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Constructive Criticism

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Yak

Yak

Paranormal Novice
Great show guys I'm currently starting from your first episode and going through them one bye one while I'm at work. I have one suggestion however, find a different way to segway into commercial breaks.

Often times you cut off the guest speaking in almost a rude way and its hard to follow what they were saying before you cut them off then pick it up after the break. I listen to MANY podcasts and this is the only show I've listened to that does it this way. I'm not sure if there is a reason for it or what but it just comes off as unprofessional. Maybe give your guests a timer of when breaks are coming up as well this way they can wrap it up on their own time and keep listener attention.

Just a suggestion anyways I love the show keep up the good work, cant wait to catch up on all the episodes.
 
Thanks for the suggestion, but as with any commercial radio show, we have hard breaks to observe. Also since we are often talking to a guest on a phone, there's no way to feed them a time signal or musical note. We have to do the best we can under the situation. Some shows do a much harder break routine than we do.
 
Oh I see I assumed most interviews were over the PC, some I can tell are on phones. Great sound quality on a lot of interviews then!
 
I just listened to the round table discussion and--Great job guys! Answers and speculation were thoughtful and informed. It's refreshing to hear guests who come across as more interested in speculating on what may be "Out There" than simply promoting a certain point of view.

My only criticism, and it's a small one: If you could find a way to loosen up the format a little without confusing the listener, I think things might flow even more naturally. But understand that I am splitting hairs here.

Gene, Chris--I think you have just scratched the surface with these guests. Maybe we could hear more discussion of specific well known cases, both pro and con?

Great stuff. :)
 
Gene Steinberg said:
Thanks for the suggestion, but as with any commercial radio show, we have hard breaks to observe. Also since we are often talking to a guest on a phone, there's no way to feed them a time signal or musical note. We have to do the best we can under the situation. Some shows do a much harder break routine than we do.
Click to expand...

Gene what constitutes hard breaks and soft breaks ?
 
Yak said:
Great show guys I'm currently starting from your first episode and going through them one bye one while I'm at work. I have one suggestion however, find a different way to segway into commercial breaks.

Often times you cut off the guest speaking in almost a rude way and its hard to follow what they were saying before you cut them off then pick it up after the break. I listen to MANY podcasts and this is the only show I've listened to that does it this way. I'm not sure if there is a reason for it or what but it just comes off as unprofessional. Maybe give your guests a timer of when breaks are coming up as well this way they can wrap it up on their own time and keep listener attention.

Just a suggestion anyways I love the show keep up the good work, cant wait to catch up on all the episodes.
Click to expand...

Interesting - and this is in no way to disparage Yak's opinion.

I find Gene's break-in for commercials very orderly and professional, and I actually like the method.

sciurus
 
sciurus said:
Interesting - and this is in no way to disparage Yak's opinion.

I find Gene's break-in for commercials very orderly and professional, and I actually like the method.

sciurus
Click to expand...

I just don't like the way the guest gets cut off, I just think there would be possibly better ways to handle it. I'm currently listening to every episode starting from the beginning and on the 3rd or 4th episode it was mentioned you guys were messing around with Skype. Now I understand not every guest can use Skype, but why did you guys eventually go away from that. I'm assuming you did as you mentioned most interviews are done over the phone. It seems it would be a good way to let the guest know behind the scenes that a break is coming up. Was it the audio quality?

Don't get me wrong I LOVE the show, this is literally my only complaint and its not even that its just a suggestion on how to improve the show.
 
You seem to have a few things confused here. We do all our networking via Skype, but some of our guests are contacted via their phone through Skype. Either they don't have Skype, or find it difficult to set up. There is no way to feed a warning signal down the line, say, 30 seconds before a segment ends. Indeed, most guests would probably ignore the warning since they aren't professional broadcasters. Most talk shows on terrestrial radio face the same dilemma. When you're at the end of a segment, the guest has to be told to stop, or you cut them off. Even if there's a musical bed at the end of the segment, the issue is the same. We smooth it out a lot, but at the end of the day, the segment's time is computer controlled, and we have to do a hard break even if the guest is just getting started. That's how the system works.
 
Gene Steinberg said:
You seem to have a few things confused here. We do all our networking via Skype, but some of our guests are contacted via their phone through Skype. Either they don't have Skype, or find it difficult to set up. There is no way to feed a warning signal down the line, say, 30 seconds before a segment ends. Indeed, most guests would probably ignore the warning since they aren't professional broadcasters. Most talk shows on terrestrial radio face the same dilemma. When you're at the end of a segment, the guest has to be told to stop, or you cut them off. Even if there's a musical bed at the end of the segment, the issue is the same. We smooth it out a lot, but at the end of the day, the segment's time is computer controlled, and we have to do a hard break even if the guest is just getting started. That's how the system works.
Click to expand...

Interesting, I've wondered about that myself since sometimes the breaks do seem harsh, so you guys don't have control over when the commercials cut in? Never really thought to complain about it, but I have wondered.
 
Remember, The Paracast is broadcast on a radio network. As with all network shows in the U.S., and most local stations, the breaks are established with a computer system. That way they're in perfect sync, which is very important for shows that are heard over a number of different stations. So our show has to fit within a very narrow and regulated elapsed time for each segment, ranging from just shy of 9 minutes to slightly under 11 minutes. Even when submitting a show that's prerecorded, the segments have to fit within this schedule (to within one-tenth of a second). You should listen to more network talk shows and you'll see they are under the same constraints we are, and there's a lot of forcing people to finish just ahead of the break.
 
Gene and Chris made things very easy and smooth for us. It was very interesting how it worked. I hope many more of you can experience a roundtable discussion.
Thanks again to Gene and Chris for the pleasant experience.
 
Gene announces the breaks 75% of the time. Still, a few guests have to be told to hold their thought. The subject matter, I think, lends to this.

The paranormal has a healthy share of manic ranters; in addition, it's not a field with clear academic boundaries.

What I mean is, if the show were about economics, a field with a somewhat finite knowledge base, it would be easier for Gene to intuitively determine when a guest is about to wrap up a point, when they're making a short point, or when they're not even close to wrapping up. In the paranormal, it's probably difficult to accurately gauge when a particularly talkative guest's rant on underground bases is going to zig into a tirade about lizard people and bigfoot UFO pilots. I think these are the times when Gene figures he'll let someone wrap up, then the unexpected zig comes and he has to jump in with his "and we'll hear all about kangaroos with duck bills, after this break, or we won't be able to pay our bills." I've never felt it was jarring or strange, and you can always tell when it's a guest who's going to be getting a lot of it.
 
ProphetofOccam said:
Gene announces the breaks 75% of the time. Still, a few guests have to be told to hold their thought.
Click to expand...

But when you come on as a guest one day you will find you have to hold your thoughts for only a matter of seconds. That is the part I was surprised at.
 
But when you come on as a guest one day you will find you have to hold your thoughts for only a matter of seconds. That is the part I was surprised at.
Click to expand...

Oh, yeah. It wasn't really a criticism. I was just saying that, while it's true, I think there are some pretty understandable reasons for it. I think the show is perfectly fine the way it is.
 
I think a good hard break is fine as long as the discussion thread is picked back up immediately after the break. There's nothing worse than a guest being cut off mid-sentence only to be forgotten after the break.

I would even be fine with no verbal announcement--just a noise cue or something (like the sound of an arcing tesla coil, explosion, breaking glass, screaming man or woman or whatever...yeah I am weird)
 
I suppose if it hasn't been suggested before: I would happily pay some measly fee (like what we rock n roll guitarists get for writing songs these days, yer dig) to get the downloads _without_ the commercials. I'm serious. A couple bucks (up to $5?) a show, or something. I'd gratefully do it. I don't mean live, I mean after the show is archived. Otherwise, I have to pull it into my own software (use Digital Performer btw) and edit it myself, which I do routinely, 'cause for example on the Moseley shows the commercials are just too grating. I of course _know_ you have to do them. I know it's a bitch getting paid at all on the 'net, believe me... But I would pay a couple bucks a week to have you, say, email me the weekly shows without commercials.

Question to Paracast listeners, am I alone?
 
Rizla said:
I suppose if it hasn't been suggested before: I would happily pay some measly fee (like what we rock n roll guitarists get for writing songs these days, yer dig) to get the downloads _without_ the commercials. I'm serious. A couple bucks (up to $5?) a show, or something. I'd gratefully do it. I don't mean live, I mean after the show is archived. Otherwise, I have to pull it into my own software (use Digital Performer btw) and edit it myself, which I do routinely, 'cause for example on the Moseley shows the commercials are just too grating. I of course _know_ you have to do them. I know it's a bitch getting paid at all on the 'net, believe me... But I would pay a couple bucks a week to have you, say, email me the weekly shows without commercials.

Question to Paracast listeners, am I alone?
Click to expand...

No, you aren't alone and you aren't the first to mention this idea, unfortunately, Gene has made it pretty clear that there is no way for them to distribute the show commercial free without violating their agreement with GCN. As they are trying to make more money from the show and not less (and who could blame them? they do good work) this is something that will never happen. So we'll just have to keep skipping the commercials manually or importing the show into an editing suite and removing them. It's a small price to pay for a great show, imo.
 
Nah, you're right and I'll continue to do it. The best of these shows are works of art. I've edited way worse stuff routinely, I can assure you. I just wanted
to wish upon a star. Cheers.
 
Regarding the breaks, from my own experience, Gene let us know how things would happen and actually it is really very orderly, about 30mins in I think we were totally in the swing of things. I had known about hard breaks due to radio before and from a taking part standpoint, I can attest that at no point does it feel rude or anything, quite the opposite.
 
Just to remind one and all: We aren't paid for the network ads. Just our own. And some of ours are trade outs. So we do ask for some sales help to get us more paid business.

I have offered to share revenues for a paid ad-free version, but the network isn't interested.
 
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