In his recent post about my blog, Christian Long commented that he’d like to know how I podcast every blog entry: “Want to figure out how he manages to podcast every single blog entry.  Robots or his own time/energy?  Either way, I’m intrigued…and envious, too!” (think:lab, 1 Sept 2006)

Since you asked, I’ll reveal how I do it! Last spring, I discovered a tool called Talkr, which takes the RSS feed from your blog and uses  some very good text-to-speech technology to create audio files. It didn’t take me long to set up a free account and submit my RSS feed. Then I added a small bit of code to my blog template to create the “Listen to this Podcast” button you see at the top of each post which links to the corresponding audio file. Next, I submitted my podcast feed to the iTunes podcast directory, and created a page http://www.ikiw.org/podcast that gives readers information on how to subscribe to the podcast using iTunes or other podcast aggregators.

Besides being a natural complement to the blog, it also makes my blog more accessible for people who have to rely on audio either due to visual impairment or very demanding schedules. I hope you like it!