Neilsen/NetRatings reported last week that nearly 9.2 million people — or 6.6% of the online population– have downloaded a podcast and nearly 5.6 million (or 4% of Web users) have downloaded a video podcast. The report seamlessly went on to characterize podcast listeners as the “podcasting population” and then proceeded to compare them with those that “publish blogs”.

This has prompted a lot of chatter and backlash on this report, and rightly so. The mainstream media continues to have difficulties connecting to today’s mainstream consumers that include both bloggers and podcasters, as well as those who read blogs and listen to or watch podcasts.

The report does reinforce the idea that interest in podcasts is growing well ahead of earlier forecasts. A February 2006 eMarketer study pegged the active podcast audience at about 3 million this year. Charlene Li of Forrester put the number around 700,000 in April.

The numbers are going in the right direction. Yet I’m waiting for the next study that I hope will have more value to advertisers and vendors. By comparing blog readers to podcasts audiences, there might be a clearer view of how far podcasting is penetrating mainstream consumers.