Jason Calacanis, CEO of the blogging network Weblogs, Inc., thinks that Podshow raising another $15 million in venture capital means that the podcast bubble is here:

Lest there be no question, we are now in a full-blown bubble. What on earth Podshow is going to do with almost $25M in funding is anyones guess, but its not going to end well I can tell you that. To raise this money they must have had a $35-60M pre-money valuation. That means the VCs are going to look for a $300-500M exit at the very least, and that means they need to get to $30-50M in revenue. Not sure I see that happening.

The entire concept is that this is niche media–you dont need a lot of money. Weblogs, Inc. raised low six figures from Mark Cuban and we never spent it–we made money.

Unless Podshow is looking to do a rollup which is what Ron and Adam were involved in during the last bubble this is gonna end badly. Id love to believe a podcasting business could grow to a billion dollars–but I just dont.

Podtrac today announced a GoDaddy.com podcast advertising campaign on French Maid TV, a video podcast described as “yet another excuse to take a few women, put them in lingerie, and have them bounce around.”

The custom-produced episode features French Maids in a four-minute video podcast showing how to register a domain name with GoDaddy.com.

“We pride ourselves on being at the leading edge of innovative technologies. We see podcasting as a new medium of high-quality, user-generated content that connects with our customers,” said Bob Parsons, CEO and founder of GoDaddy.com.

Parsons is also well known for pushing buttons with his Superbowl advertisements featuring women’s wardrobe malfunctions.

“French Maid TV is certainly GoDaddy-esque and helps us reach a targeted audience with our usual provocative and highly-entertaining style,” adds Parsons.

Audion Laboratories is demonstrating Podcast Station version 2.0 at the Podcast and Portable Media Expo 2006.

Version 2.0 features include:

• The ability to record Skype calls on the KishKish.com Skype Answering Machine, (SAM), and with a right click export the file directly into Podcast Station for playback, editing and mixing into podcasts. (SAM Gold or Platinum version only)
• Resizable window that increases the number of decks and cart buttons to a maximum of 30 decks and 70 carts.
• A “Pro” interface that adds an auto crossfade feature between decks. Audio on any two side-by-side decks can be programmed to automatically cross fade one to the other from 1 to 8 seconds.
• Dictation style transcription making it possible to start, pause and rewind an audio file to facilitate transcribing content to word files.
• Loop mode allows any deck or cart to be looped indefinitely.

At the second annual Podcast and Portable Media Expo, being held at the Ontario Convention Center (above) Sept 29-30, Ron Moore, head writer and show runner for Battlestar Galactica, and creator of Battlestar Galactica podcast, gave the second keynote speech.

Here are some highlights from his discussion:

Galactica’s podcast pilot project was initially referred to as a “stunt”, and he thought it would eventually go the way of WebTV. (Held up his Sony recorder they sent him to record the commentary, and he said he’d someday donate it to the National Museum of Podcasting, and something about the holy site of Adam Curry’s birthplace….).

Moore was very casual about recording the podcasts, at home, where he was having a tall glass of Scotch and smoking. He had no idea that people could tell that that was going on — dogs barking in the yard, garbage trucks rolling by outside, kids down the hall. Posters on forums complained about the sound quality and the swearing and drinking. Decided that “podcasting isn’t for whiners” – and mocked and ridiculed the detractors.

The second annual Podcast and Portable Media Expo, being held at the Ontario Convention Center (above) Sept 29-30, is getting underway with keynotes by podcaster and author Leo Laporte, host of TWiT.tv, and Ron Moore, Executive Producer of Battlestar Galactica.

Leo Laporte is kicking things off with a discussion of important issues facing podcasting as it wraps up its second (Laporte says maybe third) year….

Here are some highlights of his comments:

Laporte talked about the frightening prospect of being the guy up in front, the keynote guy opening a conference. “Keynote speeches are the way they set agenda for what’ll be important at the conference. Here we are, in the second year of the PME conference, and we have some big issues facing us.”

“The name (podcasting) – we’ve been talking about it a lot already. Apple is going after one of the sponsors of event, MyPodder. There’s some debate over what Apple’s trying to trademark — is it the word “Pod”?

“I’ve always had a little problem with the name podcasting, even though I know it is here to stay, and Apple cant take it away. People say ‘I love the stuff you do, but I don’t have an iPod.’… or ‘I don’t use iTunes so I can’t do those podcast things.'”

“Podcasting existed before Apple, and is not dependent on iPods and iTunes,” noted LaPorte. “It is not good for podcasts to be so closely associated with Apple and iPods. If Microsoft doesn’t put podcasts in Zune, in Vista, in IE7, though, we’re at a disadvantage…”

The Podcast and Portable Media Expo, being held Sept 29-30 in Ontario, CA opens today.

“We’ve been planning this event for nearly a year,” said event organizer Tim Bourquin. “It’s like a bobsled – you start pushing it downhill, and, after awhile, it picks up momentum and speeds on its own.”

Bourquin recently described highlights of the two-day event:

• Leo Laporte, of the TWiT.tv podcasting network; Ronald Moore, the television executive behind the Battlestar Galactica Podcast (and tv show); and Andrew Barron of Rocketboom will be delivering keynote addresses, which are free and open to the public.
• Breakout sessions are channeled into five general “tracks,” ranging from Podcasting 101 to business and corporate podcasting, to special-interest and hobby podcasting.
• Podcast recordings of all breakout sessions will be available after the Expo.
• Dozens of exhibitors will be showcasing their wares throughout the two-day event.
• People’s Choice and PME Awards ceremony Friday, September 29.

Podcasting News Publisher Elisabeth McLaury Lewin recently interviewed Bourquin about plans for the Expo.

We’ll be bringing you news throughout the next two days from the Expo.

PodCamp Boston , September 8 – 9, was a free ad-hoc gathering of people interested in podcasting at Bunker Hill Community College, just north of Boston in Charlestown. Guest Reporter John Wall caught up with some of PodCamp’s participants early on the second day of the workshop, and asked what their favorite sessions so far had been.

Mitch Joel said he really enjoyed the “gear session — really interesting to see how people put this stuff together.”

Bryan Person, who helped organize the PodCamp event, said “Mitch and CC (Chapman) gave a great talk on building your personal brand — that was excellent — and I went to a session by Lisa Barnes about planning your podcast. One thing that stood out was thinking beyond just your next podcast… That was a good ‘take-away’ for me.”

PodCamp is the brainchild of Christopher Penn of the Financial Aid Podcast, and Chris Brogan of Grasshopper Factory. Attending the open space-style BarCamp in Boston a few months ago, they were inspired to create a similar un-conference with a podcasting focus.

Mark Chally, creator of the PodPod acrylic portable device stand (above), is one of the companies and individuals that Apple has contacted regarding marketing products using the term “pod”.

Here’s his take on the “pod” trademark issue:

Apple claims there may be “confusion” between the iPod and PodPod marks. I consider this claim absurd. No one would confuse my web site or my hand-crafted product with any endeavor by Apple. Apple has also sold products bearing the syllable “pod” in their names–online and in their retail stores–both well before and well after approaching me in regard to the mark.

I doubt they approached any of the manufacturers of these and other products bearing “pod” in their marks, before approaching me. One might suspect that they were unable to obtain the “pod” mark because of the earlier application for the PodPod mark, as some have claimed the trademarks are essentially the same.

via Wired

PodShow, a startup podcasting network co-founded by former MTV VJ Adam Curry, reportedly is getting an additional $15 million venture capital investment.

According to Thomson Financial:

PodShow inc., which recently raised $15 million in Series B funding. This follows up on an $8.85 million Series A deal from last summer, from Kleiner Perkins, Sequoia Capital, Ram Shiram and Jerry Newman. All four are back this time around, but an undisclosed lead came aboard at a major pre-money valuation step-up. I know lots of firms that it isn’t – NEA, Oak, Spark, Greylock, etc. – but that is only useful if there was a narrower market of potential backers.

Rumors had been floating around the DEMO conference that this deal might get even larger, but Ray Lane of Kleiner Perkins assures me that $15 million is all for now. He also acknowledges that PodShow has become a bit of a VC bellwether for the podcasting market, as its original funding was soon followed by deals for companies like Odeo and Podtech.net. In other words, expect additional podcasting deals to come down the pike shortly. Be interesting to see when the first exits occur…

PodShow’s projects have been all over the map. The new round of investment, nearly double the previous round, suggests that investors are comfortable that some of PodShow’s various ventures will be successful.

Digg dudes Jay Adelson and Kevin Rose, along with David Prager (TechTV, G4), Dan Huard, and Ron Gorodetzky, dig doing downloadable video so much that they’ve created a new media company, Revision3, to do it.

According to the company, “Revision3 is the first media company that gets it, born from the Internet, on-demand generation. Unlike aggregators, mash-ups, clients and web sites, Revision3 is an actual TV network for the web, creating, producing its own original entertainment and content.”

Revision3 has grown out of garage video podcasting to the point that it is now getting over 1.5 million downloads per month.

According to VentureBeat, the startup has raised $1 million in financing, led by a $250,000 commitment from Greylock Partners, which also backed Digg. Other investors include Marc Andreessen, co-founder of Netscape, and Michael Tanne, of tag search engine Wink, Don Hutchison, of Goodmail/Excite@Home, Mike Maples, a podcasting expert, and Ron Conway.

Revision3 respectively suggests that it is time to “Kill Your Television.”