TAL 1

ASSIGNMENT: This semester, one of our projects will be to create an audio podcast. One of the best examples of a podcast I know of is “This American Life.” Please give a brief summary of this week’s This American Life podcast “Mr Daisey and the Apple Factory” played in class on Friday and downloadable at http://www.thisamericanlife.org/.

What is the topic of the story(s)? The Euro… how the whole “one currency” thing didn’t, and isn’t going to work out over there. It went on about some other related stuff, but, about ½ way through it I was so bored I just started checking out their coding so I didn’t really catch much of what they were yapping about through the last half.

What made you laugh? Where that Pascal guy was saying how the French would like a unified Europe only if it was basically a “Big France.” NO WAY. They couldn’t stand that, then they couldn’t be so conceited about being “FRENCH.”

What surprised you? How stupid and shortsighted all the countries over in Europe were in adopting the “one currency” thing. About the Podcast… the HTML… I was completely and totally lost when I checked out the elements… couldn’t figure out a bit of it really. Guess it goes a little beyond than what you pick up in introductory classes. Oh, and I was surprised a Real Player would download the thing. Guess there’s just no end to what the Real Player can do, huh?

Describe the non-dialog elements used, the sound effects, dramatic music, etc. How did these add or detract to the story being told? Describe them? Music… old jazzy styles here and there… more electronic, mathematical rhythms in parts that give you things to think about or where there’s more or less a passage of time. I heard a few other actual sound effects, but the “non-dialog” elements were nearly nearly all musical. Can’t say any of them really did anything for me personally, nothing was really impressive, but I guess the idea was to keep you occupied an help set the tone for the subject they were talking about

Tell me one other thing you noticed about this podcast that might be useful in creating a podcast of your own? Just how it’s put together. I heard some areas where someone was in the middle of what was obviously meant to be one continuous stretch of conversation, yet, the levels an tone of the voice changed from the end of one sentence to the beginning of the next. I guess that’s kind of something to look out for when making your own. I suppose a lot of people really wouldn’t notice though. I also noticed at the bottom there was a “Now Playing” section which gave you a short rundown of what the section playing was all about. I thought that was a good idea, pretty cool really.