Podcasting site Odeo has relaunched. Again. We have kind of lost count, but Beta News says that this is Odeo’s sixth launch. Initially launched mid-2005, Odeo debuts (again) with a number of new features.

The biggest addition to the site is video, but other new capabilities allow users to:

– Search & explore over 500,000 channels with millions of audio & video episodes
– Browse by category or by keyword tags
– Subscribe to channels & get notified when new episodes are published
– Rate & review content
– Collect favorites & create playlists
– Create a profile page & connect with friends
– Get recommendations & discover new and relevant content
– Share content via email or embed into external sites & social networks

Some of the features are not yet available, but are promised to be in the works, such as synching to mobile devices, easier embedding of audio and video for social networks plus an upgraded set of recording tools through a new version of Odeo Studio. There is also talk of bringing back the Fire Ant media player to the site.

Odeo’s parent company, Sonic Mountain, has also forged “strategic partnerships” with content networks Revision3, blip.tv, and NextNewNetworks, to build out Odeo’s library.

Odeo has had a colorful history. Founded in 2005 by Evan Williams, co-founder of Blogger and Twitter, the company was purchased by Sonic Mountain in 2007. (Lots of previous articles about Odeo here.)

If you have some thoughts to share about the new Odeo site and features, or reminiscences of older incarnations of the site, we’d like to hear from you.