Why newspapers could profit from new podcast search

Yesterday, Yahoo launched its podcasts search. The search is "intended to enable people to easily search podcasts through keywords, categories or user-generated topic tags. The beta site also highlights podcasts of note, those that are particularly popular and user recommendations and ratings", reports News.com. Eventually, Yahoo will even offer tools to produce own podcasts later on. Yahoo is not the first to offer such a service. Sites like Odeo.com and Podcast.net already offer podcast searches.

The Wall Street Journal described the podcast phenomenon: "Bruised by earlier failures to embrace new technologies, big media companies are rushing into the two-year-old field of podcasting - audio programs for downloading onto computers or portable music players. The high-stakes goal: grab young listeners, even at the risk of cannibalizing existing audiences or wasting time and money on a technology that may never go mainstream."

Some newspapers have picked up the podcast fad and more could follow (see also this article). Newspapers that have started to offer podcasts could profit from the launch of the Yahoo search. As the Yahoo search is likely to reach many people, newspapers that integrate podcasts in their news could reach new audiences, especially younger ones, through Yahoo.

Source: Wall Street Journal, Pressetext (in German), News.com