Michael Allison's Blog

Tag: podcasting

Interview with Rian Bowden from Daily Splice


Last week, I had the chance to sit down with Rian Bowden, co-founder of Daily Splice, to discuss his company and ask about emergency communication.

Daily Splice is a podcast aggregator. Users can create a playlist of podcast (their own or others’) and receive customized show lengths delivered to them at specific times during the week. Paying customers can create a branded listening console with a playlist of their own. The site supports both video and audio podcasts.

Daily Splice clients, like the fire and police departments, have found it useful as a tool for direct public communication. Yes, the traditional media is still an option, but when organizations want to present unfiltered information, Daily Splice provides that option.

Watch the video to see which Island organization Rian thinks should be using Daily Splice to communicate information about the H1N1 issue.

(Runtime: 3:33)

3 Comments by Michael on August 19, 2009
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How to Podcast: A Recession-Era Guide

I write about different social media tools and communications tactics but haven’t written much about podcasting, so I’m going to tell you how to start and do it cheaply! There are a number of comprehensive guides like How to Do Everything with Podcasting by Shel Holtz and Neville Hobson, but I’m just going to give you the quick and dirty.

If you have ideas you want to get out there, and you want to utilize a medium other than text, podcasting may be a good solution.

If you take a look at the right-hand tool bar on my blog, you’ll find a link to something called The Comms Student Paper Podcast. This was an 11 episode podcast I created during the final half of my Masters’ degree.

First, create the long-term and short-term visions for your podcast. Long-term, I chronicled the parts of my Masters’ paper and the steps I took for my research. Before recording each episode, I came up with my short-term plan and focused only on a specific section.

Second, decide which tools you’ll use. Below, I have some suggestions.

Production Tools:
1. Microphone – You can use anything from the one built into your laptop to a $1,000 professional model. But remember: you want your listeners’ ears to be comfortable.
2. Audacity – A free audio recording and editing program.
3. The Levelator – Automatically adjusts the levels in your audio file to make it sound better. It’s free.

Broadcast Tools:
4. Libsyn – A podcast hosting service. You can start at $5/month.
5. WordPress – My favourite blogging platform. Use this to post links to your podcast and include some show notes for an at-a-glance summary.
6. iTunes – By submitting your podcast to the iTunes store, people can subscribe to and download your show to their listening devices.

Bonus:
Podsafe Music Network – Use this to find theme music and splice it into the beginning of your show.

Third, remember that people might download your podcast out of order, so be sure to mention these three items in each episode:

1. The episode number and date
2. How listeners can contact you and leave comments
3. Where people can download your podcast

Good luck with starting your first podcast. With a little effort, you could be sharing your ideas with your community.

(image credit: Magic Photography)

No Comments by Michael on January 8, 2009
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