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November 8, 2005

LearnOutLoud’s Guide to Home Recording

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If you’ve ever considered recording but felt prohibited by technology or lack of formal education, fear not! I have written a tutorial that gives novices a good overview of what it takes to start recording their own audio today. And by today, I mean literally within the next 24 hours. Don’t worry about spending thousands on expensive gear, these days all you need is a mic and a computer. This article covers the rudimentaries of finding a good mic, using recording software, making your audio content available for the net and more.

This first tutorial is designed for people with a budget in mind, so the cost of what I describe does not exceed $100. In the next few days I will provide another tutorial that covers the next level up in price. In the future I also plan on tackling mobile audio recording, the different kinds of microphones, what gear does what, post production techniques and more. Hopefully these how-to’s will be as educational for you as it is for me when I write them.

I took great pains to make everything as easy to follow as possible and I included pictures for visual reference. In the end I hope these tutorials inspire anyone that harbors an interest in recording their own audio. It’s fun, it’s easy and yes, it can even be cheap.




November 8, 2005

The State of Podcasting

So with the first birthday of podcasting is in our rear view mirror and the Portable Media Expo and Podcasting Conference just days away it’s a great time to assess the state of podcasting. It’s so hard to believe that something that seems such a big part of my daily life today (I probably average 1-2 hours of podcast listening each day) was hardly a blip on the radar a year ago.

Nicole Simon just posted a good article over on Corante summarizing her take on where things are at. For the most part I think she’s right on the map. I think that we’re at a stage with podcasting where many podcasters who jumped on the gravy train back in the spring and summer are starting to ponder whether podcasting is going to be a business for them or whether it will remain a hobby.

For those who want to turn it into a business there will have to be a clear path to revenue delineated soon. Ad insertion services like Fruitcast might offer one hope but it’ll be interesting to see how well that works. Podcast networks might prove to be another boon to the community. The recent acquisition of Weblogs, Inc. by AOL is a signal that while most individual podcasts and blogs might not have a ton of clout, by banding together a lot of value and power cna be created. Perhaps more podcasters will start charging for their podcast although it still hasn’t been shown that many people to the left of Rush Limbaugh and Sean Hannity can get away with that. So we’ll see…

For those that are content to keep their podcast strictly at hobby level the key question will be whether they will have the wherewithall to keep it going. After all, a lot more goes into producing a good podcast than going into producing a good blog. And as podcasts in general become more professional that tends to raise the bar for all podcasts. My fear is that a lot of people will abandon their podcasts over the next several months leaving many of the directories with a ghost town-like feel due to all of the orphaned shows.

What will it take to keep this thing rolling on? Let me offer a few suggestions:

1. A solid revenue model soon – If there isn’t a good AdSense-ish type model in the next few months that allows the indie podcasters to start making a bit of money I think we’ll see a lot of people leave the game.

2. A general shift to higher quality podcasts – At first it was somewhat novel to be able to listen to some dude or dudette ramble on for an hour or so about mostly nothing because it was so unlike the pre-packaged crap on commercial radio. But that novelty is rapidly wearing off. It’s time to recognize the value of a well-produced, more concise podcast.

3. A “killer app” podcast – To this day there hasn’t really been a “Must Listen” podcast that has captured the attention of a large chunk of the podcast universe. Maybe the Source Code or Dawn & Drew but I think you could argue against either of those. I think there’s a good chance that something will soon hit the airwaves (I know…wrong word) that will knock peoples’ socks off. A podcast that’ll be on the front of USA Today or Time Magazine. I don’t know what it is yet but I’m waiting for that one podcast that gets a ton of podcast virgins to hop on board and start downloading shows.

There has been a lot of progress in the last few weeks. Yahoo’s new podcast directory is very cool and the whole market that’s opened up for video podcasting since the release of the video iPod presents some really amazing possibilities. So this week’s podcast conference should be a lot of fun.

We’ll be there representing LearnOutLoud and hoping to catch a glimpse of what the future holds. We’re incredibly excited about the potential for podcasting as an educational tool and think that the surface of that potentiality has hardly been scratched. These are fun times we live in no doubt. I’m sure that one day our kids and grandkids will enjoy reading stories about them. Scratch that. They’ll enjoy listening to stories about them.




November 3, 2005

C.S. Lewis Bio & Audio Books

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We were finally able to put up a C.S. Lewis author page yesterday. It looks as though Lewis’ work will be seeing a resurgence thanks in no small part to the new film adaptation of “The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe” that’s coming to us this Christmas from the director of Shrek. I’ve looked at the trailer and it has the potential to be a real children’s fantasy classic (I don’t know if it will top “Labyrinth” though). It certainly deserves to be made considering how well the Harry Potter and Lord of the Rings films have been doing. Besides that, Lewis and Tolkien were writing buddies so it’s high time that Lewis gets some of the limelight Tolkien has enjoyed recently.

In addition to writing the popular Narnia series, Lewis is also a primary modern voice in Christian philosophy. Books like “Mere Christianity“, “The Problem of Pain” and “The Screwtape Letters” are classics for anyone interested in exploring the fundamental beliefs that underpin Christianity. Lewis is also an exceptionally approachable author; his work is laced with a wit and humor that makes even the most serious subject matter seem less daunting. My first exposure to him was via the Screwtape Letters, and since then I’ve been privileged to read several of his non-fiction books. I whole-heartedly recommend them as essential texts for anyone interested in Christianity and faith in general.

So before you go watch the movie in December, take a look at what’s available by Lewis on Audio. Our good friend Nancy over here at LearnOutLoud has assembled everything currently available in audio format. You’ll find the whole Chronicles of Narnia series, every one of his Christian non-fiction books, and even special titles that are devoted to Lewis’ life and work. Feel free to share your thoughts in the LOL forums as well.




November 1, 2005

Christian Audio Book Publishers

There’s a lot of Christian book publishers and we’ve added three of them as publisher pages. Thomas Nelson Word, Zondervan, and Oasis Audio publish hundreds of audio bibles, Christian audio books, and audio books covering other topics like business and self development. Here’s the pages we’ve made for them:

www.learnoutloud.com/thomasnelsonword
www.learnoutloud.com/zondervan
www.learnoutloud.com/oasisaudio

And if you’re interested in finding more Christian audio books check out these publishers:

Mars Hill Audio
Creedence Communications
Multnomah Publishers
Tyndale House
Destiny Image
Baker Publishing Group