By Sean Sullivan Lagniappe columnist

“The revolution won’t be televised.” Gil Scott Heron wrote those words many years ago, but many today think it may be podcasted. The New Oxford American Dictionary declared podcasting the word of the year in 2005 and it has quickly become 2006’s most overused and annoying term.

I know what you’re thinking; “Sullivan has really run out of stuff to get angry about when he’s picking on podcasting.” Not so my friends; my cup runneth over with objects of anger, but I hear less about all my other annoyances than I do the clear and present danger of podcasting!

The podcasting thing has become almost a password for the un-hip to try to gain entree into a perceived world of new media coolness. Do you remember what happened to Tommy Cruise when he used that Fidelio password in “Eyes Wide Shut”... in other words quit talking about things you don’t understand? If you are one of these people who feel compelled to tout podcasting as the next BIG thing, I hate to break it to you but this podcasting thing has been around many years.

Podcasting is today’s equivalent of having your best friend’s sister record the “King Biscuit Flower Hour” for you on a cassette, and you listening to it on your walkman as you ride your bicycle to you friend’s house to practice your break dancing moves, because he has a really killer piece of linoleum that you can windmill on like a freak….

Sorry, I was breaking and popping nostalgic there. I know many a pundit and the proud designers at Apple believe they have changed the way people use media. Sorry, the cassette tape beat you to that years ago. Is the podcast more convenient than sitting around recording stuff off the radio and television…sure, but the podcast is just a freshening of old analog technology. News reporters fall over themselves to talk about podcasting, but I don’t know if they know why they’re reporting on it. Is being able to download your favorite radio and television shows convenient…yes. Revolutionary? No.

While I’m on the misunderstood technology warpath, the revolutionary idea of “blogging” is the modern version of a “diary.” In essence every time a brother would steal his sister’s diary and read it to his friends, he was laying the groundwork for blogging. Short for web logging, blogging is no more revolutionary than people writing in a composition book about their hopes, fears, dreams and clothing-covered tattoos. The only difference is someone searching the Web for pictures of Anna Kournikova or Alf may stumble upon someone’s cyber space diary and read how they, like Alf, enjoy eating cats.

I guess I seem like an old stick in the mud when it comes to the “newest” Internet crazes, but I’m not. I didn’t once mention that downloading a mix of music for your IPOD is no different than when you used to make mix tapes with your double cassette deck. That way you could have a Run D.M.C. song right next to a Mister Mister cut for maximum make-out soundtrack quality, so remember that next time you’re on the tread climber with your IPOD bumping to the Black Eyed Peas and Keith Urban. It’s not a revolution it’s just a small Walkman.

Sean Sullivan is Lagniappe lagniappe columnist. Contact him at ssullivan@lagniappemobile.com.

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