A Podfic Tagging & Organization Tutorial (aka "You, too, can now reap the benfits of Bess's OCD!")

[bessyboo]

HAPPY POD AWARE, EVERYONE! :DDDD

Podfic: it's an audio recording of a fanfic, like an audiobook, how awesome is that? Fans from all over put their voices out there so you can enjoy fanfic on the go or just in a different way. To find out more about podfic, why we do it and how to get started, check out pod_aware on LJ or DW.Now, if you've been following my

Comments

[cactus_cat]

I love this! You're amazing. Thanks for the cookie!

One thing I've always wanted, but have never been able to decide how to do, is add the rating (age-appropriate level rather than star) to the tags somewhere so I can quickly and easily separate "ok to listen to at work" and "usually makes me blush", etc. Any thoughts on this?

And now I need to make m4b work on my Android phone, because you have convinced me that it is far superior.

[bessyboo]

My best idea for this would be to change all the genre tags to something like "Podfic: SFW" and "Podfic: NSFW", or something similar. Or, instead of SFW/NSFW your could use G-NC17 ratings. Genre is a tag that I COULD use for further sorting, but have never felt the need to use for anything else, because I'm mostly worried about sorting by fandom & usernames.

Exxxxcellent. Always glad to draw another one over to the dark side of podbooks ;) (Psst, a quick google search turned up this...)

So glad you like this! (Also I APPROVE OF YOUR ICON! :D)

[cactus_cat]

I like it! I think I'll go with SFW/NSFW. :)

Thanks for the link! I've tried a few different players, but so far they haven't played well with the phone part of my phone. I'll give this one a go! :D

[bessyboo]

Glad to be of help :)

Hope that works out for you! YAY PODBOOKS! \o/

[cantarina1]

I recognize a lot of your podbooks :D I also see one of mine, hee!

I have a different set of metadata practices, but it's always interesting to see how other people do it. I put the fandom up front in the title and podfic in the genre too, but I start shifting things from there.

It's interesting to see grouping used. I rely a lot on the visual cues of the cover art when I'm skimming through podbooks (whereas I go by fandom with the MP3s).

[cybel]

Since I use cover flow with column view, I find it easier to use the title without the fandom first; under the album column I add the fandom to the title. This way I can browse by title or fandom or reader or whatever just by clicking on the appropriate tab at the top of the columns then typing the first few letters of the item I'm looking for.

Of course, you can also just type what you're looking for into the search field in the top right corner of the iTunes window, and only items including what you type in will show.

As for read vs unread podfics, I use playlists for this, having matching playlists on my ipod.

[bessyboo]

I find it interesting hearing about other people's metadata practices as well!

Grouping is something that, since it only appears in my iTunes (where I rarely listen to podfic), I knew I wanted to use for sort of "optional additional sorting"--something that wouldn't be a huge deal to not be able to see on an iPod/iPhone, but was still helpful to have in general, when needed. Thus, further fandom clarification.

I rely a lot on the visual cues of the cover art when I'm skimming through podbooks (whereas I go by fandom with the MP3s).

See, I can't imagine keeping different types of podfics in separate places--for me, it's all podfic, it belongs all together! That would drive me nuts. ...which is perhaps why I don't download MP3s (except for conversion to podbooks) XD

[nickelmountain]

This is an excellent idea! I have a filing system for the podfics on my computer, but it's sorely lacking. I will DEFINITELY reap the benefits of your OCD, thank you!

[bessyboo]

You're very welcome! :)

[outboxed]

This is really interesting! I'm not sure I have the time to go through and retag my entire collection but your tagging system makes A LOT of sense, and covers all bases, so I may well have to employ it in future. (:

[cybel]

Many podfics can be retagged in a batch, though not for all items, of course, e.g. title and album (if fandom-title is used).

To tag everything by a certain author, or reader, or of a certain genre, though, just highlight everything you want to work on--or move them to a smart playlist then highlight them all--and you get a get info window with a number of options. If you change any of these options, all the podfics you've highlighted will have that tag changed to whatever you've entered.

[bessyboo]

Ditto everything cybel said about batch tagging--do not underestimate its usefulness! Of course, there are things that you CAN'T batch retag, like the Name & Album fields using my system, and also the Comments field, but for me, when I retagged my whole library, it was WELL worth it. YMMV, though, so judge on what you think the time/payoff cost/benefit will be for you!

[anatsuno]

I didn't read everything (my brain is overwhelmed, I admit) but I am struck by the impression that some of your tagging (the end section, about sorting to listen, etc) is replacing what I'm doing with smart playlists instead. Like, my "to listen" is a smart playlist looking at which tracks with the genre "podfic" have a Play Count of zero, for example. so now I'm curious to know if you ever use smart playlists, and if yes, how. :)

[cybel]

I love smart playlists, all playlists, really. Unfortunately I can't use play count meaningfully, though, as I often fall asleep while listening, so my iPod thinks I've listened to some podfics I really haven't heard yet. :-(

[bessyboo]

I don't use smart playlists for two reasons:

1) my iPod does not reliably transfer play counts; for instance, my iTunes says I've NEVER listened to revolutionaryjo's reading of "Stealing Harry", but it was one of the first 5 podfics I ever added to my library, and I can guarantee you I've listened to the WHOLE thing a MINIMUM of three times.
2) I like to be able to browse through my library, and have all the things I haven't listened to visually sorted at the top. It just works better for me.

Also, for me, playlists are more for music--I don't have video or audiobook playlists. It's a separation that I think would throw me, if I were to "mix them up", so to speak. Basically, all of my podfics go under "Audiobooks". All of my videos go under "Movies/TV Shows". And all of my PDFs go under "Books". If it's not SPECIFICALLY sorted into one of those categories in my iTunes for me, it's music.

[anatsuno]

*nods* All my podfics go under audiobooks too. But I don't tend to have many music playlists (though I have some); I use playlists specifically to sort out my podfic. :)