By Alex Mandossian

In the emerging world of podcasting, several companies have already established dominance for themselves, and Microsoft isn′t one of them.

Apple is leading the media player market with their line of iPods.  They also own iTunes, the leading podcatching software found on our computer desktops and inside of iPods.

Yahoo! appears to be taking dominance in the online podcasting market with their beta version of Podcasts.Yahoo.com. 

Where does Microsoft fit in?  So far, it doesn′t fit in anywhere.  And if they try to compete with a similar product to one that is already out there, they′re going to lose.

While some say that it is too late for Microsoft to join the podcasting game, I believe that there are three areas where Microsoft can still dominate the podcasting world.

By Alex Mandossian

What Microsoft has is a very strong online presence. They have the Internet browser – Internet Explorer – as part of their Windows operating system.  While many argue that it isn′t the best browser available, the fact is most of the people on the planet use it.

Podcasting got its name because people began downloading songs from the Internet onto their iPod to listen to.  But actually it is much more than that.  

Now people download talk programs and information products to their media players as well. And we now have a better selection of media players to choose from even though the iPod is still the market′s favorite.  Users can also listen to these broadcasts while online. 

What we have today could be better defined as webcasting than podcasting.  If Microsoft could somehow reframe this whole podcasting thing and call it webcasting, they could offer another direction.

Even though it′s the same thing, just by reframing the whole concept they could cause enough confusion in the marketplace to gain an advantage. 

I hope one day Microsoft will have a search engine for webcasters, people who are looking for podcasts online while looking at their computers.

Right now Microsoft has a huge advantage because of the MSN search engine.  While Google is the most popular search engine today, it′s no secret that all the statistics and case studies have shown that it is a male-oriented search engine.  

But MSN Search is a female dominated search engine according to the case studies that I read and according to my own experience.  Women love MSN search. They adore the densely populated words that are there.  They read everything. They stay on the search results and read for a long, long time.  

Could Microsoft offer something to the podcasting marketplace that nobody else is doing, something that would establish dominance in a certain area the way Apple has dominated the media player market with the iPod?

Perhaps.  Microsoft has many strengths and the world of podcasting is still evolving.

By Alex Mandossian

Microsoft isn′t into hardware; they have always focused on software. I don′t believe they are going to try to join the podcasting game by developing another media player.

Besides, the iPod Nano, iPod Shuffle, and iPod Video are already dominating the market, not to mention many other really nice media players that are available.

What about another podcatching software product? Again, we already have great podcatching software.

For our computer desktop, Apple′s iTunes is sexy, gorgeous, and the number one podcatching product on Windows. If Microsoft tries to compete with iTunes, they’re going to lose pathetically.

ITunes owns the iPods. And iPods own the portable media player market since 80% of media players sold are iPods.

For online podcasting, Yahoo! owns that part with www.Podcasts.Yahoo.com. They′ve got the web interface that not only allows for subscriptions to the iPods – they know where the market share is – but also allows subscription through their own music engine. This allows you to put your podcasts on your Zen Micros, your Gmini Archos, and all the other different devices available on the market.

Apple owns the desktop software of choice and Yahoo! owns the web software of choice. I don′t think Microsoft can do anything in any of these arenas if they try to be just another option.

The only thing worse than having the bus go in the wrong direction is having the bus go the wrong direction enthusiastically. I think that′s what Microsoft is afraid of, whether they do it intentionally or not.

Could they create a podcast directory that is the godmother of all directories? There are some challenges with iTunes′ and Yahoo!′s podcast directories. However, iTunes has tens of thousands of podcasts in their directory and it would be hard to come up with something much better.

My opinion is that Microsoft needs to look at their strengths and develop something that is needed in the podcasting market that no one else is delivering or doing.

By Alex Mandossian

It isn’t about people listening to Internet radio in front of their computers; it is about people grabbing an entire wealth of knowledge from the internet and putting it on a portable player to take with them wherever they go.

People spend hundreds of dollars on their players and the information they put on it, whether it is songs, podcasts or information products.  Podcasting is about people bettering themselves by turning their dead time into entertainment time and learning time.

So what can Microsoft do with podcasting?  Is it already too late for them to play in the podcasting game? Who knows?         

The fact is, they have to make a decision now if they want to play in the game at all. The only bad decision right now is no decision at all.  That would be a train wreck about to happen.

By Alex Mandossian

Microsoft has always been a lagging indicator in the direction that Internet marketing and the technology realm are heading. They tend to watch what′s happening and join in after something has been already been established, after someone else has made the mistakes.

It′s an interesting strategy. But when it comes to podcasting, there are those who believe that Microsoft is just too late to join the game. A few critics have said that there is absolutely nothing that Microsoft can do to become relevant in the podcasting arena.

Recently, Microsoft executives have talked about podcasting being part of upcoming software releases. We′ve heard that Longhorn, the next generation Windows operating system, is going to have RSS and other features integrated into it. But they′ve really done nothing at this point.

They recently had a big RSS integration demo with Longhorn in front of a large audience. During the presentation, it crashed. This doesn′t look good for Microsoft.

Now I hear that RSS is going to be integrated into Internet Explorer and we’ll be able to subscribe to a podcast right from our webpage.

Well, we already have software that works with the existing operating systems and are absolutely satisfied with the current mentality.  Who′s going to want to buy a $300 operating system to do something you can already do? Integration into the OS is becoming less and less important.

They′ve recently launched Windows Live and Office Live, both of which have RSS integration, but neither has anything to do at all with podcasting. So far, all we′ve seen is Microsoft giving lip service to podcasting.