Manage Podcast
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A podcast RSS feed allows you to publish your podcast beyond Blackboard. It allows your students to "subscribe" to your podcast with a tool such as iTunes, i.e. to automatically receive new postings without checking Blackboard.
In the Manage Podcast area enter the feed title and a brief description of it.
Subject: Enter the feed title (Normally the course name).
Message: Enter a brief description of the types of Podcasts that will be available in this course.
Completing this information is optional.
You can assign a category and add an image as an album art (cover) to your podcast. It will be used by the iTunes program. This is an optional step.
Category: (Example: Mathematics)
Sub Category: (College Algebra)
Add Album Art: If you have a picture that will identify the course’s podcast feed, you can browse to it and it will be added to the podcast feed. optimal size for album art is 300 x 300 pixels.
Most importantly, determine whether to make your feed only accessible to the users of your course or to the public. Select Everyone in the Options section in the Manage Podcast area in order to enable Blackboard to create an RSS feed for your course podcast.
Visibility - In Course Only: (This option is selected by default.)
Using this option:
- Students will NOT be able to subscribe to the course podcasts.
- Students will only be able to Listen/View a podcast once they log into Blackboard and click on the posted link.
Visibility - Everyone:
Using this option:
- Students WILL be able to subscribe to the course podcasts.
- Students can also log into Blackboard and Listen/View a podcast.
- If the student subscribes to the podcast, the posted podcasts will be downloaded to the student podcast software without logging into Blackboard.
Available to the public means the student could share the link information (Feed URL) with other users.
Note:
- Your podcast cannot be located by a user searching the Internet (i.e. Google. Yahoo, etc.)
- Your podcast cannot be located on the iTunes server unless you or a student posts the podcast to that service. (Students posting your podcast can be accomplished even if you chose “In Course Only”, because the file can always be downloaded and then posted to the Internet.)