[okfn-discuss] How to save a podcasting platform / community with open source spirit?

Thu Jul 4 05:18:34 UTC 2013

On Jul 3, 2013, at 9:58 PM, Miguel Paz <miguel at poderopedia.com> wrote:

> Hi everyone
> We need your tech savvy help.
> In Chile we have a large podcasting community called Podcaster.cl.
> This is a website/community of podcast makers, that includes around
> 160 live podcast and around 400 podcast that have existed and died in
> the process. The guys that run the platform, who don`t charge for
> using it and get some little money from advertising just announced
> that they will end it in a couple fo weeks due to lack of financial
> support to keep it going.
> Some of us are wondering how to save it by turning it into a community
> run platform.
> Podcaster runs on a very old Wordpress version (1.5), on 3 servers
> (one for site and front end, and 2 for mp3 storage/serving). Currently
> the servers cost around US$ 4.000 a month, due to bandwith usage and
> hosting.

USD 4K sounds like a lot, but what do I know. You could check if you would save any money by moving the mp3s to Amazon S3.

Of course, you could charge something nominal for the podcasts, but that may not with well with the listeners, but it doesn't that would make up enough money to pay the bills.

--
Puneet Kishor