Excellent tips and resources - and I totally agree - there are definitely some podcasts that run an hour or longer that I am a devoted listener of, including "This Week in Travel", so it really is more about the content than the length.....the more valuable and interesting the content is, then longer the podcast can be and still attract and keep listeners.

And I love the idea of including time-stamps to help people, and also adding chapter markers to help people keep their place if they have to listen to a longer podcast in short segments - I know GarageBand (for Mac) will do this, and I'm sure there is Windows software that will do this too.

There are some very compelling podcasts that only run 60 seconds an episode. Meanwhile, shows like This Week in Travel run almost an hour.

Format and length will shape the audience you draw... is it a podcast they will play on a quick break at the office, while walking the dog, driving to work, working out at the gym? Or is it more of an advertisement... should it follow standard advertising times... how long do you need to get your message across?

That said, 5-10 minutes is a safe length to test the waters

I recommend including detailed show notes on your blog that include the time stamp for each topic... that way the people who "skip" know when to stop and listen... and it makes your content searchable.

You might find Donna Popacosta's Trafcom News Podcast a helpful resource in the basics of podcasting.

If you're looking for music, check out a company called Loopsound -- they're out of the UK. They have many categories to choose from. Songs are 15 seconds, 30 seconds, or 1 minute. They have some great selections. Check them out @ Loopsound.

If that's not the case, for example if you're interviewing someone over the phone or over Skype, then you need another piece of software to capture the audio first, after which you can import it into Audacity and edit it - as Rebecca says to remove static or background hum or hiss, trim bits out or off either end, and add in some music for the intro/exit.

For recording audio there are a number of options - and as many opinions on what is best. Do some Google searching on "free audio recording software" to turn up a long list of options, and take a few of the higher-recommended ones for a test drive. Some of the free programs certainly do a fine job (after all, for audio editing Audacity is a really great application and it's free)....but if you're really serious about producing quality audio podcasts, at some point you may want to spend a bit of money on recording and editing applications.

Personally I use AudioHijack Pro (Mac only software) for recording, then Audacity for editing.

Last piece of advice: You cannot use just any music for your podcast - unless you purchase royalty-free music specifically licensed for podcast use, then it's likely copyright protected and you could get into trouble by using it - lots of folks have found this out the hard way, so be sure to search for royalty-free music and read the license rights carefully.

Audacity is free...download it at Audacity. Basically, you use Audacity to record an audio (podcasts) that you'd like to upload onto your blog/website. It's NOT used for interviewing. Although, Audacity does have importing capabilities. You could always IMPORT your interview and clean it up, i.e., take out noise, static, trim the audio, etc...

I only used it once and was satisfied. I'm still learning about it myself. If I discover anything new, I'll let you know. Hope this answered all of your questions <img src="http://www.travel-writers-exchange.com/Forum/my-plugins/bb-smilies/default/icon_smile.gif" title=":)" class="bb_smilies" />

I know I have a ton of questions, but I want to make sure I understand the program.

Audacity lets you record from your computer input source, and to edit the resulting file, and does a really great job. It has quite a lot of nice features, and as Rebecca mentions, it's free. So if you're doing your entire podcast from your microphone (where you do all the talking or if you're interviewing someone who is right there with you), then it's all you need. It will even export your file as an MP3, the preferred format for podcasts.

However, if you're creating a podcast -- say for example an interview -- that you're conducting by telephone, then you'll need something else to record the "other side" of the conversation - the person on the other end of the phone. Another free and simple solution here is to use Skype for the conversation, and then record it using a different application like the free Skype Recorder (or search for other free tools to record skype calls with). I use AudioHijack Pro, which is not free but which works really well for me on my Mac. Once you have your conversation recorded, you can use Audacity to edit the recording as needed.

Generally speaking I use Audacity to trim out any long silences, remove extra "ahs" and "umms", normalize the volume, remove any background hiss, or to splice parts together if I've flubbed up and re-recorded bits more than once. After that I'll add in some music intro and exit. You can have a music track all the way through if you like, BUT if you're adding music it's CRITICAL to be sure you don't use copyrighted music - search for royalty-free music at places like iStockPhoto.com (yes they do music too) - it may not be free, but it will be free from copyrights which will keep you out of hot water.

Good luck!