This is a loose continuation of the previous article “The art of podcasting“

If you asked me now what a podcast is I would answer thus:

“An audio or video file placed on a website used to promote the goods and/or services of a corporation or social network based web app.”

Nevermind all that rss stuff or even mention of itunes or ipods, it’s not about that anymore. It’s not even about who actually makes the media - unless they are a name that is a brand itself.

Any half competent website proudly claims “We now even have some podcasts.” Often linking to a page with an embedded wmv file of a semi professionally made advert. You can’t even download the file in order to discover that it doesn’t play on an ipod. Not that you ever needed an ipod - I used to make a video podcats and never once saw what it looked like on an ipod. (Instead I used to use podshow’s mash player - lol)

The great democratisation that the left wingers proudly claimed have already been privatised. They are now called user generated content providers. But lets not forget that the left wingers are also the geeks. In a beautiful example this month’s Podcast User magazine features has a cover story about John Cleese. And whilst it goes into details about how he is using podcasting to promote his brand it closed the article with a list of what microphones he uses!

Now apart the fact John Cleese’s podcast isn’t renowned for it’s stereophonic soundscapes it’s an insult to him to forget that he is John FUCKING Cleece. I want to know what sort of mic he uses about as much as how big his cock is! (Favouring the latter of course.)

But let’s not think this just an attack on a publication that many of us enjoy and whose writers I have an enormous amount of genuine respect for. After all they dedicate most of their publication to discussion actual content in the form of show reviews and interviews.

Let’s instead take a look at their US centric competition. This month’s Blogger and Podcaster dedicates ONE PAGE to content, a generic article by Tee Morris. The remainder is given over to talk of business models, audience metrics, marketing, new gadgets and social networking.

This isn’t just geekery but right wing geekery. And yet it has the balls to declare CONTENT IS KING.

Well your fucking majesty why don’t you take a closer look at the content of your magazine.

Let’s rewind a little bit to how I would have described podcasting two years ago.

“Frustrated audience use mp3s and rss to make shows themselves free of the advertising, marketing and journalistic decay that undermined modern media.”

In short we were sick of all the shit. But the stupidest thinng in the world is that I got that defintion having listened to Adam Curry!

And now I’m doing my best to find a show that doesn’t spend most of it’s time discussing the goods or services of a third party. Nevermind GoDaddy ads - I’m turned off now by talk of podcasting itself. I am sick to death of Keith and Girl emails telling me to vote on podcast alley. I don’t listen to Keith and the Girl - and Podcast Alley is run by podshow. What idiots.

I’m sick of being invited to put a pin in a frappr map or add to friends on myspace.

And I’m assuming you are sick of it too - right?

So now I’m working on what I intend to do about it.

In part three of this article I hope to look at how and why this all happened and hopefully discuss how to learn from this and take preventative measures for my new venture.

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Here’s a photo of Soccer Girl and Dawn and Drew, they make great podcasts and this is a great photo don’t you agree? As Paul Nightingale would say a picture is worth a thousand pounds.

Now that I’m ‘free’ of podcasting, that is to say I don’t have to worry about my own show anymore but rather other people’s shows; I’m starting to see the entire thing in a new light. You know how it’s easy to give advice on other people love lives yet your own seems infinitely more complicated - well it’s just like that.

So my insight today was that all about this notion of community or as they say, social networks. Not podcasting networks but social ones (of course it’s a euphemism - like social services - there’s nothing social about it at all - that’s why the ‘add to friends’ button on myspace is so effective). A place where podcasters and their audience can communicate with each other but more importantly where audiences can communicate with each others regardless of the podcaster.

Every successful podcast I know has a forum of it’s own or at the very least a very busy comments section on their blog. I used to naively think that a show would acquire an audience ‘on it’s own merits‘ and the podcaster would then herd them like sheep into a forum. But now I’m starting to realise this isn’t the case at all.

In fact, I’m starting to realise it’s not the media at all that’s important. Rather it’s the message that is communicated via the medium. So therefore a forum can reiterate your message with added interactivity. People come together because of a common interest - they then wish to explore that interest by either consume some media or discussing it online.

April’s Podcast User Magazine has an article by Mark Hunter about Keith and the Girl - it’s worth reading, for it’s a reminder of how an audience can quickly be redressed into an army. I used to listen to an enjoy Keith and the Girl but ended up getting bored with all talk about people on their forum. I didn’t care about the other Keith and Girl listeners cared about the podcasters themselves.

But now I’m starting to see forums - at their best - as the same content repackaged (with added interactivity). And whilst I don’t like forums and I’m not a member of any podcast specific forums the point is not the interactively but the message itself.

Like this blog - at the moment I have something to say and I’m communicating it via the medium of text. It doesn’t matter if it’s funny, well written, riddled with errors or just plain wrong. If it’s message was compelling and I went out my way to promote this blog to a specific target audience then they would want to discuss at length.

But in all honesty I don’t really care what YOU think all that much. Sorry, but I much prefer writing rather than reading and I don’t much like talking about what everyone else is talking about. Please excuse my arrogance - I am capable of two way conversations but if all you want to talk about is one specific subject then you are clearly far more obsessive than I am!

So this can neatly transcribed into why Spainful Films failed (notice how I’m happy to refer back to me or my work). Because it’s message was ambiguous and never that relevant. That reluctance on my part to create a community for people to consume the same messages using another medium - whilst me true to myself (I hate talking to strangers) was being foolish from the business point of view.

I treated my audience as passive viewers rather than giving them flash buttons and hyperlinks to click on, or forums to post their banal photographs on - regardless of their relevance to me, my work or my message.

And finally that just making some media and putting it out there - regardless of it’s artistic merits - is quite simply useless.

That is why Keith and the Girl is the best podcast in the world and why I want nothing to do with any of it. I’d much rather just set my own artistic agenda than became just another forum you to join.

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Here’s a blow by blow account of what has happened over the last few months that lead up my decision to terminate the Video Podcast.

February 2007: Having had an extended break of a few months I finally get round to writing Detective Fashion’s third season of podcast episodes. The season is collectively called The Trial of Fashion and apart from ticking all the boxes in terms of plot is also very funny and completely new and different from the two series before it. For example, the entire series takes place in one room, the court room.

Early March: Dave and myself do a read through and and apart from a little rewriting everything seems fine. It would need two extra actors (to play the barristers) and camera person/director as camera movement was a must and both Dave and myself would be in shot almost all the time. Of course ideally it would need a prodcucer but we’ve somehow managed without so far.

It is decided that whilst it is unlikely that the series can be filmed in it’s entirely over the Easter holidays (our usual filming time) we can at least film a good few sequences (maybe even 25% of the series) and maybe even a couple of other stand alone films which introduce characters who turn up in the trial.

Late March: Dave and I attend an in-house seminar by Podshow. Having prepared a business plan for an idea that in my eyes would change podcasting in Britain I cafefully ask around to see if my plan would hold water keeping my cards very much to my chest. Both full time staff and other podcasters paint a picture of podcasting that differs from my own. I decide that my masterplan would fall on deaf ears and that even if it was accepted it would require more responsibility - in short it would need a damn good producer - the same thing that Spainful has been begging for since the start.

Early April: Dave decides he will not return to Jersey over Easter for the usual period of a 2-3 weeks (filming time). Instead he is to pop over for 3 days, meaning that filming cannot take place.

In a fit of panic and inspiration I write a six part script loosely titled ‘The All New Season 3′ which apart from introducing a ton of new characters is also dramatic shift in style for Spainful Films’ Video Podcast (lots of swearing). The series is to be performed solely by myself but with an extended cast over 10 puppets including the return of Vincent Harmony.

Dave as planned pops over and is surprised to hear about these new script for which he is not involved with in any capacity. (This isn’t the first time this has happened - Sandy’s initial series “I love the Media” was also made without the involvement of Dave). After reading the scripts he is shocked and slightly sceptical.

Closer analysis reveals that the scripts are a thinly disguised attack on various aspects of podcasting. The dual protagonists represent the ineptness of community based podcasters alongside the threat from corporate podcasters; masters of jargon fueledl rhetoric who preech about core values of social engagement node/system networks). Likewise Podshow themselves are targeted, through use of the Adam Curry character introduced in Fashion’s second season.

None the less filming begins and I stay up late working for several days and nights as I film all the puppets that I’ve been making over the last few months. I also film the Adam Curry sequences. I go to capture the new footage and once again the camera chews up the tape. It always does this but usually waits until after the footage has been captured. Knowing I’ll have to film some of the same scenes again I begin to loose heart.

I even use green screen for the first time in almost ten years! It looks awful of course but in this case that’s the point. In my head I see Dave’s look of bemusement and disappointment. I imagine him feeding my own words back to me about ther need for real drama to underpin the comedy - to treat the charcters no matter how they look or how they behave like real everyday people. But there is none of that here.

And slowly I realise the whole thing is a big pile of shit. Like crawling about in the dark for a bit of hope I realise I’m making something that even I can’t be bothered to watch. But there was no one there to stop me. Even when I made Sandy’s show I always had a guest or a guest camera person to perform to.

This new endeavour sign posted a new phase what I have been calling the decline in my mental health over the last 6 months. I often choose the word isolationist when talking about my social self but the reality of the situation is I’ve hidden in my room for most of the year. I don’t really to talk anyone at college - and with no lectures this year there is little point in going in anyway - and whilst I am capable of being genuinely social and even at best charismatic - I am also dogged by a constant sense of anxiety and crippling loneliness.

April 14th: Something inside my head breaks - or rather explodes. Unlike my usual depression in which I just don’t want to get out of bed, I find that my body seems to want to get me up and about. I find myself waking early, going for walks and eating healthier (out of nowhere I suddenley stopped smoking). But I also find it increasingly difficult to talk, I start stuttering for the first time in my life and have to stop to take deep breathes mid sentence. And when I go to bed I don’t just cry I fucking weep.

I feel utterly ashamed I can’t even put together some shitty little videos that no one watches. That all my work is shit and that the reason I’m like this is because I’m punishing myself for allowing my ego to delude myself into believing I should even try to better myself. It’s not that I just want to die at this point but that I actually deserve to die.

And with that I know there is something seriously wrong. I’ve learnt over the years that when I start thinking about suicide that I’m not well. That it’s all just a symptom of my illness and I’ll like myself again a few weeks. The point is I have to lift the load, not deal with the symptoms but the cause.

So I write to Neil Dixon at Podshow and tell him that’s it - no more podcast.

And I feel good for the first time in weeks. For it’s not as if I’m can’t work anymore it just means I won’t have to worry about writing; lighting; performing; filming; editing; sound designing; compressing; uploading; promoting; or discussing a show that only 50 people are subscribed to. That I won’t have to think about growth; the future; the brand and I won’t have to promote Podshow - and I won’t have to answer emails explaining how to use their god awful website because people can’t find the new episode. I won’t have to be put on hold by Podshow for a week while I’m put through the system.

And I feel good for a good few hours. Like the looking at the potential of a clean white page, which whilst I know I can’t fill it with ideas right now I can at least enjoy the peacefulness of it.

Neil telephones a few hours later and want to discuss it. And guess what - I talk to him for a good half hour - in English! - without crying! - hurray - and I sound like the professional human being I know I’m capable of being (or at least acting like). And I feel almost normal again.

Neil of course is reluctant to say “ok, see-ya then” and talks about moving forward and resolving the issues. I’m reminded of the scripts I’d written and how much this business-speak amuses me. Having explained the situation to him - that it’s all too much for me he asks if I’d still be theoretically interested in doing something else for Podshow. A beautifully diplomatic way of taking a measure from the fuck-you-o-metre. And of course I would, for desite the silly irritaing things (see above) that Podshow do they are no worse than any other company I’ve worked for/with.

And I’m reminded of the lifestyle that Dave has been trying to promote since we started. That we do a bit of writing, maybe have a few meetings and then other people do some stuff that is nothing to do with us. Then we get a call to turn on a given day in a certain costume and do a bit of acting and then go home and that’s it.

Let’s not forget a few weeks ago I wrote about student TV stations winning awards in which teams of 30 would get up and cheer. Is it riduculous to think that a single podcast could be made by 30 people? What would it be like - would it be 30 times better than what I failed to make on my own, with a broken camcorder.

And so I’m so once again on I’m hold for a week as I wait to hear what Neil has to say. In the meantime I’m trying to reprogram my brain to accept that my work isn’t shit and that I am a decent human being and I deserve, like everyone else, the best that life has to offer. And then I can get back to being true to myself again.

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