web content accessible to as diverse a range of users as possible. For podcasts this means the University is required to provide Closed Captions to assist with the comprehension of video content, and transcriptions of audio content. These come in the form of additional text files to be published alongside your podcast episode(s). 

University staff and students have access to two free systems which can help with generating these files, Panopto Lecture Capture and Microsoft Word Online. Other paid services are available. 

Visit the 'Podcasting and Accessibility' support page for help with generating accessibility files.

Before a podcast can be watched or listened to, it must be hosted on a web server and be reachable via a publically-accessible URL.

You may either host your own multimedia files, or preferably you can request that Educational Media Services at Oxford host the file for you. This is as easy as sending us the multimedia file that you wish to have hosted.

More information about placing the content online is available in the MediaPub Publishing Guide.

Once your multimedia content has been produced and is hosted on a web server, you must catalogue the file within our MediaPub publishing portal. If you are member of the University, you may request access to MediaPub and log-in by using your Oxford single sign-on.  

MediaPub allows you to catalogue your media. Doing so will create RSS newsfeeds for the University media portals. In this manner your podcast is published to the University of Oxford Podcasts site and also Apple Podcasts (formerly iTunes U).

Many colleges, departments and faculties already have multiple newsfeeds available. A podcast RSS feed is a normal RSS feed with one key exception; it includes the web address of a multimedia file and some basic information about this podcast.

More information about MediaPub and how to use it with podcasts can be found on the:

  1. MediaPub Publishing Guide, also available within the MediaPub site internal help pages  
  2. MediaPub Writing and Discoverability Tips

We believe that one good way of promoting the talks within your series, and ensuring your podcast reaches the widest possible audience, is to follow our MediaPub Writing and Discoverability guide when publishing your podcast. This is a set of recommendations about cataloguing your podcasts with effective language and with descriptive titles, keywords, and descriptions that cater to a global audience. That is, the podcast must still be marketed to maximise user exposure and ensure that Internet users interested in your subject can discover your podcasts within Apple Podcasts and on the University of Oxford Podcasts website.

The number of downloads and streams your podcast generates within Apple Podcasts is one way of measuring its global impact. We provide quarterly statistics regarding engagement on the University Podcasts site and Apple Podcasts for each of the series you have published, which should help you gauge this impact. Please email Educational Media for details.

Get support


For help with podcasting and publishing contact Educational Media Services

EMAIL EDUCATIONAL MEDIA

Local IT support provide your first line of on-the-spot help

FIND MY LOCAL IT TEAM

 

Contact us


Educational Media Services

13 Banbury Rd, Oxford, OX2 6NN

Tel: (+44) 01865 289983

Email: media@it.ox.ac.uk