Jimiminar takes to the airwaves!

It's no secret that I've quickly developed a love for podcasts - who ever knew there would be such (mostly) great content out there, and free too. So much so, that for pretty much everything out there, if you like something so much, then it is a natural step to want to emulate that. I have been giving some serious thought to maybe knocking together my own podcast, and the reality of this could be closer than you think.
I have looked into what it takes to actually produce a podcast, and all that is required at it's core is a microphone and a means of recording it. I also checked out methods to host the podcast themselves, and there are free services for low requirements - i.e producing a small(ish) podcast on a weekly, or fortnightly basis.

Now, I am planning to post about some of the cool (and not so cool) podcasts I have discovered on my travels over the Internet and the iTunes store (lol), and one thing that does hold true is that 2 is the magic number. That is, podcasts work (in my opinion) the best where there are two hosts. With just one host, it does seem to much of a monologue - with two hosts banter and the back and forth can be had. It also means that that the other host can pick up the slack, as with the desire to keep speaking throughout. With three hosts, it generally degrades into chaos - everyone talking over each other; only with great discipline can order be achieved.

I'm pretty sure I mentioned a while back, that I would happily entertain the idea of putting together a podcast if a co-host could be found. Now, fast-forward to last weekend, and in the attendance of my good buddy Wilson, we checked out an archive recording of Wilson's Corner - a show we put on the student radio station, RaW. During that session, I showed Wilson some of the video podcasts and coupled with the infliction of nostalgia, the idea of resurrecting Wilson's Corner was quickly suggested.
Now it would be pretty pr0 to do that, I definitely had a lot of fun putting on Wilson's Corner, particularly the pre-show meetings we had, which were let's face it, an excuse to grab some ales. Whilst it would be a good thing to start up again, I do have my concerns on the form the rebirth could take. Looking back on Wilson's Corner, something that was kinda clear back then, but painfully obvious listening to it today was how disjointed the show was. There was no real cohesion, Wilson and myself coming at the show from two completely different angles. Never was that anymore obvious than the music which populated the show; and how often we argued for our own songs to receive the airplay.

Yeah, so a new show would be pretty cool, but we will have to decide what to base it on. It makes sense to have the banter on things which interest us, which for myself would probably turn into a bit of geek show, much like the podcasts Extralife Radio and The Totally Rad Show. Now I can't Wilson wanting to indulge in that, his thoughts on watching the live Amsterdam episode of Diggnation (with more mainstream and accessable stories it has to be said) being:

"Well it's geeky, but there were some laugh-out-loud moments..."

If the podcast show does get it off the ground, ideally I would probably knock up a solo show of my own, so I can get my geek on. That show would be more of an audioblog as such, rather than a podcast. I keep going on how I should be more of a proactive blogger, so jumping on the mic would be so much easier to keep the blog uptodate.

To go on a slight tangent, WoW introduced voice chat natively into the game as of patch 2.3 and that got me thinking it was time to buy a headset. Especially if I want hit my aim of being part of an active raiding guild, they usually have a ventrillo server set up. So getting a headset could have double the usage. One as used in WoW, and the other to produce podcasts with.
I plan a two-pronged attack with the personal podcast as well. Not only would it keep the blog uptodate, but it could help boost the confidence. I always "enjoy" leaving answerphone messages and literally talking into a mic would be an extension of that. I can imagine that I would probably be "erring" and "umming" a lot at first, but eventually it would probably get smoother. Also, the production would hopefully increase as I get more familiar with producing podcasts and have a go at editing and all that fun. As Randy Deluxe of The Instance Podcast fame says: Once you're able to talk comfortably with four listeners, it's the same with more and more listeners, to paraphrase.

It looks like the purchase of a headset will have to wait till after next payday, but it's definitely sooething I want to try so watch out.