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Enemies ......ehh ??

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IrishJohn

Paranormal Novice
Hi guys
I've been a regular listener to the show and listen when i'm going to bed. I never joined the forum before but am interested in the comments you read out.
Anyhoo what inspired me to join today was when i listened to my podcast last night and heard listeners being described as "our enemies" for complaining about the amount of advertisements. A bit excessive dont you think ?.
Anyway i have no axe to grind and have no hidden agenda ...my name and email address are there for you to see.Here's how i have treated "the paracast" lately....I will only download if mysterious universe, Mysteries abound,paranormal podcast, Originz and a couple more are not available....WHY ?
because paracast plays too many advertisements too often. That's just the way it is guys, i know you say it's down to sponsorship ....so be it, but i won't be hurrying back and from the sound of it i'm not alone.......Paranormal podcast for example also plays ad's but not so many so often and guests are not cut off mid sentence to do so.Sorry about this guys but it appears to me that your ego's are getting in the way of finding the right balance for the show......enemies ?
No just plain old listeners with the ability to switch over.
Thanks
John
Ireland

EDIT : By the way guys i think the show is well done, the topics and guests are great and the host's have an honest approach. I think with a small bit of restructuring it could be great
 
IrishJohn said:
Hi guys ... I've been a regular listener to the show and listen when i'm going to bed. I never joined the forum before but am interested in the comments you read out.
Click to expand...
I hope the guys don't mind if I jump in here and comment. First of all it's cool that you've decided to join the forum and share your ideas and concerns. This is IMO the best UFO forum around. Regarding the advertising and Gene's comments. Sometimes the guys have a way of expressing themselves that shouldn't be taken so literally. I took the "enemies" comment as an offhanded way of Gene expressing the frustration he feels at having his show constantly criticized regarding the advertising. In no way would I interpret that comment any other way. I'm sure that both Gene and Chris would love nothing more than to be able to create free downloadable shows with no advertising and still make a living doing it.
 
You have to take a bigger view of these things imo,
Ads are a part of life, you get em on TV , in newsprint and magazines on billboards and buses.

But heres the thing, if you are using windows media player or similar its not hard to skip them, something you cant do with TV etc.

Ive been listening since 2008 and its been my direct personal experience the good doesnt just outweigh the bad ie ad's.
It kills it dead and buries it in the basement.

Im no golden boy, there are times ive been as popular here as a nasty case of nether region warts, but all things said and done there is so much value in this podcast, the effort of using the mouse to skip the ads is a rats piss in an ocean of great info

Personally i usually just listen to em, its a great way of experiencing facets of a culture not my own.

The idea of discarding so much wheat over such a tiny amount of chaff makes no sense to me.

In a perfect world we'd all be riding unicorns that fart candy flavoured rainbows.

It doesnt strike me as reasonable to complain about ads (which we get everywhere) when my backyard is still devoid of said farting unicorn

Clearly there are more important things to be wingeing about, like sweet sweet unicorn gas
 
I hate adverts, hate hate hate them. I've not watched one on tv since I got TiVo a couple of years ago.

I think it's ridiculous folk complain about adverts though, just skip past them. Is that really all you've got to complain about? Now I complain a lot, a hell of a lot, but only about things worthwhile, complaining about adverts is stupid and pointless, it's the way of the world. Get over it friend, there are bigger fish to fry. Pick your battles.
 
The one thing interesting about the ads is the type of things the advertisers think Paracast fans would be interested in. Door reinforcements. Storable food. Weight loss. (The last is kind of normal.) Holsters. Food supplements. Etc.
 
We don't have a say in what ads the network inserts. But usually the first minute of an ad break belongs to us (nine minutes out of the total episode). We'd love to talk about products that you listeners would want to buy -- it helps us pay the rent and such. So if anyone can suggest an advertiser who might sign up, let me know. We can also use a little sales help. :)
 
I had no issues with the amount or content of the ads...at least the ads are honest and not hiding who they sre..(incomeathome.com=herbalife) and the bank silver scam ad that C2C runs...
 
IrishJohn said:
Hi guys
I've been a regular listener to the show and listen when i'm going to bed. I never joined the forum before but am interested in the comments you read out.
Anyhoo what inspired me to join today was when i listened to my podcast last night and heard listeners being described as "our enemies" for complaining about the amount of advertisements. A bit excessive dont you think ?.
Anyway i have no axe to grind and have no hidden agenda ...my name and email address are there for you to see.Here's how i have treated "the paracast" lately....I will only download if mysterious universe, Mysteries abound,paranormal podcast, Originz and a couple more are not available....WHY ?
because paracast plays too many advertisements too often. That's just the way it is guys, i know you say it's down to sponsorship ....so be it, but i won't be hurrying back and from the sound of it i'm not alone.......Paranormal podcast for example also plays ad's but not so many so often and guests are not cut off mid sentence to do so.Sorry about this guys but it appears to me that your ego's are getting in the way of finding the right balance for the show......enemies ?
No just plain old listeners with the ability to switch over.
Thanks
John
Ireland

EDIT : By the way guys i think the show is well done, the topics and guests are great and the host's have an honest approach. I think with a small bit of restructuring it could be great
Click to expand...

It's frustrating, because we run the same number of ads as any radio show run by a regular network in the U.S. The same number, and that includes the same as CoastToCoast, Rush Limbaugh, Randi Rhodes, Thom Hartmann, etc. That's the way the business works. Podcast-only shows may have less ads (or no ads), because, for the most part, advertisers aren't buying. But we would offer an ad-free version on a subscription basis if the network ever allowed us to set up such a system. Right now, the answer is no.

And, no, we don't constantly interrupt people mid-sentence, as some complain. We allow a sentence, thought or paragraph to finish, but sometimes the guest will continue a response in the next segment. On a rare occasion, we will interrupt someone who wants to filibuster and just talk and talk without answering the questions. Some guests fell they can just overpower the hosts and get their way; we aren't letting them play that game.

Thanks for listening.
 
Regardless of what your feeling is about the logistics of the show John Ireland you could do a lot lot worse than posting in this forum.

To be honest I don't know if the other shows you mentioned have feedback forums other than a dedicated comments page about individual shows, but if they do they would pale in comparison.
 
Gene Steinberg said:
It's frustrating, because we run the same number of ads as any radio show run by a regular network in the U.S. The same number, and that includes the same as CoastToCoast, Rush Limbaugh, Randi Rhodes, Thom Hartmann, etc. That's the way the business works. Podcast-only shows may have less ads (or no ads), because, for the most part, advertisers aren't buying. But we would offer an ad-free version on a subscription basis if the network ever allowed us to set up such a system. Right now, the answer is no.

And, no, we don't constantly interrupt people mid-sentence, as some complain. We allow a sentence, thought or paragraph to finish, but sometimes the guest will continue a response in the next segment. On a rare occasion, we will interrupt someone who wants to filibuster and just talk and talk without answering the questions. Some guests fell they can just overpower the hosts and get their way; we aren't letting them play that game.

Thanks for listening.
Click to expand...

I don't fully know what the answer is Gene, I've read all the debates here and people taking the time to record the periods of show time vs.commercial times and have NO Reason whatsoever to doubt your contentions above, mostly because I don't care about the issue...its free for Pete's sake...but to my untrained ears I have to agree with the contention that john and others have posted. It does seem like you guys get rolling on a point and the next second I'm being told to do something before "THEY" prevent me from doing so. :) and I came to this conclusion before I started reading the threads that discussed this issue. It may be because I simply don't listen much to the other shows or focus on them like i do the paracast. I notice on c2c they start playing some fade out music before they go to a hard break why not do the same thing with Chris's music? give him some air time :)
 
spookymulder said:
I don't think you could have inadvertently have heard it as it came up several times :)
Click to expand...

Maybe I don't know what inadvertently mean then!
My finger never pressed the 'skip 30 seconds' button enough times. I've usually got it spot on, it's always 10 times it needs pressed, apart from the break around 55mins, that's usually only 4 times.

I've reconciled myself with the ads a long long time ago, it's the world we live in. I'm just glad we've got free access to the program, the ads don't have to be listened to.

If you're not with us you're against us !!!
ps that was a joke :)
 
This is
spookymulder said:
I don't fully know what the answer is Gene, I've read all the debates here and people taking the time to record the periods of show time vs.commercial times and have NO Reason whatsoever to doubt your contentions above, mostly because I don't care about the issue...its free for Pete's sake...but to my untrained ears I have to agree with the contention that john and others have posted. It does seem like you guys get rolling on a point and the next second I'm being told to do something before "THEY" prevent me from doing so. :) and I came to this conclusion before I started reading the threads that discussed this issue. It may be because I simply don't listen much to the other shows or focus on them like i do the paracast. I notice on c2c they start playing some fade out music before they go to a hard break why not do the same thing with Chris's music? give him some air time :)
Click to expand...
It's not a debatable issue, actually. Facts are facts. Someone exaggerates, and suddenly people repeat the exaggeration as if it had a basis in fact. But it doesn't.

As to the end-bumper, we use a stinger now (from The Outer Limits and a Radiohead song), but we can't just do a voiceover over the final part of a segment for reasons that are too complicated to go into here. But if Chris wants to send us a 10 second stinger to use instead, sure. :)
 
I've given this partial solution before and I shall again:

Download the free audio program audacity. Import episode of Paracast and then remove ad breaks by highlighting them and pressing the scissors icon. It does not require careful listening or cutting, the ad breaks are almost always visibly different due to the break and slight difference in audio. I do it cos I often listen whilst driving and can't be fiddling to fast forward the ads. This process takes about the time of one ad break.
Easy.
 
There's never any point in complaining about a free product. I don't get all the emotion that gets invested in this discussion repeated ad nauseum.The debate about ads on the show should be eliminated period until people start paying for the show. If you don't pay, don't complain, just enjoy. There's a treasure trove of a back catalogue here for you to ffwd through ads to your heart's content with.
IrishJohn said:
Anyhoo what inspired me to join today was when i listened to my podcast last night and heard listeners being described as "our enemies" for complaining about the amount of advertisements. A bit excessive dont you think ?.
Anyway i have no axe to grind and have no hidden agenda ...my name and email address are there for you to see.Here's how i have treated "the paracast" lately....I will only download if mysterious universe, Mysteries abound,paranormal podcast, Originz and a couple more are not available....WHY ?
because paracast plays too many advertisements too often.
Click to expand...

So while yes, 'enemies' is a poor choice of words, it only reminds us that many who don't pay for a free product can still be indignant enough to complain about it - it's an ongoing, boring, painful comment to have to deal with. Those other podcasts you mention are mostly re-reading already posted articles found online with little in the way of debate or quality interviews. You really can't compare them at all and at MU prices The Paracast looks a lot better and has a much more engaged, thoughtful listening audience that sustains a great, highly critical and often funny forum. No one else has that combo. To each their own.
 
It's kinda like when people complain about violent or sexual images on TV. Jeez, everyone and his dog has umpteen (great underused word) channels, so bloody change the channel instead of trying to dictate what everyone should be able to watch.

Those of us from the UK who are old enough will remember a woman named Mary Whitehouse, who took it upon herself to 'clean up' TV. She constantly complained and campaigned against this and that on TV, trying to force her morality on the UK. She really genuinely believed that her idea of what is acceptable is what our idea should be. The thing is, with people like her, she isn't even interested in the fact that no-one forces anyone to watch anything. She was just a frigid bossy, nosey woman who could not keep herself out of other people's business. Funny thing is, I often suspect such people - the ones who campaign vociferously against nudity etc - are probably 'quite interesting' behind closed doors, a bit like men who are rabidly anti-homosexual in public because in private they actually were homosexual, or wished to be able to be.
 
Having run a large website of my own that went from almost no adverts to having a decent amount of adverts, I know from experience that this transition seldom goes well. If the show had ads in it from the beginning it would have been no big deal. People tend to get irritated with changes even when they are positive ones in my experience.

Yeah, the ads are annoying, but all ads are annoying. Can't fault them for trying to grow the show and actually getting it on the airwaves. Yeah, there's been some episodes that I wasn't too fond of, but the show's good enough often enough to put it near the top of my list and keep me coming back, ads or no ads.
 
TalkingMeatSuit said:
Having run a large website of my own that went from almost no adverts to having a decent amount of adverts, I know from experience that this transition seldom goes well. If the show had ads in it from the beginning it would have been no big deal. People tend to get irritated with changes even when they are positive ones in my experience.

Yeah, the ads are annoying, but all ads are annoying. Can't fault them for trying to grow the show and actually getting it on the airwaves. Yeah, there's been some episodes that I wasn't too fond of, but the show's good enough often enough to put it near the top of my list and keep me coming back, ads or no ads.
Click to expand...
What's your website?
 
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