The Hesperia Star blog, although it's first to market, so to speak, is actually the second Web 2.0 idea we had for trying something new with the newspaper. The first was to do a Hesperia Star podcast, and we've been doing dry runs of a podcast since December.
We don't yet have the feed set up (but should soon), but you can download the latest here.
For those unfamiliar with the term, a podcast is an audio file (normally in MP3 format) that is downloaded over the Internet, typically automatically by specialized software. (That's what that feed will be for, once it's set up.) Don't be fooled by the "pod" in the name -- although the term refers to Apple's iPod MP3 players, pretty much any computer or portable MP3 player can play the files just fine.
The content available via podcast ranges from professional radio content (NPR and Clearchannel are two early pioneers in this area) to lots and lots of amateur productions. We'll let you decide where the Hesperia Star podcast falls on that continuum.
Our podcast is relatively casual, and normally consists of Peter and myself reviewing the week's newspaper, looking at what stories and photos we published and sharing our thoughts about why those stories, what went into putting them together and so on.
We hope you find the podcast informative and fun. We're still learning, so your feedback is greatly appreciated.
