Adaptive podcasting is now open source for all

It brings me absolute joy to finally open source all the code of Adaptive/Perceptive podcasting.

This research project has run for a long time and at some time thought about pulling the plug. I always thought it had so much potential and needed to reach different people who will explore and use it for many more use cases than a research agenda.

If you are wondering what Adaptive podcasting is, check out the post from R&D and my own thoughts last year.

Now the code base is public under a Apache 2 license, it means anyone can make changes to the code base including I hope,

• Port the player code to iOS for all those iPhone users.
• Create a WebAssembley version of the player
• Add new web editors
• Create converters from the likes of audacity, audition, etc
• Increase the capability of the player to support other data & sensor sources.
• Take advantage of the additional features the University of York added
• Add to the documentation.
• Add more well thought out SMIL features like fallbacks, real time fades and effects, etc.
• Finish the XML Schema I started (I’m too out of schema writing sorry)

There is so many people who had a hand in Adaptive podcasting, which are all named in the credits. This project couldn’t have happened without them and it speaks volumes about a future where collaboration is the default.

I am personally humbled by everything and if I wasn’t in Amsterdam during the Society 5.0 conference would be sending out lots of emails letting everyone and anyone know. There is a long long list of people to contact to let them know its all public now. Its also one of the research projects which has always been in the forefront of my mind and consumed many of my cycles. Its a great project and in the history makes clear the trajectory of progression. However wouldn’t existed without the community of practice, which kept me on my toes. Even now, I’m keen to see the community grow and built the amazing experiences which we dreamed about.

This is a clear sign of the power of public service. Many will ask why would the BBC open source this? Its in the BBC’s royal charter, helping build the UK economy. This is also a natural end to the Perceptive Media workstream for me, looking at implicit interaction to drive experiences and narratives.

Ultimately I’m hoping to further the ambition on podcasts and adaptive audio full stop. I have always said and stood behind the notion media has so much more potential. I do expect some enterprising individual to take the source code and port it to the Apple app store. Although I’m already looking at fdroid for the latest player too.

If you have any questions about Adaptive/Perceptive podcasting please do get in touch via email or github. This project is leaking so much potential be it public, commercial, etc.

I really look forward to seeing what people do with it all…