Audio

Long before iTunes U made it cool, colleges and universities have been moving content online. The University of California is no exception.

UCTV, which was originally launched back in the year 2000, has just released its first app. You can use the app to watch and listen to a wide variety of education content produced by the University of California with topics ranging from Politics to the sciences.

The app is free to download and use, and you can find it in iTunes. Its Android counterpart should come out in fall 2012.

UCTV

iTunes

Launch a social media campaign that will build your brand and deliver results in our online Social Media Marketing Boot Camp starting June 7. Speakers include Abigail Cusick (Bravo Digital), Gregory Galant (Sawhorse Media), Alex Leo (Thomson Reuters Digital), Jim Tobin (Ignite Social Media), and many more. Read the reviews.

Today Amazon decided that it wasn’t involved in enough price wars. iTunes is Amazon’s next target. Amazon started selling recent hit releases for $.69, including Katy Perry’s “E.T.”, Jennifer Lopez’s “On the Floor” and Lady Gaga’s “Born This Way.”

It has always sold some MP3s for $.69, and it has even had weekly sales. But it wasn’t until today that Amazon started selling recent hit releases for that price without calling it a sale. No, this looks permanent (unless it doesn’t work).

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Random House has released a community sourced audiobook version of the Wizard of Oz.

The new audiobook, which was released today, was recorded at the American Library Association Annual Conference in Washington, D.C. this past June. Random House Audio, in partnership with OverDrive and First Book, recorded a community version of the classic children’s story at OverDrive’s Digital Bookmobile. More than 300 amateur narrators read the story aloud, one paragraph at a time, adding a variety of voices to the popular characters Dorothy, the Tin Man, the Cowardly Lion and Scarecrow.

The recording features an introduction and author’s note read by Rebecca Stead author of When You Reach Me, as well as readings by Dennis Lehane, Ken Burns, and Cory Doctorow.

The finished recording will be available on www.firstbook.org/wizard with all proceeds benefiting First Book. In addition, Random House Audio is donating 5,000 children’s audiobooks to First Book as part of the project.

William Carlos Williams brought the American language into poetry. He was also a quirky and entertaining reader of his own work. The 92nd St. Y just posted an audio podcast of him reading a few of his poems. You should check it out.

This blogger used to drive around in high school listening to a tape of Williams reading–it was fortifying, a good practice. Now you can sort of do the same thing.

Listen to Williams reading “A Sort of a Song,” “The Maneuver,” “Seafarer,” “The Three Graces,” “Paterson, Episode 17,” “The Descent” and “Fish.” Do it now. Poetry is good for you.