Podcamp Philly 2011 broadens focus, podcasting joined by more online media

Online media beyond podcasting played a large role Saturday at the fifth annual Podcamp Philly, held in the Tuttleman Learning Center at Temple University.
“[The event] started out being focused toward podcasting and video podcasting and has really grown to encompass everything from blogging to social media tools,” Whitney Hoffman, the director of operations for Podcamp Philly said. “It’s about teaching people to share information, not just online media.”
Graphic design, content strategy, business basics and the social media giants all were discussed in multiple sessions, among other topics that don’t directly touch podcasting.

Wordpress, the open source publishing platform giant that has its own unconference to be held at Temple in November, too, was heavily featured, serving as the basis for several lectures on its introduction and advanced utilities.
“We talked about how to set up a WordPress commerce site to run a business and talked about all the different tools with it, which was pretty useful,” Michael Kluseck, an attendee from Port Richmond said. “It’s always good to know what products are tried and true.”
Search engine optimization was also a hot-button topic at Podcamp Philly.
“It’s equally important not just to create additional content, but to also find a way to get it found,” Hoffman said. “Google has sort of changed its algorithm, things have gone from where you used to be able to game searches to have stuff show up in search rankings better, but now things are more weighted through social media and other channels.”
Sunday sessions included those focused on Audacity and Wikipedia, in addition to a crush on, of course, podcasting.