Build a Decent/Great Political Show
The way American politics worked was changed by blogging. Podcasting is going to expand the reach. Find out how to make a convincing and exciting political broadcast. Furthermore, given that there are functions to incorporate on Spotify, it will make it easier for people to communicate with their ideas or thoughts. The company says it is starting to test “Polls,” a method that lets listeners participate in podcasting by answering questions asked during the show via podcast hosts. This is good news, as Spotify and Podcasting just make the audience even more fun and rewarding.
The Fairness Doctrine was repealed in 1986 by Congress, and the talk-radio world was never the same. Before this repeal, the FCC had directed shows to give the opposing parties equal time on a matter. After this was lifted, experts like Rush Limbaugh changed the essence of talk radio radically by supplying it with a hard push in one way and no consideration of the alternative point of view. Throughout most of the United States, this has led to a clear shift to radio conservativism. And outsiders have indeed recently come to present alternatives.
Podcasting offers another outlet for this highly charged political speech-show format and has already repeated this format by other podcasts. Timeliness is the first significant factor in a political broadcast. The show received by the viewer today should be important to the news of the day. You have to keep up with the news. Several outlets are available for current news and political information in the United States:
TheSenate (http:/www.whitehouse.gov) and High Court (http:/house.gov) (http:/www.whitehouse.gov/), High Commission (http:/supremecourtus.gov/). These websites provide access to press releases and views of the federal government’s three main branches: executive, legislative, and judicial.
GPO Access – (http:/www.gpoaccess.gov/crecord/index.html)
This is the website of the Congressional Record, where quotations from the House and the Senate are updated regularly.
The C-SPAN archives – (http:/www.c-spanstore.org)
This is where you can find the C-SPAN network video files. Although C-SPAN is required by the government, it is also a private business, and the content on this website is protected by copyright. Before you use the material in your podcast, you must ask for authorization because you think it is reasonable to use. A Contacts section includes an email address for requesting permission.
C-SPAN archives – (http:/news.google.com/)
Google brings pieces from all major news outlets to an easy-to-search app. You may also subscribe to the news service and receive alerts when articles that correspond to your search parameters are posted. It is a perfect way to get the news to you.
CNN and Fox News – (http:/cnn.com/) (http:/foxnews.com/)
These news networks provide a news alert service that will send you an email during major news events.
The RSS
If you have an RSS aggregator already, use it to track the news by subscribing to your chosen news outlets!
In connection with these timely news and information sources, you can also use historical records in your podcast. The C-SPAN archive (http:/c-spanstore.org) contains video files for all the C-SPAN images you are entitled to use (link on the left of the page of the Request Form). The History Channel has a variety of historically significant speeches (http:/historychannel.com/speeches/). This material is protected by copyright and you’d need permission to make use of it. The Internet Archive – (http:/www.archive.org/) has various content from Creative Commons, including renowned discourses you can use freely in your podcast.
Equal News Use
Right under Section 107 of the United States copyright code, whether the usage is for “comments” or “reviews,” you can use the content free of charge. It is considered “fair use” according to the law. Quoting articles and news outlets to offer your opinions is commonly known as fair use. Ideally, the post, the source and the author should be quoted.
Format
It is time to focus on the format until you have the news of the day at hand. Generally, a two-host [Hack # 20] format is simpler to function for listeners than a single-host format. A host sounds like it’s ranting unless it has credibility. With two speakers, listeners get the sense of a conversation, even though both speakers have the same perspective.
Political shows are running on optimism. Listeners value their time because they expect that you will send them interesting news and that you will translate it for them and, in a way, they will agree with it. The two-host format permits each host to challenge the other by answering the questions the audience believes would ask. The impression that you are just a credible source of legitimate opinions should be reinforced with every format feature in your show.
The material trick, which works particularly effectively in political formats, is the large-sized technique. You begin with an idea in general. Then you offer a tiny anecdote that shows the bigger point. You finish by trying to extrapolate the smaller anecdote back to your listeners’ larger theme. Here is a case in point:
The economy is currently descending. I met this man a few days ago, who had been out of work for 2 years and had 20 years of field experience. People like this are all around. I say to you, the economy’s in a tailspin.
Start with a sweeping declaration, followed by an illustrative explication and return to the bigger factor. Another way of building trust is to encourage listeners to test you. Tell them to search for themselves the stories from the site. Even if only a few people take your invitation to heart, your faith will persuade the rest. This will only increase your trust in you.
Segment Concepts
In addition to the normal news item with opinion section and listener mail, in your political talk show, you can use several additional format items as a daily feature:
Interviews with Others
Interviews are suitable for democratic protests. They provide officials with an opportunity for their message to reach an audience and provide listeners with responses to questions about the day. Since episodes are time-shifted, you can use resources like your blog to get your listeners’ questions by posting who your guests are and ask questions in advance. If you are new to this and unsure how to start an interview podcast, what topics to pick and what questions to ask, your listeners will help you find the right direction.
The Objector
Have a weekly segment in which you speak to a person across the political spectrum. This type of segment will significantly boost your reputation, as it demonstrates how your political opponent can be dispatched quickly.
Unique Piece of News
Cover each week a certain type of news story or a news item from a specific source. An example of this is a section of “Crazy Conservative Nonsense” or “Wacky Left Views.”
Tests
This is a weekly section during which you review [Hack # 27] a new political book or video.
Games for Call-in
Select a listener to play a game where he can win a reward. You should really make yourself imaginative in thinking of a game that is enjoyable but not so challenging that nobody can win it. Form elements like these can discourage viewers from returning to your show, even if they do not like what you have got to say most of the time.
Use of Website
Making the most of your podcast-related text on the blog is important for the political show format to work. Ensure that there are links to the tools you mentioned during the show and more content to support your argument.
Keep comments for this kind of podcast always available. Angry debates will expand your fan base and get your attention in the broader press.
What’s not Translating
Podcasting is a simple way to send the same audio that can travel over the radio. But you cannot simply convert formats that function so well directly on the radio into your own podcast. The first distinction between the two media is that podcast listeners do not miss the dial, and typically listen to the podcast from beginning to end. You may not have to get people up to speed “just tuned in,” so you do not have to repeat yourself as radio hosts do. If you listen to a radio program, it oddly covers a little in an hour —most of one or two subjects. You’ll be able to cover a lot if you’d like your podcast to last as long as these shows are seen as you do not have to repeat yourself.
The slight distinction is that radio shows, especially radio call-in shows, are live. The live design of the show enables hosting activities to be covered in real-time. This isn’t something that you’d do in your podcast. The call-in aspect of the show is different as well. A live show is a continuous dialogue where listeners can hear what they are saying, and then call in to answer. Your call-ins must be arranged in advance for a podcast.
Rush Limbaughs or Al Frankens aspiring must consider the distinctions between the radio and the podcasting media. Podcasts may be popular in the political field. Still, the style of these shows is somewhat different from their radio cousins.
Great Politics as well as Public Opinion
To get an improved sense of what works and then what does not work for political and opinion show formats, I asked some podcasters to tell me about their ideas.
There are two (2) Privileges.
Bill Rice and Keith Burwell would like to consider their two rights podcast (http:/tworights.com/) more reflective and fair than what audiences might see in conventional media. They aim to involve audiences in discussion in combination with the tension and extremism of radio chat shows.
It takes circa three hours to produce each show. There are plans in advance in which each host writes its own notes and explores its own show topics. Both hosts should not merge their notes, so they think that the interplay is more authentic and vigorous if they approach the show separately. It takes about 30-45 minutes to record. Then, edit, encrypt and upload.
Its operating system consists of a Windows PC, a few microphones from RadioShack [Hack # 13], and a Behringer Eurorack UB802 mixer [Hack # 14]. They use [Hack # 50] Audacity to record, mix, and encode.
They tried various formats, including music and ads, and let their instincts and input direct them into a tripartite format. They cover the hot news of the day in the first chapter. They make reviews and comments in the second segment. And in the end, they concentrate on ideological or academic problems at the “higher level.”
They prefer two hosts to one since the engagement of the hosts is more enticing for the viewer and leads to fewer rant shows. In the long run, they want the show to work in the traditional media and maybe even make use of it as a tool for their own political ambitions.
The Demonstration of Randi Rhodes.
Randi Rhodes Show (http:/therandirhodeshow.com/) is on the professional side of the podcast continuum. It is a podcast and a radio show on the new Air America Radio Network (http:/airamericaradio.com/). Air America launched in 2004. Still, Randi was long before that in Florida. Randi deals through her one-woman radio show, which lasts four hours a day, on the liberal side of American political divides.
There are four people on the show: the host (Randi), the producer who writes the comedy parts, produces the website, and carries on administrative work; another manufacturer who books visitors, calls and does research, and the creative director who runs the board and chooses the music.
Each show participant puts approximately four hours of planning before they go live. You edit pieces, write scripts, redesign your website, and make the analysis. They are published in the New York Times, The Washington Post, The Los Angeles Times, The Guardian, The BBC, Media Matters, BuzzFlash and several of their blogs.
The show primarily has a call-in style [Hack # 20], with listeners calling in to discuss the events of the day. But they have some comedy bits written. The audience contact is mainly via telephone, but the message board and blog play a major role in interacting with the audience and building trust in a single-host format.
Podcast by John Edwards
In 2005, John Edwards, Democratic vice presidential nominee, began his own podcast. His personal podcast (http:/johnedwards.com/) incorporates policy decisions, personal opinions on his life, his family and his children, and the answers they receive to the email questions.
The podcast technology is as homespun just as it sounds. They have got a microphone on their kitchen table that John and Elizabeth use with a GarageBand running Macintosh [Hack # 50]. You use GarageBand to create approved, podcast-safe sound loops [Hack # 63] under podcast segments. And iTunes is used for MP3 encoding.
How this excites John about podcasting is how he can talk directly through the podcasting media about what he thinks about a grassroots level political community. “Podcasting is an important tool because it helps me to have a personal discussion of a lot of questions with the grassroots,” says John. “The fact is, we must reinforce the voice of the grassroots in all possible ways. Podcasting allows us to do so.
Written by Harvey L. Frierson Jr. Host of The Ike Jackson Report Podcast and Owner of BX Media LLC a commercial HipHop Music, Film and Television intellectual properties company.
