Posts tagged radio
Where to Start as a Journalist? Try the Peabody Awards
I’m graduating in May in hopes of becoming a journalist. I’ve had internships and I’ve worked for my university’s online news source. Can you steer a terrified senior in a direction? Where should I look? What should I be looking for? What should I work on?” — Helena
We get questions like this fairly frequently and there’s no exact answer. But with yesterday’s announcement of the 2012 Peabody Award winners we’re seeing the incredible range of today’s journalism.This isn’t to say that you can’t quibble with this story winning over that story, or say they could chose more innovative work, but it is to say that if you look at the winners from the Web, radio, television and documentary you see a wild diversity of storytelling approaches and ideas.
And reviewing some of the winners, I think, is a great place to start.
Start with the Web and The New York Times win for “Snow Fall: The Avalanche at Tunnel Creek,” a multimedia feature using aerial photography, video and words while taking advantage of contemporary presentation techniques such as responsive design and parallax in order to augment and further drive the story forward.
SCOTUSBlog is the other Web winner. There are no bells and whistles. Instead, it’s pretty much a text only blog that’s become a go to resource for stories, background and explainers on all things that have to do with the US Supreme Court. Here, deep, thorough, consistent reporting and analysis wins out.
Radio, I think, is in a golden age and the reason I think this is is because of the launch of iTunes back in 2001. This allowed people to easily subscribe to podcasts — and by extension radio programming — that we previously didn’t have access to. Yes, RSS already existed but iTunes gave us an easy interface to either hear or distribute programming. While your local public radio station might not carry it, you can now hear everything from the BBC’s From Our Own Correspondent to The Moth Radio Hour, 99% Invisible and Radiolab among a host of other exceptional programming.
Each of these programs uses different techniques and styles. By listening and analyzing, we learn new tricks that expand our understanding of what’s possible in audio storytelling.
One of this year’s radio winners comes from Radio Diaries, is called “Teen Contender” and follows the 16-year-old Olympic boxer Claressa Shields in a first person narrative from Flint, Michigan to London. Here’s a great breakdown by Julia Barton on the techniques used and how this created great radio.
Other radio winners include WNYC’s Leonard Lopate Show, a “traditional” hosted show about New York’s political and cultural life; This American Life’s “What Happened at Dos Erres,” an incredible radio documentary about a Guatemalan immigrant in Boston “who learns that the man he believed to be his father actually led the massacre of his village”; and NPR for its hard news reporting in Syria by Kelly McEvers and Deborah Amos.
I’ll leave it at this and with the recommendation to explore different types of journalism awards across magazines, multimedia, photography, documentary, radio and the rest. Through it, you’ll come across work that brings about an “Aha!” moment, one that makes you say, “This is what I want to do.” And then start positioning yourself and aiming towards doing it by applying for work — or learning the skills needed to apply for work — in that area.
Hope this helps. — Michael
Have a question? Ask away.
Larry King on Getting Seduced
Kicking off a new animated series created by Blank on Blank and PBS Digital Studios is this flashback interview with Larry King.
In it, King recalls a time from his early years on the radio when he received a telephone call from a woman who said, “I want you.”
As a young 20-something, he did what a young 20-something is apt to do: told his audience they would hear a complete Harry Belafonte album, put on the record and drove off to find some love.
And then a very big problem occurs.
Where are the Women in Podcasting?
Via Julie Shapiro at Transom.org:
What’s the aural equivalent of a vantage point? From whatever that’s called, from my perch at the Third Coast International Audio Festival, an observation has been increasingly nagging. It’s nothing new, it’s fairly obvious, and it deserves your attention. It is the lack of female hosts in the ever-widening world of podcasts.
I generally keep up (or try to) with what’s out there in the radio/audio/podcast cosmos, so I’ve been aware that male-hosted podcasts (MHPs) out-number women-hosted podcasts (WHPs), easily. But the actual numbers floored me. According to the widely-used podcast-delivery phone app Stitcher, as of mid-February, 2013, out of the top 100 podcasts in their system, 71 are hosted by men (many by two or three men), 11 are hosted by women (of which three are just 60 seconds long), 9 are co-hosted by a man and woman, and 9 are either NPR or BBC news aggregation podcasts with alternating hosts and reporters, or it’s unclear who hosts. iTunes results were similar.
Though these numbers may not surprise, they should alarm you too. And they point to the disappointing truth: that podcasting – hailed back in 2004 as a “revolutionary” new tool for freedom of expression and endless creative opportunity – quickly copped the same gender stereotypes and realities that traditional broadcasting environments have demonstrated throughout history.
Of course I’m not the only one who’s noticed this, or thinks about it. Nick van der Kolk (Snap Judgement, Love + Radio) posited the question via Facebook back in 2011, and Ashley Milne-Tyte (The Broad Experience) wrote about it last year, just to point to a couple of previous public ponderings. But it is an issue that merits continuous noise, so here’s an attempt to bang on a few more pots and pans about the situation.
I asked two dozen people (half women, half men) in the extended Third Coast community (producers, pub radio decision-makers, podcast hosts) to weigh in on the topic. A little more than half responded. Of those who did, approximately 85% were women. What follows are my own thoughts, combined with observations and opinions from those who responded to my questions. Without getting too investigative, or too scientific, or too statistically inclined, there seem to be a few main factors (and many smaller ones) contributing to the egregious imbalance of MHPs to WHPs.
Read on for Julie’s thoughts and examples of great female-hosted podcasts and programming.
Michael Jackson’s Thriller Turns 30
Billboard has an interesting history about the November 30, 1982 release of Thriller. In it, we learn of technology disruption (FM was replacing AM radio) and the audience fragmentation that occurred because of it.
We also learn about CBS Records’ concern over the album’s potential success:
Since the start of the [80s], black music had been increasingly banished from most white-targeted radio stations. This was partially due the virulent, reactionary anti-disco backlash that resulted in the implosion of that genre at the end of 1979. As the 80’s dawned, programmers increasingly stayed clear of rhythm-driven black music out of fear of being branded “disco,” even when the black music in question bore little resemblance to disco. This backlash was greatly magnified by the demise of AM mass appeal Top 40 radio at the hands of FM, which led to black artists being ghettoized on urban contemporary radio, while disappearing from pop radio, which focused on a more narrow white audience.
How dramatic was the decline of black music on the pop charts in that period? In 1979, nearly half of the songs on the weekly Billboard Hot 100 pop chart could also be found on the urban contemporary chart. By 1982, the amount of black music on the Hot 100 was down by almost 80%.
Also, and notably, MTV had just launched. But the music videos the station played were very white as it followed the playlists occurring on the FM charts. They too were very hesitant to give Jackson airtime.
[MTV executives at the time] concede that the channel initially assumed it would not play the video, as its thumping beat and urban production did not fit the channel’s “rock” image. They contend however that in mid-February, after seeing the clip—which was possibly the best that had ever come across their desks—they began to re-think things.
Good thing they did.
Billboard, Michael Jackson’s ‘Thriller’ at 30: How One Album Changed the World.
The Making of a Radio Empire: A Fascinating Tour of NBC in the 1940s
Before television took over the airwaves, Rockefeller Center was home to the National Broadcasting Company during the golden age of radio. This promotional film from around 1948 chronicles the rise of the media company from a small collection of 20 affiliated stations, formed in 1926, to more than 170 stations two decades later. The 24-minute documentary, courtesy of the Prelinger Archive, introduces the network and goes behind the scenes at Rockefeller Center, peeking into the mail room, sound recording studios, and music library.
FJP: This is nice excuse to nerd out for 24 minutes and get your history on. We highly recommend exploring the archives too.
What Happened At Dos Erres
We are totally enjoying a recent episode of This American Life on the story of Guatemalan immigrant Óscar Ramírez:
In 1982, the Guatemalan military massacred the villagers of Dos Erres, killing more than 200 people. Thirty years later, a Guatemalan living in the US got a phone call from a woman who told him that two boys had been abducted during the massacre — and he was one of them.
Beyond the fascinating storytelling, what we liked the most is the degree of collaboration between several journalistic enterprises: startup extraordinaire ProPublica, Colombia-based Fundación MEPI, independent journalist Habiba Nosheen, and This American Life.
Insofar, their collaboration has already rendered a remarkable set of journalistic products (and byproducts): an in-depth essay, a timeline, a slideshow, and an eBook. Praiseworthy by all means.
Image: Partial screenshot of Óscar’s Story, by Sebastian Rotella and Krista Kjellman Schmidt. Via ProPublica.
FJP: If you haven’t listened to this, set aside some time and do so. It’s an amazing story.
An Incredible Audio Archive in the Making
Anne Wootton and Bailey Smith, winners of a $300,000 Knight News Challenge grant, are the creators of Pop Up Archive. They are building open-source software and partnering with the Internet Archive to streamline the entire workflow of a radio producer — from ingestion to cataloging to eventual distribution.
“What’s closest to our heart is saving oral history. It’s actually easier to lose your material that’s digital than it is to lose something that was on a tape,” Smith told me. Data gets corrupted, or just lost. Thousands of files called 000001.WAV become meaningless to humans.
FJP: Oh man. This will be so incredibly useful.
Bonus: Here’s an FJP interview with David Gerlach, founder of Blank on Blank, which is slightly different and equally awesome.
30 Days, 30 Lost Interviews
Last week I met with David Gerlach, founder and creator of Blank on Blank, a nonprofit that salvages, archives and remixes audio recordings journalists submit from their past interviews.
Visit the site now and you’ll see and hear from Allen Ginsberg, Thom Yorke, Dave Brubeck and even Jonathan Alter on how to interview presidents.
Blank on Blank currently has a Kickstarter campaign up and running. Aside from the $10,000 they hope to raise, they’re also trying to “raise” 30 new interviews. Have a great one on your hard drive or in a shoe box? Visit Blank on Blank and tell them about it.
In the Q&A below, we discuss how Blank on Blank started, how it works with Public Radio Exchange to distribute these lost interviews and give them new life, and what it means to remix an old audio interview. — Michael
FJP: What is Blank on Blank? What’s its origin story?
David Gerlach: Blank on Blank’s mission is simple: turn print journalists’ lost interview tapes into new unheard multimedia. We are a nonprofit transforming journalists’ interviews gathered to write stories, into a new podcast, public radio series, and collection of animated shorts on YouTube. The future of journalism? Remixing the past.
FJP: Why is archiving, salvaging and ultimately repurposing this material important?
David: So many remarkable stories are in danger of being lost forever. Yet there is a huge mobile, online, and radio audience that wants to hear them. As a former print journalist I always thought about these amazing conversations I had on tape that no one ever got to hear after I finished a story. There is something about hearing someone tell a story in an intimate setting versus reading what was said. We want to help print journalists expand their portfolios and realize the untapped value of the interviews gathering dust on their tapes and computer hard drives. It’s about rebooting and striking back in the face of a print media world that’s been turned upside down. Plus it’s easy to do.
FJP: When you get an audio interview in, what happens next?
David: We take a listen and and cull the interviews for the must-hear outtakes. We want evergreen stories. Unexpected conversations from the well known and universal tales from everyday Americans. Then our talented public radio-seasoned producers polish and edit the audio, add some music and storytelling, and a Blank on Blank is born. We turn most interviews into smart audio slideshows. And cartoonists, illustrators, filmmakers, graphic artists, and photographers turn these pieces into inventive videos that live on YouTube and beyond.
FJP: I’ve seen Blank on Blank production on PRX. What’s that all about? How and where is this material being used and distributed?
David: The Public Radio Exchange (PRX.org) is a phenomenal partner. They distribute both our new podcast and our interview segments to public radio stations. So now Blank on Blank content is being heard on stations across the country, as well as on XM Satellite radio. PRX is also home to The Moth Radio Hour, WTF with Marc Maron, and 99% Invisible, so we are honored to be in such must-hear company.
FJP: How can journalists get involved?
David: It’s easy. Have an interview or an interview excerpt you think should be heard? Go to http://blankonblank.org/your-interviews/ and tell us about it. Maybe there was an aside, an anecdote, or unbelievable story that came up when reporting a story. Or one that didn’t make it into print, but it always stuck with you. Perhaps there is a choice back and forth you think encapsulates an article or book you are writing now or years ago. Think of this as a multimedia sidebar to reach whole new audiences. Then all it takes is uploading the digital interview file to our storage cloud (or getting us a tape). From there we do all the production work. We also welcome any and all editorial input and do love recording our contributors to set the scene for their interview, if they’d like to.
FJP: You have a Kickstarter up and running, what do you plan to do with the funds if you raise them?
David: We’ve launched a slightly different kind of Kickstarter. This funding platform has become such a creative force we thought it was an ideal place to raise not only money ($10,000), but content. We’re looking to raise 30 lost interviews in 30 days - the best unheard conversations from journalists that have never been heard. The best excerpts from these interviews will be transformed and shared with new audiences. Funds raised on Kickstarter will go directly to covering audio and video production costs.
FJP: Why should a journalist or a publication partner with Blank on Blank?
David: Why shouldn’t they? We make it nearly effortless for our contributors to get more mileage from work that’s already been done. They reach new listening and video audiences simply by getting us an interview, raising the awareness of the journalist, the publication, and even driving a new audience back to the original print stories. We’ll take it from there. Our contributors keep the rights to their original interviews and get a new piece of multimedia to host on their website. Plus Blank on Blanks are perfect for spreading via social media. Our sole mission as a non-profit is to preserve journalists’ interviews and bring your work to life.
Speed-produced Longshot Radio to make its next episode this week with Radiolab, in 48 hours, with everybody
Think improv where you can cry if you want, and where there’s no stage or troupe - just a booth and a microphone. From their camp at the 99% Conference (which doesn’t have anything to do with Occupy Wall Street) theme-based Longshot Radio will release a series of radio pieces on experimentation and the times when risks don’t pan out. And they’ll do it really fast.
There are many ways to become involved from anywhere, all of which are clearly spelled out here.
And seeing as how the show asks passersby to go out on a limb and tell a personal story, we asked executive producer Jody Avirgan to share some of his experiments-gone-wrong, and how he and his friends managed to create something so unique. He told us this:
Certainly at 4am on Sunday last time around, we were questioning the whole endeavor. But, yes, the idea is to not be afraid to try things, and to react to each little failure with a tweak and an adjustment, rather than throwing up your hands. So, there are countless moments where you have a big idea (“we should get people from every country in the world to remix the same radio piece in the next four hours”) that butts up against possible failure. You then adjust, and find other unexpected victories.
This American Life Retraction Transcript for Daisey Foxconn Episode
Via Ira Glass, This American Life:
I should say, I am not happy to have to come to you and tell you that something that we presented on the radio as factual is not factual. All of us in public radio stand together and I have friends and colleagues on lots of other shows who – like us here at This American Life – work hard to do accurate, independent reporting week in, week out. I and my coworkers on This American Life are not happy to have done anything to hurt the reputation of the journalism that happens on this radio station every day. So we want to be completely transparent about what we got wrong, and what we now believe is the truth.
And let’s just get to it.
The transcript walks us through Mike Daisey’s trip to China to investigate labor conditions at Foxconn, and leads to an interview between Marketplace’s Rob Schmitz, Ira Glass and Daisey himself.
Babes of NPR: It’s definitely a thing.
If you’ve ever been told you have a face for radio, you know it’s not a compliment. These public radio employees disprove the stereotype that radio is where homely journalists go to hide themselves. Babes of NPR is a Tumblr blog that features photos and descriptions of some of public radio’s most recognizable voices, as well as the young and ravishing staff that make our favorite shows happen.
Pictured above is my high school classmate Benjamin (Benny) Bergman, a producer on Morning Edition, one of NPR’s flagship broadcasts. Who says you can’t work in radio and have it all?
Ira Glass: ‘Who cares if radio survives? Something else will happen’
It’s a predictable but important question, whenever you get a group of successful radio storytellers in a room. Will the medium survive? Or rather, do talented people still need the traditional institutions of radio to do good work?
Apparently this is the magic question that activates Angry Ira Glass.
At WFMU’s Radiovision Festival last Saturday, Ira Glass (This American Life), Marc Maron (WTF), and Tom Scharpling (The Best Show On WFMU) gathered for a panel discussion about, among other things, the future of the craft. Eventually, moderator Therese Mahler asked the magic question.
Glass replied, agitated: “For some reason radio seems to survive, and I believe it’s because as long as there are cars with radios and people are lazy, people will get into a car and turn on a radio.”
Later, he continued: “It’s disturbingly nostalgic. I mean, who cares if it survives? Who cares if radio survives? Like, something else will happen,” Glass said. When Maron pressed him for what, exactly, that might be, Glass struggled to come up with an answer.
I love that photoshop job. haha. Ira is right, sound is malleable. It’ll be fine.
for the rest of the article and a link the the 5 min conversation, see Niemanlab.
Happy Halloween from the FJP
Bonus points, Part 01: Vintage Horror Radio (via iTunes).
Bonus points, Part 02: The Longform.org Guide to Creeps and Creepiness.
Bonus points, Part 03: Close Your Ears, a Slate review of Tales from Beyond the Pale, neu-Radio Horror storytelling.
Bonus points, Part 04: War of the Worlds 1938 Radio Broadcast.
Image: It’s the Great Pumpkin, Charlie Brown, by Tom Whalen.
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