Radio radio. A fine example of a small story told well, from This American Life--a four-year-old grows very interested in Jesus and what he taught, and then she sees a connection to a new person she learns about, Martin Luther King. Go to Kid Logic (Episode 188) and skip ahead to 13:10 in the audio.

What takes this from a story to a good story? Well, there is something at stake: the father says that he is telling his daughter important things that she's never heard before, and you can tell that he's trying to be true to the richness of the teachings of Jesus and King without overwhelming the child. And the child is hungry for information about Jesus. So, something at stake.

And the people are not static. Their life together is unfolding through the child's growing understanding of the values taught by their two leaders. She's not quite the same at the end as she is at the start, and the father might not be the same either. The people move in their lives.

And there is suspense, maybe two ways. How will the father teach these complex things to his young daughter? How will she take them up? And further: once she figures out one thing about the example of their lives, will she figure out the second thing that is lurking there, that we as listeners know? And if she figures it out, how will she respond? This suspense ties into the stakes.

And an insight into human experience will be lightly stated or implied, as a result.

I remember a writer diagnosing a faulty draft of another writer's short story largely based on the idea of something being at stake. If someone stands to gain or lose, and the progress of the story depends on how that is worked out, that's a good sign about the draft of a story. If a writer has trouble saying in a sentence or two (to another writer or friend) what is at stake, then the story probably isn't clear about it either. Then the story isn't done. The story may have been told, but it hasn't been shaped, crafted, polished. It's not artful. (Source? I'll have to go find it.)

So there are formal elements that you can start to recognize in a good radio narrative. Having done so, maybe the chances of writing a better story improve. Or when you listen to a story, do you notice more about the people and our common humanity because you understand this aspect of story-telling? Maybe so.





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Sustainability interview. In a beginner's attempt to use some decent digital audio gear, a few months ago I recorded an interview with Paul Murray, Environmental Safety and Sustainability Director for Herman Miller, noted manufacturer of office furniture in innovative and sustainable ways. Schurz Library has posted the piece on the web, and you can listen to parts or to the whole stream. Questions touch on personal and corporate involvement in sustainability, community-building in corporations, ways students can prepare for new careers built around sustainability, and more.

The idea, not yet put into practice here, was to start interviewing as many of the interesting guest speakers who come to campus as possible, to capture something from all these good events and let others participate beyond the day of the visit. Obvious enough, but a little time-consuming.

Sadly, you can hear that I had the two microphones set at different levels, somehow, and that the building fan was running overhead the whole time. [0 & P]

Takeaway goes multimedia. On the NY Times business page today, Joe Nocera introduces the new Public Radio International morning show, The Takeaway, which is interesting because it promises to give a nudge to NPR's Morning Edition market dominance. But for our purposes here, notice the new show's commitment to interactive and multimedia approaches:

Surely, radio is not going to be the only medium to be exempt from the disintermediation force of the Internet.

And so this:

It is an attempt to create a more conversational kind of radio, she said, radio that is more adaptive and spontaneous and innovative than “Morning Edition” — and more interactive. Both Mr. Hockenberry and Ms. Udoji had computers in front of their mikes, and solicited e-mail from listeners that they read during the show.

Not that they've worked it all out, but you can hear the gears turning, the experiment underway, with plans for much more than emails on the air. See also the enjoyable and leisurely Bob Edwards audio interview with Takeaway hosts John Hockenberry and Adaora Udoji. Somewhere around 20 minutes in, they talk about the interactive vision for the show and its web site, still developing. One highlight is Hockenberry, I think, speaking of their project as a kind of aggregator site -- there's the best clue, perhaps, that they're trying to make a new move.

What's still missing, though, from public radio as I hear it, is a strong local and regional element woven into the NPR/PRI syndicated shows. It's very expensive to hire the staff for that kind of thing, and there may not even be a good model in place for how to do it. We have our little five minute weekly show here, Michiana Chronicles, as an example and a clue, but that's such a small amount of air time and such a small number of voices. [0 & P]

Elephant walk. I turned on the Mashatu Game Preserve video feed just now, and a dozen elephants were just stepping away from the pond, their tails swinging, their ears flapping.. It's overcast there in Botswana today, and many dozens of slender white birds are hanging out by the edge of the pond. Monkeys of some kind come strolling by the shore in single file, with the young riding like wealthy princes on the hip bones of the elders. [0 & P]

An African watering hole. They're still streaming live video and audio 24 hours a day from a pond in the Mashatu Game Reserve in Botswana. The side note says the best viewing times are 4-8 a.m. Eastern Standard Time or 12-4 a.m. as well, but I had a good viewing today in late morning, EST. At night you see the bushes and trees surrounding the pond and much darkness beyond the range of the lights, while in the day you can see beyond to the plain.

Both day and night right now the temperature is above 25 degrees Centigrade, and just now, near sunset, a small herd of something like gazels was nervously taking at turn at the water's edge. The males have dark ear tips and a white underbelly and horns shaped like parentheses. The camera turns to a group of monkees of some kind, with a plentiful cloud of young wrestling among themselves while the elders sit and keep an eye out. The youngest one is given a push over repeately by slightly elder cousins; when given a chance, the little one plays with a round rock that has caught its eye. All the while some sort of bird, I believe, is clicking and singing -- its note riding just on the edge between percussion and melody, never quite sure which it is.

A quiet time after the monkees go; eventually a small herd of sleek buffalo-like cattle slide by the bushes into view. Maybe a dozen of them, with hair standing on the ridges of their backs and horns like italicized parentheses in some hip modern font. Just behind them, a zebra waiting its turn. Something spooks the herd and they rush off, then settle a few dozen yards away. They turn and splash back into the water; you hear the sound of it on the other side of the world. The ones that don't step into the pond kneel at the very edge and drink, their front legs down. The camera turns aside to the lone zebra having a long drink. It's legs are pure white down to the hooves.

National Geographic is taking people on a week-long visit to the pond and its region this summer. [0 & P]

Just say yes. At lunch today with Andrew and Misty, podcasters of small farm living over at Geek Farm Life, Andrew offered a few tips about podcasting. First of all, just do it, just get started, make a recording, and another, and another, even if the first ones don't satisfy you. In time, you'll find the shape of the thing, build the craft, hone the skills, and you'll have something. Second, choose a subject matter that you can stay with over time, something with many aspects that you can explore and learn from and enjoy. Third, offer people something they can't easily get elsewhere, some instruction that can encourage them and get them started on whatever it is you're discussing.

If I had to add to the list based on listening to the two of them talking on their podcasts and in person, I'd add: Enjoy details, because they are suggestive and help you solve problems; adapt, and enjoy change, because when you take ideas and experience seriously you're not going to want to do the same thing this year that you did last year, not quite at least; enjoy the differences between similar things, because these reveal the nature of both more fully; imagine that there might be good reasons for all manner of human practice, old and new, and be willing to commit some of your energies to preserving some of the old practices; no matter how open you are to ideas and experience, don't be afraid to reject some things boldly and confidently.

Also: Learn how to make something fabulous, like the honey Misty and Andrew brought from their own hives as a present to the students at Indiana University South Bend today. [0 & P]

Geek Farm Life. Among the most active of northern Indiana's barncasters, that is, podcasters, are Andrew and Misty of Geek Farm Life. They're on Barncast #110 now, recounting their life and work on a small farm. Try the first two minutes of #110 and see if you aren't envious of the upbeat spirit.

Listeners leave messages on the answering machine that end up in the audio -- they ask questions, help solve animal husbandry problems, follow up on previous barncasts, and add a community feeling to the many projects that our two farming podcasters always have underway. And you hear the barnyard animals having a noisy time in the background.

They've produced something in the neighborhood of 100 hours of audio, one week at a time. It's a fun and instructive combination of web audio, livestock, autobiographical documentary, good old American self-fashioning, and the joys of technology. [0 & P]

One clue. Indiana University has asked faculty on the eight campuses to propose ways to use podcasting and video equipment that will be given out in the form of grants to the most promising projects. In other words, a top-down buy-in, a call for production all across the state university system, with tech support. [0 & P]

Art museum student podcasts. Notre Dame professor Chris Clark has asked students to produce podcasts about selected works of art in the collection of the university's Snite Museum. These SniteCasts involve digital gear, Garage Band, podsafe music, some research, sometimes another student reading the text. Twenty or so pieces are up on the web site as well as on the major podcast subscription services.

I like the idea of annotating the campus, the community, some big event, via podcasts. [0 & P]

The Four Yorkshiremen come to class. Teaching my class how to use Audacity tonight, and we needed a script to practice on ... I printed out a copy of "The Four Yorkshiremen" by Monty Python. It was just over three minutes of audio but made the whole process a lot of fun. Four students played the speaking parts and one directed, calling for lines to be repeated when necessary. A few minutes of digital editing and playback before class was done ... and people still laughing along the way.

It was one of five audio pieces we heard during class: an interview; a teaching segment with a bit of music, examples, jokes; a dynamite political poem by Auden; and a teaching segment read directly from a textbook. The contrasting styles, content, and form helped start a conversation about the demands of genre as well as the appeal of mixed media in some cases. I think it's almost always a good sign when people can talk about genre.

Next week, students all go through their blogs looking for pieces that might make good podcast, or else they work up something fresh. [0 & P]