Okay, this isn’t exactly scientific. It’s based on a sample of precisely… 1. Me. But I can’t believe I’m alone. (Okay, my Morrissey A-Level studies tell me that we are all alone and shall be for ever, but you know what I mean).
I’m not stupid. I can write simple Python code, I can assemble (most) Ikea furniture and I can even put music on my phone using iTunes. But I cannot FOR THE LIFE OF ME work out how to use Apple’s Podcast app.
I seem to be able to subscribe to an entire series – which I don’t always want to do – but do you know what? There isn’t enough room on my phone for the entire Wittertainment back catalogue. There isn’t even room to update iOS after a few apps and a few hundred songs.
All I want to do it drag THIS one single podcast onto THAT phone. And I can’t figure out how to do it.
The result is: I stream podcasts. I click on the ‘download’ link and Safari happily plays along. It’s a bit hard to navigate a 2 hour podcast (hello Jason Isaacs) on a tiny screen, so sometimes I have to reload it (helping the download stats, possibly).
Other podcasts offer the opportunity to stream in a lovely embedded player. I listened to the whole of Serial this way. And I suspect a lot of podcast listening is done this way – in web browsers (possibly in the background).
I’d like to hear your experiences. Do you load up your generic MP3 player and jog into the sunset – or for most podcasts, are you streaming and needing a 3G or wifi connection?
On iOS 7 can you delete the podcasts app and sync podcasts to the music app like in olden days? From memory that works much better. Since moving to iOS 8 I’ve used the podcast app with varying degrees of success. It doesn’t sync well across devices, so my laptop doesn’t know what I’ve listened to on my phone, but I have got it downloading mostly just the episodes I want from the podcasts I’ve subscribed to.