This is great news for podcasters as well as people who enjoy checking out live podcasts. Livestream has announced that is has free accounts that are ad-free. In other words, it is now possible to do a live podcast through Livestream without it costing the podcast producer any money, and without forcing the viewers to sit through a series of ads.
There are a handful of podcasts that I keep up with that do live shows. I try and catch them when I am able to because it is more fun to be in the live audience, participating, than it is to listen to the recorded, downloadable, version. (Admittedly, I will go and listen to the downloaded version even if I attended a live show).
As a viewer, I find it really frustrating to have the content that I came over to see and hear being blocked by a pop-up ad. I find this happens all too frequently with Ustream. The annoying, unwanted, ad cuts in right in the middle of what a podcast host is saying. When the ad ends, I am left struggling to figure out what I’d missed while the ad was playing.
Livestream has a solution. There is now a Livestream for Producers iPhone app. The Livestream for Producers Android app is coming soon. Use the app with a free Livestream account, and you are good to go. You can share live video to an online audience for free right through the app. You get unlimited free streaming to the web.
This is an easy way to do a podcast while you are at an important, interesting, or newsworthy event. Your viewers will not be forced to put up with a series of annoying ads in order to view your podcast. The downside is that your podcast will only be archived for a total of 30 days after the event. That could be a turn-off for podcasters who want to have an archive of all their shows available through Livestream.
Livestream made a video that compares how the Livestream for Producers iPhone app preforms as compared to JustinTV, Ustream, and Bambuser. It makes it pretty clear exactly how well, or poorly, each of the four services work.