WSJ.com - As Podcasts Boom, Big Media Rushes To Stake a Claim

"Like many new technologies, podcasting may be snubbed by the wider public or fail to spawn a profitable business model. But the media industry's scramble signals its determination to avoid a repeat of earlier debacles when companies were slow to deal with new technologies.
Tough lessons from the past include Napster and other music file-sharing programs, which damaged CD sales even as the music industry dallied in offering ways to buy music online because of copyright issues. Another example is satellite radio, with its hundreds of channel choices. Its emerging popularity surprised regular radio companies, who dragged their feet on developing technologies to fight it such as squeezing more channels onto the regular radio spectrum."