The Walt Disney Company has been in the podcasting space for a while. They have had podcasts on iTunes since that software started official support of podcasts directly in the software. They contacted Michael Geoghegan in the summer of 2005 to do a series of podcasts on the start of the 50th Anniversary Celebration of Disneyland in California. These turned into the Official Disneyland podcast which is released monthly and still produced and hosted by Michael Geoghegan. Walt Disney World followed with a weekly podcast started in late December 2005.

Now the Disney Cruise Line is getting in on the action, sort of. The podcast feed is at the DCLNews.com site, which is designed for use by news media outlets and professional journalists. There are only two items in the podcast feed so far, which are an audio segment and a video segment on the press conference announcing the 2007 Disney Cruise Line Mediterranean cruises. These were produced by David Brady who is producer and host of the Walt Disney World Resort: Plugged In podcast, which is the official podcast for Walt Disney World. He does a good job with the Walt Disney World resort podcasts, and did another good job with these two segments. I personally hope for more podcasts from the Disney Cruise Line and The Walt Disney Company in general as they could do some really imaginative things.

EXPO magazine has released their 2006 Best New Shows Awards, and the Podcast and Portable Media Expo was the winner in the "Trade and Consumer Show" Category. In the first year of the Podcast and Portable Media Expo had over 2,000 attendees and 60 exhibiting companies converge on the Ontario Convention Center in Ontario California.

The 2005 Expo was in November, but this year it is being moved up to September. The registration is open for this years conference as reported previously. And if you are interested in going to this year's show you are in for even more. In an email from Tim Bourquin, he said there will be about 80 companies exhibiting this year which is a third more than last year's show. And to accommodate the additional companies at the show, as well as the over 2500 attendees they are expecting, they have moved to a bigger hall to accommodate everything and everyone, myself included as I will be there covering the event for Droxy.

The Virtual Podcasting Expo we reported was happening is now open. If you follow the "Read" link at the bottom of this post you can get into the virtual lobby. From there you can view the schedule and take some orientation tours of how the virtual conference system works.

From the schedule they seem to have some interesting topics being covered, like the "What Makes (Or Breaks) A Podcast - Podcast Listeners Speak" by Leesa Barnes, the "Podcasting Networks - The Best Way to Market Your Podcast" being offered up by Todd Cochrane, as well as several sessions on Feedburner uses with podcasting. But there are also some that are a little confusing on how they relate, like the "Top 10 Tips for Running a Political Campaign" session, I am sure one (or more) of those is to have a podcast on your campaign site to build community with your potential voters.

If you check it out, please leave a comment on what you think about it.

Back a while ago we covered the advertising impact from a research study, and fellow Weblogs Inc Network (WIN) blog The Unofficial Apple Weblog (TUAW) reported on the audience size aspect of the report. Now we have a blog post from the Geek News Central blog that their numbers for the current podcasting audience size is way off. Geek News Central is getting their counts from being involved with TechPodcasts.com network of podcasts and Podcasternews.com as well as also several other sites that are using the RawVoice Generator.

The post over there shows that if the Forrester Research report was  correct  that the numbers they have verified stats for would be a large percentage of the whole audience that the report says there is currently existing. Of course they know there are lot more other podcasts out there than they have the stats for, so they reach the conclusion the numbers from the report are way off.

If you can't make it to the Portable Media Expo, which is taking registrations as reported here, or just don't want to wait until September, you can check out "The International Podcasting Expo" which is being held April 21 - 23, 2006. The unique thing is that this expo is being held around the clock, and online. The expo will be a non stop 48 hour event using a virtual expo system. There will be a cross platform audio conference room which will be recorded. Listeners can participate in live podcasts which will be available shortly after they are recorded on a special expo feed.  You can go sign up for the expo at their site.

Are any of our readers planning on signing up for this virtual expo?

It seems the registration for the 2006 Podcast and Portable Media Expo is open. This conference is going into its second year and from all accounts I have heard it was great fun had by all who attended the expo. It is at the Ontario Conference Center in Ontario California again, although it is moving from November to September. It is still two days of vendor exhibit hall, keynote presentations and conference sessions.

This conference is mostly aimed at those in podcasting, although I know a lot of podcast listeners went last year for the exhibit hall, and to mingle with, meet and see their favorite podcasters. It is also a way to get advertisers and podcasters together to facilitate sponsorship deals.

The conference has five conference tracks this year which are listed after the break.

• Podcasting 101 - A to Z for Beginners - Getting Up To Speed Fast
• Podcasting As A Business - Turning Content Into Profits
• Corporate Podcasting - Communications and PR Best Practices
• Podcasting As A Hobby - For Those Who Create Purely for Enjoyment
• Portable Audio & Video - Moving Traditional Content Into a Portable, On-Demand World (includes sessions for educators, musicians, and other specific interests)

They have a Frappr map setup for attendees to show where they are coming from on the attendees tools page. One of the other tools on the page is a link to the forums setup for discussion and side meeting arranging.

I am hoping to be there either in some way, either as a podcaster, just a podcast listener, or covering the expo for Droxy. Are any of our readers going to be there? Leave a comment if you plan on going.

Following on the heels of the news of HBO signing to sponsor podcasts we reported the other day, we noticed an article on the growth expected in podcast audience s and advertising, which our fellow Weblogs Inc Network Blog TUAW (The Unofficial Apple Weblog) report on as well.

The research firm not only predicts the future size of podcast audiences, but they also predict the large growth in advertising dollars spent on podcasts. According to eMarketer, the advertising dollars spent on podcasts this year will be $80 million, growing to $150 million in 2008, and doubling to $300 million in 2010.