NPR comes to Joplin

I listen to everyday on my way to and from work.  A lady from church called this week to say that NPR would like Wednesday to interview some intelligent, politically active women like my wife, Kimra, and her mother, Elizabeth.  Our church has a dinner every Wednesday night.  NPR wanted to interview some conservative women in the conservative SW corner of the conservative state of Missouri.  My family are Democrats, so they got to contribute to a more balanced perspective.  We got to meet Senior NPR correspondent Linda Wertheimer while she interviewed Kimra and her mom about issues like health care and the effect of the economy.  They did a great job, and I’ll post a link here once it is podcast on their website.

After the interview I managed to catch the producer and ask her about her recording equipment.  Since I have done a little podcasting, I was curious how the professional does it.  She was using a Sony TCD-D3 walkman recorder.

Sony TCD-30 Walkman Recorder

She was also using a directional mike and headphones.  I asked her how she made sure she got good sound.  She said you need a good microphone.  “You get that good NPR sound by putting it up really close to their chin.  Most people are afraid that getting the mike too close will scare the person, but have to get it right there [about 2 inches from their mouth].”  Pointing it at their chin keeps you from getting the puffs and plosives.

I asked her whether the headphones let her monitor the sound, and she let me try them on.  The sound was amazing.  The directional mike is long with smaller mikes along it’s length.  I could hear the ambient sounds in the room with the headphones than I could with just my ears.  I did a short interview with my son, Glenn.  I could hear my interview questions low and clear, but I could hear his answers as clear as a bell.  It was like the directional mike was the primary sound and the ambient mikes were the secondary, softer, background sounds. The microphone definately makes a difference.

I asked her about post-production editing.  She said, “Edit, edit, edit and tell the story.”  She may start with 3 hours of raw recording footage and edit down to a 5 minute NPR story.  Wow, talk about telling a concise story!  She asked me what program I used to edit my podcasts.  I told her Audacity is what everyone uses. They use what is now Adobe Soundbooth .

I asked her about copy on music for intro and outro.  She rolled her eyes and said that is a huge issue.  The music companies want to be played every time the song plays, and they say NPR is playing too much of the music.  Plus when it plays on the radio, it plays just once, but when they post it as a podcast on their web site, it develops a long tail.  It is also hard to tell how many times it is actually played.  I suggested that traditional copyright laws need to be revised to address the long tail of user-created content posted on the web.

It was a great conversation with a professional broadcast producer.

Creative Commons License

This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 3.0 United States License.

no comments yet.

Clustermaps - My lovely dots are gone

I looked at my Clustermap on the lower right side of my page and was shocked to see that I only had a few dots on my map.

That was quite a change from my Clustermap that used to look like this:

Then I saw a message on the larger clustermap that said This map was archived on 5 Oct 2008 [explain]

Which then brought me to:

I see a note saying “This map was (or will be) archived”, or I’ve noticed that my lovely dots are gone. What does this mean?

Apparently, the maps are archived and reset annually.  So,  now I get to see where people this year come from to visit.  Kinda cool…and current.

So if all your lovely dots disappeared from your clustermap, your reader haven’t necessarily left you (hopefully).  You just get a fresh start. 

Creative Commons License

This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 3.0 United States License.

no comments yet.

Protecting Children in the 21st Century Act passes

The update to CIPA passed in the U.S. Congress.  The emphasis for online safety is shifting from filtering to educating. I wanted to get it straight from the horse’s mouth, so I went to the Govtrack.us to find the bill.  I found two main parts interesting.  First was a new public awareness campaign.

SEC. 212. PUBLIC AWARENESS CAMPAIGN.

(1) identifying, promoting, and encouraging best practices for Internet safety;

(2) establishing and carrying out a national outreach and education campaign regarding Internet safety utilizing various media and Internet-based resources;

(3) facilitating access to, and the exchange of, information regarding Internet safety to promote up-to-date knowledge regarding current issues; and

The Federal Trade Commission shall carry out a nationwide program to increase public awareness and provide education regarding strategies to promote the safe use of the Internet by children. The program shall utilize existing resources and efforts of the Federal Government, State and local governments, nonprofit organizations, private technology and financial companies, Internet service providers, World Wide Web-based resources, and other appropriate entities, that includes–

(4) facilitating access to Internet safety education and public awareness efforts the Commission considers appropriate by States, units of local government, schools, police departments, nonprofit organizations, and other appropriate entities.

I’ve used http://www.netsmartzkids.org/ and http://www.mcgruff.org/.

SEC. 215. PROMOTING ONLINE SAFETY IN SCHOOLS.

• (3) by adding at the end the following:
Section 254(h)(5)(B) of the Communications Act of 1934 (47 U.S.C. 254(h)(5)(b)) is amended–

‘(iii) as part of its Internet safety policy is educating minors about appropriate online behavior, including interacting with other individuals on social networking websites and in chat rooms and cyberbullying awareness and response.’.

Creative Commons License

This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 3.0 United States License.

no comments yet.