Podcast Research

By Pass It On Director/Presenter Adam South – 14472597

Podcast Review #1 – ‘Deserter Pubcast Episode 1’, deserter.co.uk – http://deserter.co.uk/2016/10/deserter-pubcast/

Podcast:

• 40:39
• Opening music
• Intro the notion of the series overall
• Intro themselves – self-deprecating, jokey
• Mention recording location explicitly – is this meta? Broadcast radio wouldn’t mention their location particularly
• Highlights of the episode
• Micro pubs
• Chit chat veering on a tangent – light in mood
• The tone and theme seems very; this is two South London blokes having a chat about bloke stuff in a pub.
• Golf comes up within 6 minutes
• Animals
• ‘Deserter philosophy’, ‘Deserter sensibilities’ keeps cropping up, theme, branding – how things relate to the topic of the show / the hosts.
• Humour = organic, presenters jibe one another.
• London centric; Battersea Park, Brockley etc.
• Pub news
• Punctuated by short music stings
• Micro pub background / history
• Drugs
• Social media news roundup
• Beers and ales
• Swearing is allowed
• “Housekeeping” – explicitly mentions/thanks off-mic crew, producer etc., landlord, owner
• Plug themselves at the end, all media platforms
• Thanks & ask for feedback
• Ending music

Platform (website):

• Has branding, with a large “Deserter” logo at the top, and a little slug line with a humorous catch phrase ‘Don’t. Give Up.’
• Logo placed on right in favour of the top left of the screen, typically the first part seen, being dedicated to social media links.
• Search bar
• Facebook ‘Like Us’ link
• Newsletter sign up
• Twitter feed
• The audio plays from a Souncloud widget, underneath which;
• Info about episode
• Follow us on Soundcloud
• Image credits, social media buttons, tags
• Previous / Next episode buttons
• Comments section

Podcast Review #2 – ‘Answer Me This Episode 347: Half An Eyebrow’, answermethispodcast.com – http://answermethispodcast.com

Podcast:

• 55:01
• Intro song, original, amateur, acoustic humour number
• Presenters straight in, don’t introduce right off the bat
• Slightly awkward, amateur-ish humour
• South London again
• Straight into a rambling anecdote, with off-shoots and rants (even looser than previous podcast)
• Male and female = main two presenters
• Male is married
• Tinder jokes
• Swearing acceptable again
• Straight into the format; the presenters debate a question from a listener (pre-prepared – from comments online it seems)
• A third presenter, male, chips in infrequently, less dominant, very poorly edited (has an echo effect on only his segments, like he has been edited in and/or recorded separately – comes off extremely amateurish and awkward)
• Presenter jibe each other quite firmly, makes for a more potentially awkward listen, but nevertheless light in tone and mood.
• Explicit sexual content; e.g. “I’m sure listeners have wanked off to your voice” – seems quite sudden, shocking and out of place; not really tasteful or consistent in tone.
• Awkward self promotional musical stings, like poor corporate ads
• Long talk about some product ‘Square Space’ the presenters are pushing.
• Long pauses frequently
• Tell listener how to send a question at the end, send via website to potentially be featured in following episode
• Outline upcoming side projects
• Outro music, same as intro, fades up during presenters’ end chatter, bit ropey

Platform (website):

• A very jumbled, busy, hard to discern ‘WordPress’ site
• Large branding header image at the top centre; the site actually seems strictly formatted to mobile device portrait – large gaps on left and right column
• As stated, not very visually appealing, the site reads like a jumbled mess, a scrolling feed of self promotion and random streams of consciousness, with links to the podcast episodes bookended by self promotion, ads, and even links to music videos.
• A small search bar, social media buttons, and even a graphic link to a merch store appear top right, but beyond that is mostly ads and self promotion
• Sound runs off ‘Soundcloud’ widget

Podcast Review #3 – ‘Not A Boxer’, Spark Podcasts – http://stories.co.uk/podcasts/not-a-boxer-nira/

Podcast:

• 08:02
• Intro; live, jazzy instrumental music, and an intro dialogue read by multiple contributors/presenters – feels very all encompassing, diverse, exciting and inviting, straight away from this start
• States clearly, this episode is presented by “Nira”.
• Anecdote about Nira’s experience of bigoted views on minorities in the field of advanced mathematics, and PHD’s in general
• Humorous, interjections of audience laughter reactions
• Inspirational story, going against odds, obstacles and expectations to become a successful mathematician
• Very illuminating, felt present in this performance, very engaging podcast!
• Happy ending, Nira got the PHD
• Story continues, still engages, belly laughs from audience, ties up all ends then some
• Ends with the music, thanks for listening, how to feedback and find more ‘Stories’ Podcasts.

Platform (website:)

• Layout very simple and elegant, less is more approach
• Black and white colour scheme, clear, user friendly and approachable
• Tabs at the top to navigate elsewhere around the Spark website
• The page for the podcast simply contains the player (running through ‘Cast’), the title and date of the piece and the presenter, with a short blurb and a thanks below

Summary of podcasts:

Podcast 1 – Deserter;

I felt that this podcast was colloquial, lightly humorous, and reflected the area that the presenters were in well, with a diverse array of local aspects covered, albeit from the bias perspective of the London based presenters – but with affection, comedy and in a somewhat entertaining way. I felt that this was a typical representation for this type of podcast; I felt that the length was appropriate, being not overly long (say if it were an hour plus), or too short for the amount of content they covered. I felt that the discussion between the two worked really well due to their pre-established relationship, working, travelling together etc. These are the elements which I would hope to reflect in our own podcast; a good level of friendly, on the nose banter, highlighting the significance of the locality of our pieces, and a length that feels fit for purpose.

Podcast 2 – Answer Me This;

The second podcast I examined was somewhat disappointing, as I had hoped the presenter might be more relatable, and given their level of experience at podcasting, professional sounding than Deserter – however, in fact, I found the exact opposite to be the case. This podcast didn’t sit well with me for a number of significant reasons, as should be clear from my initial interpretation of an episode, detailed above; in terms of minor grievances, there were technical issues to do with the sound and recording quality of the piece, and the interface of the platform was fairly off putting – majorly though, the tone was inappropriate and all over the place, the show seemed to be paced poorly, rambling at length about uninteresting nonsense with little regard for standard or focus, and the entire piece was punctuated with a souring level of self promotion that felt a bit sickly to my ears, personally.

Unfortunately, these traits can be commonplace across some, more amateurish podcasts – however I did not expect it here, and so was ultimately disappointed. There were not many redeemable qualities in my opinion, and for that reason I found no aspects which I hope to reflect; only what I would class as an example of how not to make a good podcast.

Podcast 3 – Spark Stories;

I enjoyed this final podcast the most out of all of the ones I listened to during my research, for numerous reasons – mainly its simplicity and effectiveness in it’s purpose; to tell stories, with diversity, style, and in an entertaining way. This podcast is inviting, rather than trying to demand the listeners’ attention needlessly, it succeeds mostly where the previous podcast (Answer Me This) fails – the key objective is achieved, it puts across one individual’s story. This instance happened to be the individual Nira, whom (with what sounds like a slight Birmingham accent, and in a live performance environment) proceeds to tell a story that might not necessarily be engaging – one about him achieving his mission to gain a PHD in mathematics, but the presentation is everything. The platform at once, giving practically the entire piece to the performance, allows us to become enchanted in the character of Nira, and caught up with the audience we hear laughing along. The mission statement here is clear, the presenter changing from instance to instance – these are real people, telling real stories; and this podcast’s task is discerning which to present to us. In summary my only qualm with this podcast is simply that there isn’t more to it, as it happily sit listening to similar content I dare say at great length.

What I hope to carry across from this work is the simplicity in communicating the stories and the achievements of others; ideally in as entertaining a way.

Summary of platforms:

Frankly, the best of the podcasts in my view – Spark Stories – has the best looking platform; in terms of aesthetics, it is visually appealing, reflecting the audio in it’s level of clarity and simplicity. The podcast is presented alone, against a black and white, straightforward background, just as the content within, an individual’s story, would be.

The Deserter site was also quite well put together, with a good sense of branding, ease of access and seemed to feature lots of additional content as well as several ways in which to comment and communicate back with the podcast and/or its presenters.

Finally, the least well designed platform was the one associated with Answer Me This – not surprising, the site was far from user friendly, with content laced together in an illogical stream that was less flowing and more of a mish-mash. Furthermore, there was more emphasis on shameless self promotion, and for other podcasts and projects the presenters had going on no less; than the actual episodes of this series.

Ideally, our platform will offer uses a simple, clear, but attractive interface, which presents the audio in a concise and effective way appropriate to our aims and intentions; with room for our potential listeners to fin additional features, content and information, as well as abundant ways to effectively reach out and feedback to us.

Contextual Research

Article 1 – “Creativity Becomes an Academic Discipline”, The New York Times – https://www.nytimes.com/2014/02/09/education/edlife/creativity-becomes-an-academic-discipline.html?_r=0

This article is an in depth look at the formal emergence and emphasis of ‘creativity’ in a traditional academic environment – mostly universities in America; which is relevant to our podcast thematically, in that we are striving to demonstrate that significant, creative as well as practical learning takes place and proper skills are acquired away from the boundaries of the mere classroom.

Part of the article talks of the professional world and businesses as of late putting more weight in the notion of creativeness in general, and applications carried across such as effective problem solving and how creativity translates to a more necessary and useful tool than, for instance, something like critical thinking.

I found a lot of this article useful essentially as an indicator that the premise of our podcast had merit, in my view, the fact that the article’s main takeaway is the prospect of imparting creativity to more practical, everyday situations, stands to vindicate our intended efforts to highlight and showcase how individuals across Lincolnshire have taken it upon themselves, in whatever circumstances, to learn a skill away from formal institutions and curriculums, and to explore the practical and creative elements of our contributors’ efforts.

Article 2 – “Lincoln Pupils Get Advice on School Allotment”, Lincolnshire Echo – http://www.lincolnshirelive.co.uk/lincoln-pupils-expert-advice-creating-allotment/story-15609254-detail/story.html

Originally I looked at this article as part of my research primarily for two reasons; that it was about the passing on of skills, and that it covered elements of crop growing – which is a planned discussion point with one of our contributors, Su Roys.

An aspect I liked about the article was the explanation of why the teachers at the school had elected to teach their students to grow their own fruit and vegetables in the first place; and the importance of learning about produce, and it’s proper origin, how to apply such a skill etc. – as they state, for some of the young pupils, it was as key as moving their perception on from thinking fresh produces starts and ends at the supermarket. This drives home for me the core aspect of pass it on, where the more practical skills we examine through our contributors have a necessity in their being passed on, and how this is different to the more creative side, which could be viewed as less urgent.

Obviously by its nature this article is more lightweight than the others I have looked at in my research – how it remains valid in my work, to aid in the consideration of why passing on skills is evidently so prominent in Lincolnshire, and in a wider sense, what it means to pass on a practical skill, against creative skills.

Article 3 – “Craig Bratley Talks”, The Ransom Note – http://www.theransomnote.com/music/interviews/craig-bratley-talks-exclusive-mix/

Rather than being a formulaic article like the others, this piece was an interview with a subject we have planned to interview for our podcast – Craig Bratley. I considered this piece as almost homework on the subject I knew that I would be interviewing personally, to get a deeper sense of his character, but also ideas about subjects he is comfortable and apt at discussing, and to gain more experience of how to approach phrasing questions aimed at a DJ, and the notion of that as a creative and practical skill.

I found this piece informative, and simultaneously quite relaxed in its flow, as is the typical manner of colloquial interviews with musicians for entertainment/journalistic purposes – and I got a good sense of Craig’s character as a focused, informed, and experienced local talent, with a deep knowledge and passion for what he does, but with a lighter side open to humorous banter and more comical exchanges and anecdotes. Hopefully this will factor in when I formulate my questions for the podcast interview – my hope is that I can tailor the knowledge I have gained to make the piece appropriately natural, warm, open to light humour – but also engaging and relevant to his skills as an artist.