Plainsfm
Level 1 (8 points)
Publishing

Q: Podcast Artwork is Incorrect Size/Type/Head Requests

Hi There,

 

I've been trying to submit my new podcast to the iTunes Store.

 

I've been trying to validate it, but I'm getting the following error:-

 

"Podcast artwork must be between 1400 x 1400 and 3000 x 3000 pixels, JPG or PNG, in RGB color space, and hosted on a server that allows HTTP head requests."

 

The image does meet standards, and I've spoken to my host and it does allow HTTP head requests. So I'm unsure why it is impossible to be validated?

 

Here is the feed URL - http://www.accessradio.org/RSS.ashx?pid=9e5d81cb-014e-44d0-9269-14ebcf838754


Also I tried another feed which WAS accepted in iTunes in a feed validator but it came back not validating?  Why would there be errors in the feed but it still gets accepted into iTunes??


http://www.accessradio.org/RSS.ashx?pid=9e5d81cb-014e-44d0-9269-14ebcf838754

 

Any Ideas, many thanks.

Posted on Sep 8, 2016 3:54 PM

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Plainsfm

Q: Podcast Artwork is Incorrect Size/Type/Head Requests

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  • Helpful answers

  • by Roger Wilmut1,

    Roger Wilmut1 Roger Wilmut1 Sep 8, 2016 11:45 PM in response to Plainsfm
    Level 9 (77,989 points)
    iTunes
    Sep 8, 2016 11:45 PM in response to Plainsfm

    The image URL in your 'itunes:image' tag has spaces in it: spaces are not allowed in a URL so iTunes sees the URL as ending at the first space. The usual workaround is to replace each space with an underscore in the filename and the feed.

     

    Your media file filename also has spaces but in this case they have been correctly replaced in the feed by the code %20 - this is messy but acceptable. It would probably be better to avoid spaces.

     

    The second URL you give is the same as the first. FeedValidator flags the error I've just mentioned, and the fact that your pubDates and lastBuildDate are incorrectly formatted:for example

     

    Fri, 09 Sep 2016 18:46:59 +12:00

     

    should be

     

    Fri, 09 Sep 2016 18:46:59 +1200

     

    iTunes may not care about this. Your 'itunes:email' tag is empty - this should be a contact address but its omission is not serious. Your 'itunes:subtitle' tag is too long - this won't cause a problem but iTunes will truncate it so it just looks odd. You can ignore the error about Atom, it's irrelevant to iTunes.

  • by Plainsfm,

    Plainsfm Plainsfm Sep 12, 2016 7:00 PM in response to Plainsfm
    Level 1 (8 points)
    Publishing
    Sep 12, 2016 7:00 PM in response to Plainsfm

    Thanks for your help Roger you are very knowledgeable about this topic, you've answered a lot of similar questions with other people as well.

     

    The feed that wasn't working I was meant to insert was this one if you have time to look at what's wrong with it.

     

    http://www.accessradio.org/RSS.ashx?pid=76fad43b-06d2-4000-9f6d-5ce0905bbc1b


    Thanks, Paul

  • by Roger Wilmut1,

    Roger Wilmut1 Roger Wilmut1 Sep 12, 2016 11:44 PM in response to Plainsfm
    Level 9 (77,989 points)
    iTunes
    Sep 12, 2016 11:44 PM in response to Plainsfm

    Your feed is missing the declaration at the very beginning:

     

    <?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8"?>


    I don't know whether this is likely to upset Podcasts Connect - the feed works OK when subscribing in iTunes. The image URL has spaces in it again.