Creating in Public: A New Series

Welcome to a new series, Creating in Public.

Creating in Public is my journey back to the joy of media creation.

You’re probably thinking, “Wait, isn’t media creation typically a public endeavour?” Well, yes, the final product is usually public, but in this series, I’m going to share everything as it happens.

Background

During high school, I was the “AV Geek.” It was a perk of being a member of the AV Club and it occasionally got me out of classes to do stuff that I enjoyed.

In college, I earned a double major: in addition to Marketing, I earned a BA in Media Production.

I had an on-campus job managing AV in the student center and theater and got to experience new technologies that I would otherwise never have access to - things like the LCD projectors that we all take for granted now and wireless audio gear.

And, yes, I was a DJ and radio personality on our college radio station. (Due to FCC regulations, the station was so low-powered that it only covered about 4 square miles. I used to joke on air, “Welcome to WMAR! We’re a big cordless phone!”) Then there was that time that students kept calling in to request Rock Lobster by the B52’s over and over again - so I played it for an hour. (The station manager was not pleased.)

So, in 2005, when podcasting became a thing, I jumped in with both feet, producing a show that had tens of thousands of downloads per month - small numbers by today’s standards, but we were very proud of the worldwide community we built. After a number of life changes by me and my co-hosts - new jobs, cross-country relocation - we finally ended the show. While we all enjoyed producing it, getting everyone to connect at the same time for recording was like herding cats.

In 2012 I started another podcast focused on the niche of event technology for a company that I co-founded. I wanted to meet as many industry trend makers as possible and an interview show was a great way to do that. It was particularly great at conferences where the organizers would provide us with some space to record interviews and capture video. After a couple of years, the organizers used to tout it as a benefit to attendees and sponsors. That came to an end when I left the company in late 2017.

Since then, I’ve been heads down working at a ginormous tech company creating new software partnerships and building new products.

As busy as I’ve been, I really missed the fun of producing media and a few months ago, decided to dive back into the pool.

This series will cover the steps I have been (and will be) taking including:

• Creating a show concept based on a topic that I love, that works with my schedule and minimizes post-production
• Naming the show
• Setting up a new home studio including new audio gear and acoustic treatment
• Creating new workflows for the Linux desktop, including DAW’s, Windows Virtual Machines and other nerdy stuff
• Utilizing podcast technologies that didn’t exist even a few years ago
• Giving up some control to SaaS platforms, instead of self-hosting all my backend and frontend technology
• Securing interviews with industry leaders when I currently have zero listeners, using only my reputation and network of friends and colleagues to make connections
• Finding and using royalty-free music and sound effects
• Adding video (when appropriate)
• Marketing and promoting the show
• Other Shenanigans

Join Me

If you want to join me on this journey, sign-up for email updates (below) or go ahead and subscribe to this blog in your favorite RSS reader.