Podcasting has been around as early as 2003 so I expected that there would be lots of pinoy podcasters in cyberspace. But after doing an online search I found out that there are only four pinoycasters. I used the following keywords in my search:
- pinoy/pinay podcast/podcaster
- Filipino/Filipina podcast/podcaster
- Philippine podcast/podcaster
Yagoohoogle, Profusion, Technorati, PodcastAlley, Podcast.Net, Ipodder.org gave me the following results:
- Pinoy PodCast (claims to be the first podcaster from the Philippines. First podcast was issued on 26 February 2005)
- Topdogs in Manila
- Rex Navarrete (based in the U.S.)
- and my own Cuying
I was really surprised to find so few. But then I thought that maybe I did not dig deep enough. Or maybe it’s because I limited myself to the search results displayed on the first page. Or it could be that there are other pinoycasters out there that have not registered their rss feeds with any podcast directory. Or that they just did not call their podcasts pinoy or pinay or Filipino/a. So I am hoping my hunt was wrongly done. And if you know that my findings are incorrect, please let me know.
But granting my search results are correct – how come there are only four? The prime reason I can think of right now is lack of resources. Blogging is popular among pinoys simply because all you need is a computer connected to the internet (plus, of course, creativity, patience when using dial-up, stories to tell, and readers to sustain your enthusiasm). But with podcasting you need other accessories like a microphone, speakers, ample storage device for huge mp3s, and a conducive place to record your audio. Blogging can be done in any internet café, but it’s a disaster if you record your voicecasts there (unless, of course, your background audio includes public noise). It’s either you disturb other internet users or you are disturbed by them.
There might be other reasons why not many pinoys have embraced podcasting yet. It could be lack of sufficient free time or technical knowledge to record and edit audio. And I hope that this lacuna is but temporary. I am looking forward to the day when multiple pinoy voices are heard throughout the world, podcasting about meaningful topics to foster peace, intellectual and aesthetic growth, and promote mutual understanding among peoples on a global scale.
