Teach42

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I love walking the dog. Know why? I’ll tell you! Because I get to listen to a Podcast. It’s probably the best time to listen to one because most of them are the perfect length. Today I listed to the Nov. 14th broadcast from Dave Slusher. I’ve listed to a few of his previous podcasts and I keep listening even though I’m not sure why. I think I was pretty close to just filing him away and moving on when he really hit me with a major idea about podcasting and innovation.

Many people are quick to dismiss podcasting as a fad or at best a cute use of technology, but nothing serious. During an interview on the Gilmore Gang, they discuss the idea that podcasting might not have a future because there’s no business model for it. Currently, there’s no obvious way to turn a profit. Dave responds by saying that the beauty of Podcasting is that it doesn’t NEED a business model.
In order for a radio station to succeed, they need to study demographics, get advertisers, promote their shows and so on. Right from the start, they have huge overhead. Licensing, broadcasting, equipment, even the physical structure all cost money. If the station doesn’t turn a profit quick, it doesn’t last long.
If a podcast doesn’t succeed, someone is just out about an hour of their life. That’s it. People can experiment with style and format all they want. If they don’t like having a rock podcast, they can try talk. If that doesn’t go well, switch to Jazz. Don’t like that? Try something else. There’s unlimited possibilities.
As Dave points out, for every invention or innovation, there were a few hundred failures usually by the same person. Rome wasn’t built in a day. People initially thought the internet was doomed to fail because there was no way to make a profit on it. Podcasting is simple, it’s free, and it’s accessible to anyone with an ounce of intiative.
Therefore, I am going to create a Podcast. Over the weekend, most likely on Football Sunday, I am going to post my first podcast. Then I’m going to try to see just how I can work it into the school curriculum. I think the students will jump all over this. It would be great as a real neat way to ‘publish’ a school newspaper, to review books, to do digital story telling and more. Perhaps we’ll have to create a podcasting club after school or something. I just see so much potential there and so few barriers to trying it out.

Speaking of barriers, Dave really hit me with one other idea. He wanted to ask for the rights to his opening theme song from the Gentle Readers (the band who performs the song). He talked about how he wanted to ask them for the rights to play the rest of their songs, and the rights to do this and the rights to do that. Instead, he just asked for the rights to the opening theme. He mentioned that it was more important to get that first Yes before asking for more.

It really got me thinking about how I’ve been going about trying to get blogging approved at my school. I want the world. When someone says, that’s a great idea but blah blah blah, I immediately start trying to defend why blah blah blah is an important piece of blogging and can’t be left out. And my attitude is getting in the way I think. I really believe I need to mellow out a bit and get that first yes. I know that blogging would be perfect to add to the toolbox our teachers have available to them, I just need to get my foot in the door and give the administrators a chance to see our students in action. However, I won’t be able to give them that chance if I maintain an everything or nothing attitude.

So there are my two goals for the near future. I’m going to mellow out and just try to get my foot in the door with regards to blogging and I’m going to try my hand at podcasting. Now all I need is a catchy name for my podcast.