The other day Frederic over at The Last Podcast had a post where he was talking about why he thought someone like Oprah could potentially provide a turning point for podcasting to go mainstream. I was thinking about that today when I was reading Leo Laporte’s post on his future adventures now that The Lab has been closed.

If it is the case that podcasting can turn that popularity corner because of the influence of someone like Oprah I wonder if Leo’s plans for live streaming could do the same for video. Sure there has been things like iJustine with the requisite amount of sex appeal but that still didn’t do anything really really for videocasting other than being a news bite for mainstream media outlets.

Some folks might want to point out the efforts of people like Robert Scoble and his new endeavors involving video. The problem is that Robert tends to be more of a positive and negative focal point around what he is doing. It is no fault of Robert’s that this happens but rather a byproduct of his enthusiasm and how the tech world reacts to his enthusiasm.

Chris Pirillo is another early adopter of live videocasting but again I think he suffers from the same thing as Robert - he is both a positive and negative focal point around any technology he is using at the moment to further his brand. There is nothing wrong with this but it can hold back on folks looking to partake in this new information flow.

With Leo however there is almost a commonality with the average internet user that makes him more accessible. It is this accessibility that I think will have the potential to step past the current personality barriers that keep videocasting from really taking off.

Leo acknowledges in his post that podcasting is the more popular medium of the two but he still feels that live videostreaming can be something to capture peoples attention

Our minor experiments in doing video versions of TWiT have convinced me that audio is the more popular medium. TWiT audio gets many times more downloads than video. That makes sense to me, since people have more time to listen to audio than they do to sit down and watch video. But there’s something about video that captures people’s attention. I’ll go one step further, there’s something about live video that’s very compelling for both viewers and hosts. I’ve missed live TV ever since TechTV went under four years ago, and I’ve been looking for some way to get that excitement back

He goes on to add that this isn’t a vehicle to reproduce typical TV models and slap a web terminology around it

I’m not interested in duplicating existing television models - I want to deconstruct TV and get to something more direct, more intimate, and much more two-way.

I hope he does pull this off and as a person who very rarely watches tech video - live or otherwise - I think for this I’ll be tuning in.

Best of luck Leo and I have my fingers crossed for you.

Conversation Tags: podcasting, video, videocasting