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Does anyone out there have a favorite Linux program for downloading podcasts? I've been using Chess Griffin's mashpodder but (a) it's now abandonware, and (b) due to the way it identifies files, it doesn't work with modern podcasts where the base name of the file is always "media.mp3" and the earlier parts of the URL change. As such, I'm looking for a replacement, preferably something that I can run as a cron job so that it fires every day without any intervention on my part and where the configuration lives in a file that I can edit with a simple text editor like vim. I'm considering rolling my own in Python just to get more experience with that language, but I thought I'd see if any Soylentils had suggestions for me to check out before I went to the effort of doing that.
(Score: 2) by MichaelDavidCrawford on Friday July 27 2018, @02:21AM (7 children)
During the rises of Fascism and Communism, George Orwell spoke of the vital importance of saying or writing precisely what you intend to express.
I at first wrote "mean to express" but that would not have been as precise as "intend to express".
I now longer say "Most Portlanders call Pioneer Courthouse Square 'Pioneer Square'", rather I say "Most Portland residents denote Pioneer Courthouse Square as 'Pioneer Square'".
Yes I Have No Bananas. [gofundme.com]
(Score: 3, Informative) by AthanasiusKircher on Friday July 27 2018, @02:45AM (6 children)
Precision of language is obviously important, but such precision is only meaningful if it succeeds in communicating MEANING, as language is fundamentally about communication, and it depends on social usage to convey that meaning.
If you try to use a word in a way that you think is "precise" but 99.99% of English speakers actually understand the word to mean something else, youe attempt at "precision" has failed. There are all sorts of words in English that don't follow logically what their form or etymology would suggest, but over enough time we've forgotten most of those "imprecisions." (I could point out a number of examples of such problems in this conversation alone, though many date back to issues in Middle English or earlier.)
Language evolves, and the best we can do is use the clearest meanings possible for the clearest communication as it is actually understood by speakers of English.
Is there an argument for OP's differentiation of "podcast" from other similar terms? Sure, I suppose. Except that's NOT what the term "podcast" currently means or really ever meant. If OP or you want to suggest a proposal to change the meaning of "podcast," by all means do so. Try it out with friends. Try to get it to spread. Most likely, you'll fail, because I don't think there's much use for a term that only denotes "netcasts running only on iPods," as the podcast standards usually allow much broader usage.
Nevertheless, if you want to propose an alternative terminology, do it. Just don't pretend that your usage is what the words already mean or other people are "wrong" for using a term in the way 99.99% of the population understand it. That's not how language works.
(Score: 2) by MichaelDavidCrawford on Friday July 27 2018, @04:32AM (4 children)
There is an institute in Paris which introduce new words into the strictly-regulated French language.
For example the French word for "Walkman" is "Baladeur". I Am Absolutely Serious.
Yes I Have No Bananas. [gofundme.com]
(Score: 2) by AthanasiusKircher on Friday July 27 2018, @07:42AM (3 children)
Yes, I'm quite aware of this, as I have a pretty decent knowledge of French. Your point? Are you advocating for this approach?
Because the French aren't by any means the only language with this sort of body. And most such bodies are only successful in guiding linguistic change when they take the lead (e.g. in coining new technology words immediately before other terms like foreign borrowings take root). When they try to fight established usage or neologisms that have already become common, they're generally not very successful.
(Score: 2) by MichaelDavidCrawford on Friday July 27 2018, @08:07AM (2 children)
It's unlawful for Quebec businesses to display signage that's written in English.
Yes I Have No Bananas. [gofundme.com]
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday July 27 2018, @10:15AM
Is it also unlawful for MichaelDavidCrawford to post a factually correct statement?
(Score: 2) by AthanasiusKircher on Friday July 27 2018, @12:53PM
LOL. Somehow I only just realized you're trolling me. Perhaps because I like to imagine good faith in posts.
Oh, well. Yet another poster here I shall now cease to communicate with. I don't waste my time with people who deliberately waste my time. It's been weird, Mr. Crawford!
Cheers!
(Score: 2) by requerdanos on Friday July 27 2018, @04:17PM
As you observe, the meaning of the word "iPod" and the meaning of the word "pod" are intertwined into the "podcast" idea (and given that a Pod is just a cozy container, and an iPod an audio player, there is impetus for gravitation towards interpreting it as "iPod").
Non-Apple-Fanboy people who make audio programs generally do not mean "a cast for your iPod" making something they call a podcast, and non-Apple-fanboy people who download audio programs generally do not mean "a cast for my iPod" when they download something they call a "podcast". Non-Apple-fanboys who work to create internet standards and the relevant software ecosystem to support standardized audio download generally don't mean "A cast for iPods" when they call the subject of the standards and software "podcasts".
Key there is non-Apple-fanboys. I have met people who have only a Macbook, an iPhone, an iPad, an iPod, etc. who have asked, with puzzled looks, how you could play a podcast without an iPod? Do "mp3 players" (another misnomer) play them too?
Another class of people sometimes confused by the (negligently confusing) terminology is people whose thing is not tech. "You listen to that there podcast, huh? What, you need one of them Mac Pods to listen to that or something? They got that at Best Buy, or you got to go to an Apple store?"
By not calling audio programs by a trendy apple-fanboy sounding name, this can be avoided.
It's not just the language and the poor sensibilities of the two classes of intellectually impaired persons above that I am concerned about; as a free software proponent I begrudge the proprietary walled-garden approach folks every cubic millimeter of mindshare. Audio programs, played on a computer or an audio player.
I don't think we need to "change the meaning of podcast"--that isn't the problem. I just don't want to redefine the perfectly good concept "audio program" and shoehorn it into the partly sensible, partly nonsense term "podcast".
Plenty of people are doing that already, and if that sticks over the long term then the language will have evolved for better or worse. Many evolving features of language are for the better--they help us interpret the evolving and changing world in a meaningful way--but I oppose this particular change*, and if it happens, it won't be because I didn't mention that I think it's an ill-advised direction in which to deliberately nudge the language.
Thus, if the word sticks (which it will or it won't), it won't be partly my fault; rather, it will be over my objection stated for the record.
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* Lots of people hear something like this and assert that since changes happen, all changes must be good ones, even the bad ones, and everyone should embrace all changes, good or bad, because all changes are good whether they are good or bad. This is insipidly stupid, but serves their purpose (to avoid intelligent discourse). I am assuming you are not such a person, and if you are, then I apologize for all these complicated words, and substitute for them a simple mild insult.