The "podcast" Namespace

A wholistic rss namespace for podcasting that is meant to synthesize the fragmented world of podcast namespaces. The broad goal is to create a single, compact, efficient namespace that is easily extensible, community controlled/authored and addresses the needs of the independent podcast industry now and in the future. Our hope is that this namespace will become the framework that the independent podcast community needs to deliver new functionality to apps and aggregators.

Our guiding principles for development of this namespace are the "Rules for Standards Makers" by Dave Winer. Please read it before contributing if you aren't familiar with it.

The podcast namespace is part of the larger "Podcasting 2.0" project which exists to bring control of podcasting's protocols back into the hands of the open podcasting community. A good overview can be found here: Podcasting 2.0

• Official XMLNS Definition the official definition of all formalized tags.
• List of platforms and apps that currently implement some or all of these tags: Supporting Platforms and Apps.
• Example Feed: There is an example feed example.xml in this repository showing the podcastindex namespace side by side with the Apple itunes namespace.
• Other recommendations when creating RSS podcast feeds.

Current Roadmap

Phase 1 - [Closed] Comment period closed on 11/15/20 and 5 tags were formalized.

Phase 2 - [Closed] Comment period closed on 1/31/21 and 4 tags were formalized.

Phase 3 - [Closed] Comment period closed on 6/1/21 and 5 tags were formalized.

Phase 4 - [Open] Comment period will close on 12/1/21, all proposals for phase 4 are welcome. Current tag proposals under consideration are listed below.

Legend

Formalized - This tag is frozen and listed in the XMLNS document. Any future changes to it's definition must maintain backwards compatibility.

Finalized - The tag is structurally stable and implementation testing should be considered safe. Any breaking changes will be widely communicated.

Open - The tag/phase is open for discussion and collaboration.

Required - This tag or attribute must be present.

Optional - This tag or attribute may be left out.

Recommended - This tag or attribute is technically optional, but is strongly recommended to be present for the tag to function as fully intended.

Tag Adoption Process

To be adopted as an official part of the namespace, there must be consensus around a tag's usefulness and either commitment to adoption by at least 1 host and 1 app, or a recognition that the tag is already being used in the wild.

It is ALWAYS ok to delay a tag to a future Phase if there is any concern about it. That is to be expected and encouraged.

When a Phase comes to a close, there will be a full review of any tags currently open for comment and questions will be asked to gather consensus before final adoption. No tags will be adopted by fiat, or if there are unresolved questions. They will just be moved to the next Phase for further comment and refinement.

Tags that are proposals or rough ideas should be expected to have syntax problems or typos. Those should be refined away as they are worked on. If they are not, that is a good idea that the tag in question isn't being seen as useful and should be considered for dropping.

We are not a "standards body". It is a community driven project where all stake holders are encouraged to participate, so that many voices are heard. This is an open-source project to be built fully in the open. Discussions also take place on podcastindex.social where anyone is free to register and participate.

Goal #1 - Eliminate Redundancy

There is significant overlap amongst the many existing podcast namespaces. Each platform and publisher has created their own namespace to give their respective system and audience the metadata they need in the way they want it delivered.

Goal #2 - Keep "required" tags and attributes minimal

The only required tags should be those that solve an overwhelming need in the industry. Requiring tags is a roadblock to adoption and should be avoided. Attributes should also only be required when they are key to the functionality of the tag.

Goal #3 - Keep Exisiting Conventions

Reinventing the wheel helps nobody. When at all possible, existing conventions should be maintained. For example, it would make sense to turn <podcast:explicit> into a unary element, where it's existence is taken as a "yes" and it's absence as a "no". But, that has never been the standard. And, given as how this namespace will probably sit alongside at least one other namespace, it makes sense to keep existing conventions in place.

Goal #4 - Be General... to a point

There is no way to address every possible metadata point that each platform would want. That is not the aim. Instead we focus on defining the elements that would be useful to the broadest set of apps, publishers, platforms and aggregators. Individual parties can keep their respective supplemental namespaces small and targeted as an adjunct to this larger namespace. But, we don't want to be so general that the spec becomes overly complicated. A beautiful, "perfect" spec is not important. Solving real problems is.

Element List

Phase 1 (Closed on 11/15/20)

The following tags have been formally adopted into the namespace. They are fully documented in the XMLNS document located here. Please see that file for full implementation details.

• <podcast:locked>
  
• <podcast:transcript>
  
• <podcast:funding>
  
• <podcast:chapters>
  
• <podcast:soundbite>
  

Phase 2 (Closed on 1/31/21)

The following tags have been formally adopted into the namespace. They are fully documented in the XMLNS document located here. Please see that file for full implementation details.

• <podcast:person>
  
• <podcast:location>
  
• <podcast:season>
  
• <podcast:episode>
  

Phase 3 (Closed on 6/1/21)

The following tags have been formally adopted into the namespace. They are fully documented in the XMLNS document located here. Please see that file for full implementation details.

• <podcast:trailer>
  
• <podcast:license>
  
• <podcast:alternateEnclosure>
  
  • <podcast:source>
    
  • <podcast:integrity>
    
• <podcast:guid>
  

Phase 4 (Closes on 12/1/2021)

The following tags should be considered purely as work in progress proposals. They should not be relied upon or implemented except for testing purposes and experimentation.

<podcast:liveItem> - Discuss

<podcast:liveItem
  status="['pending','live','ended'(string)]"
  start="[ISO8601 time stamp(string)]"
  end="[ISO8601 time stamp(string)]"
>

</podcast:liveItem>

Channel

(optional | multiple)

This element is used for a feed to deliver a live stream to podcast apps. It takes the same format as a standard <item> episode tag, but holds a subset of elements along with some additional new elements that are appropriate for a live stream context. The start and end attributes denote when the live stream "should" start and end. But, real life dictates that those times might not be adhered to. Apps are therefore encouraged not to rely on those times as anything more than a suggestion. The canonical way to know if a stream has started is with the status attribute. If status is "live" then the stream has started.

This item will also make use of the podping notification network. A podping notification SHOULD be sent out by the host when the live stream starts to let apps know.

Example:

<podcast:liveItem
  status="live"
  start="2021-09-26T07:30:00.000-0600"
  end="2021-09-26T08:30:00.000-0600"
>
    <title>Podcasting 2.0 Live Show</title>
    <description>A look into the future of podcasting and how we get to Podcasting 2.0!</description>
    <link>https://example.com/podcast/live</link>
    <guid isPermaLink="true">https://example.com/live</guid>
    <author>John Doe (john@example.com)</author>
    <podcast:images srcset="https://example.com/images/ep3/pci_avatar-massive.jpg 1500w,
        https://example.com/images/ep3/pci_avatar-middle.jpg 600w,
        https://example.com/images/ep3/pci_avatar-small.jpg 300w,
        https://example.com/images/ep3/pci_avatar-tiny.jpg 150w"
    />
    <podcast:person href="https://www.podchaser.com/creators/adam-curry-107ZzmWE5f" img="https://example.com/images/adamcurry.jpg">Adam Curry</podcast:person>
    <podcast:person role="guest" href="https://github.com/daveajones/" img="https://example.com/images/davejones.jpg">Dave Jones</podcast:person>
    <podcast:person group="visuals" role="cover art designer" href="https://example.com/artist/beckysmith">Becky Smith</podcast:person>
    <podcast:alternateEnclosure type="audio/mpeg" length="312">
        <podcast:source uri="https://example.com/pc20/livestream" />
    </podcast:alternateEnclosure>
</podcast:liveItem>

---

<podcast:recommendations> - Discuss

<podcast:recommendations
 url="[url to json file(string)]"
 type="application/json"
 language="[language code(string)]"
>
[optional comments(string)]
</podcast:recommendations>

Channel or Item

(optional | multiple)

This element allows a podcaster (or third party, with podcater permission) to specify a list of recommended content for a podcast or an episode. The recommended content can be a web page, a podcast, a podcast episode or a soundbite, so that listeners can eventually subscribe to a podcast, add an episode to playlist, add a soundbite to playlist, etc.

This is a complex tag. The full documentation is here. Please read that document to understand and comment on this proposal.

Example:

<podcast:recommendations url="https://domain.tld/recommendation?guid=1234" type="application/json" />

Example:

<podcast:recommendations url="https://domain.tld/recommendation?guid=1234" type="application/json" language="en">Some other cool podcasts</podcast:recommendations>

---

<podcast:medium> - Discuss

<podcast:medium>[podcast|music|video|film|audiobook(string)]</podcast:medium>

Channel

(optional | single)

This tag tells the an application what the content contained within the feed IS, as opposed to what the content is ABOUT in the case of a category. This allows a podcast app to modify it's behavior or UI to give a better experience to the user for this content. For example, if a podcast has <podcast:medium>music</podcast:medium> an app may choose to reset playback speed to 1x and adjust it's EQ settings to be better for music vs. spoken word.

Accepted medium names are curated within a list maintained by the community as new mediums are discovered over time. Newly proposed mediums should require some level of justification to be added to this list. One may argue and/or prove use of a new medium even for only one application, should it prove different enough from existing mediums to have meaning.

This list is currently a non-exhaustive proposal and subject to change

• podcast - Describes a feed for a podcast show.
  • Justification: Nothing new, as this is what all podcasts that exist default to today. If no medium tag is present in the channel, this medium is assumed.
• music - A feed of music organized into an "album" with each item a song within the album.
  • Justification: Music has existed as a medium for a very long time and dedicated music applications already exist.
• video - Like a "podcast" but used in a more visual experience.
  • Justification: Videos add different enough level of user experience to discern them from regular podcasts. Sites like YouTube already exist and prove out the existence of "videos" as a medium.
• film - Specific types of videos with one item per feed.
  • Justification: While doable, users have come to expect to be able to search for films without directly subscribing to a high level organization of "channels." This allows the application to make beneficial assumptions regarding how to handle an item within a film. Films exist as a medium already with dedicated applications today.
• audiobook - Specific types of audio with one item per feed.
  • Justification: Similar to a film, users typically search for audiobooks by name without some level of subscription/following. This isn't to say that an application couldn't allow following an "author". for example, but that wouldn't be organized at the channel level. Audiobooks exist as a medium already with dedicated applications today.
• newsletter - Describes a feed of curated written articles.
  • Justification: Many newsletter publications already have RSS feeds -- this helps explicitly identify them.
• blog - Describes a feed of informally written articles.
  • Justification: Many blogs already have RSS feeds, perhaps since the dawn of RSS -- this helps explicitly identify them.

Example use for a "podcast":

<podcast:medium>podcast</podcast:medium>

Example use for "music":

<podcast:medium>music</podcast:medium>

---

<podcast:gateway> - Discuss

<podcast:gateway
  order="[(number)]"
>
[free form message to listeners(string)]
</podcast:gateway>

Item

(optional | multiple)

This tag, when present in an <item> indicates that this episode is a so-called "gateway episode". Gateway episodes are episodes that the podcaster (or maybe crowd sourced) thinks represent the best entry point into a long running show. If a podcast has 300 episodes, it might be a good idea to designate 1 or more older episodes as the best place to start.

The order attribute is an unsigned integer that is meant as an ascending listening order. The episode with order="1" should be played first, then order="2" and so on.

When podcast apps encounter gateway episodes, it is suggested that they present these episodes (in some form of UI) to the user when the user subscribes or follows the podcast.

Example of a single gateway:

<item>
    <title>Podcasting 2.0 - How it all Began</title>
    <description>A look into the future of podcasting and how we get to Podcasting 2.0!</description>
    <link>https://example.com/pc20/ep1</link>
    <guid isPermaLink="true">https://example.com/pc20/ep1</guid>
    <author>John Doe (john@example.com)</author>
    <podcast:images srcset="https://example.com/images/ep1/pci_avatar-massive.jpg 1500w,
        https://example.com/images/ep1/pci_avatar-middle.jpg 600w,
        https://example.com/images/ep1/pci_avatar-small.jpg 300w,
        https://example.com/images/ep1/pci_avatar-tiny.jpg 150w"
    />
    <podcast:person href="https://www.podchaser.com/creators/adam-curry-107ZzmWE5f" img="https://example.com/images/adamcurry.jpg">Adam Curry</podcast:person>
    <podcast:person role="guest" href="https://github.com/daveajones/" img="https://example.com/images/davejones.jpg">Dave Jones</podcast:person>
    <podcast:person group="visuals" role="cover art designer" href="https://example.com/artist/beckysmith">Becky Smith</podcast:person>
    <enclosure url="https://live.example.com/live.mp3" type="audio/mpeg" />
    <podcast:gateway>Start here!</podcast:gateway>
</item>

Example of a gateway series:

<item>
    <title>Podcasting 2.0 - How it all Began</title>
    <description>A look into the future of podcasting and how we get to Podcasting 2.0!</description>
    <link>https://example.com/pc20/ep1</link>
    <guid isPermaLink="true">https://example.com/pc20/ep1</guid>
    <author>John Doe (john@example.com)</author>
    <podcast:images srcset="https://example.com/images/ep1/pci_avatar-massive.jpg 1500w,
        https://example.com/images/ep1/pci_avatar-middle.jpg 600w,
        https://example.com/images/ep1/pci_avatar-small.jpg 300w,
        https://example.com/images/ep1/pci_avatar-tiny.jpg 150w"
    />
    <podcast:person href="https://www.podchaser.com/creators/adam-curry-107ZzmWE5f" img="https://example.com/images/adamcurry.jpg">Adam Curry</podcast:person>
    <podcast:person role="guest" href="https://github.com/daveajones/" img="https://example.com/images/davejones.jpg">Dave Jones</podcast:person>
    <podcast:person group="visuals" role="cover art designer" href="https://example.com/artist/beckysmith">Becky Smith</podcast:person>
    <enclosure url="https://live.example.com/pc20_ep1.mp3" type="audio/mpeg" />
    <pubDate>Fri, 11 Sep 2020 18:51:09 GMT</pubDate>
    <podcast:episode>1</podcast:episode>
    <itunes:episode>1</itunes:episode>
    <podcast:gateway order="1">Start here!</podcast:gateway>
</item>

<item>
    <title>Podcasting 2.0 - The tide has turned</title>
    <description>What a big week.  So many important things happened this week.  We dive into it all and what it means!</description>
    <link>https://example.com/pc20/ep45</link>
    <guid isPermaLink="true">https://example.com/pc20/ep45</guid>
    <author>John Doe (john@example.com)</author>
    <podcast:images srcset="https://example.com/images/ep1/pci_avatar-massive.jpg 1500w,
        https://example.com/images/ep1/pci_avatar-middle.jpg 600w,
        https://example.com/images/ep1/pci_avatar-small.jpg 300w,
        https://example.com/images/ep1/pci_avatar-tiny.jpg 150w"
    />
    <podcast:person href="https://www.podchaser.com/creators/adam-curry-107ZzmWE5f" img="https://example.com/images/adamcurry.jpg">Adam Curry</podcast:person>
    <podcast:person role="guest" href="https://github.com/daveajones/" img="https://example.com/images/davejones.jpg">Dave Jones</podcast:person>
    <podcast:person group="visuals" role="cover art designer" href="https://example.com/artist/beckysmith">Becky Smith</podcast:person>
    <enclosure url="https://live.example.com/pc20_ep45.mp3" type="audio/mpeg" />
    <pubDate>Fri, 20 Aug 2021 20:23:55 GMT</pubDate>
    <podcast:episode>45</podcast:episode>
    <itunes:episode>45</itunes:episode>
    <podcast:gateway order="2">We reached a milestone here!</podcast:gateway>
</item>

---

<podcast:images> - Discuss

<podcast:images
  srcset="[image urls with sizing attached(string array)]"
/>

Channel or Item

(optional | single)

This tag, when present, allows for specifying many different image sizes in a compact way at either the episode or channel level. The syntax is borrowed from the HTML5 srcset syntax. It allows for describing multiple image sources with width and pixel hints directly in the attribute.

Example of a single gateway:

<podcast:images
    srcset="https://example.com/images/ep1/pci_avatar-massive.jpg 1500w,
            https://example.com/images/ep1/pci_avatar-middle.jpg 600w,
            https://example.com/images/ep1/pci_avatar-small.jpg 300w,
            https://example.com/images/ep1/pci_avatar-tiny.jpg 150w"
/>

Other Proposals

A list of the current proposed tags can be found in the issues section here.

Verification for Importing and Transferring

If the "locked" element is present and set to "yes", podcasting hosts should not allow importing of this feed until the email listed in the element's owner="" attribute is contacted and subsequently changes the value of the element to "no".

IDs

There can be multiple <podcast:id> elements to indicate a listing on multiple platforms, directories, hosts, apps and services. The "platform" attribute shall be a slug representing the platform, directory, host, app or service. The full list is here. More should be added by the community as needed.

Badges and Media