DNP Ep 01 -Why Audio (Post and Podcast)

Finally, at last, the first episode of my Daring Novelist Podcast.  The text of the post is below, for those who would rather read than be read to.

NOTE: The podcast isn't subscribe-able on iTunes and other podcast directories yet, but soon will be, and you can subscribe manually via this link - Daring Novelist Podcast Feed. Or you can directly download the podcast with the link just below this, or just listen right here on the blog! (How convenient!)

Daring Novelist Podcast - Episode 1 - Why Audio? 10:00 min




Why Audio?

Readers of my blog know that I have been getting really interested in audio lately.  I'm really throwing all caution to the wind on it with the idea of a weekly fiction podcast.  Just... giving away most of my work for free.

Although, honestly, I don't know where this audio bug is taking me.  I just find that I feel the same way about it as I did about indie publishing when I first realized it was a realistic option.

Until a few weeks ago, I never actually considered doing audio.

For one thing, I went to film school, so I know a little about audio production -- enough to know that it would be a pain in the tuchis.  If you think finding a time and place to write is a problem, forget it.  Even in really bad conditions, you can still physically write.  The right time and place is more mental than physical.

Finding a place and time to record sound?  Nightmare. 

When the cats come yelling into the room (or worse, just outside the locked door) it doesn't just break your concentration. The cat is collaborating with you.  It's in the recording. Along with the furnace, the firetrucks, the midnight train to Georgia, crickets, night birds, and the electrical box. 

(The electrical box, at least, has a constant hum, and can be filtered out.  The neighbor kid's graduation party, not so much..) 

And if you get the kind of mic that doesn't pick up all this extraneous noise, that's the kind that will pick up pops and sibilance from your voice.

And don't talk to me about levels and pre-amps.

Besides, audio is old tech, isn't it?  Other than slickly packaged audiobooks, the kids these days aren't interested in simple audio.  And what does it have to do with indie publishing anyway?  I mean other than the aforementioned audiobooks, which are freaking expensive.  They're really kinda for the elites.  It's rich people and libraries, isn't it? And msot libraries only stock a limited selection of best sellers.

So, no, I didn't consider taking up audio.

Not much.

It's not like I listen to the radio or anything like that.

So the other day, I was sitting my car, listening to the radio.  As I always do.  I don't think I listen to radio, but I do, constantly. I just don't listen to Top 40 or satellite radio.  I listen to news and talk -- mostly public radio, local sporting events and podcasts.

And that day my public radio station was having a fund drive.

While begging for cash, they pointed out how much bang for your buck you get with radio.  They were, of course, correct.  Radio is famously cheap to produce and broadcast.

And I had this epiphany.  You know how they talk about the "Wave of the Future"?  Well, I saw the wave of the past crashing through the future.

It was this image of the old days of bootstrap radio -- tiny stations broadcasting out of a little shack.  Pirate radio and propaganda.  A guy with a mic and a transmitter, playing music and telling stories and giving the farm report.

Before networks and multinational media companies got a hold of it, radio was a lot like the internet.  Heck , even afterward, radio has always been a tool of the little guy.  But in the early days, it was like blogging.  And like the indie publishing revolution.

But it was still kind of expensive, because even though it's cheaper than running a TV transmitter, even a low power radio transmitter is beyond the budget of most individuals.

Ah, but digital audio, which doesn't need a transmitter, and reaches way farther, that's just like indie publishing.  It's just like the entire web.

And... when I look into it, I find it's booming.  It's easy to overlook, because it's everywhere in the background.  People like me don't think we listen at all, when actually we're subscribed to 400 podcasts and listen to all sorts of things on the web and our phone and the radio.  All the time.

People listen as much as they ever did.  It's just that what they listen to comes from many different sources.

A few years ago, all you heard was that the podcasting boom was over.  But now, everybody says audio is the wave of the future.  People who don't have time to read, still like to listen.  In their cars, in the kitchen while cooking or doing housework.  While jogging or walking the dog.  Video is cool, but you can't do anything else while watching, really.

A lot of people in publishing are talking about creating "enhanced books" to build stronger engagement with their audience.  Something cool to compete with all the noise on the internet. 

But these efforts often fail, or succeed only in finding a niche audience.  I keep telling people that it's because the audience isn't looking for deeper engagement or for more complicated books.

They are looking for simpler things that integrate with the noise. They like that a pure text ebook can be read on their e-reader, phone, computer, tablet -- anything that can handle text.

Sound is just like text.  It's everywhere, and can be accessed from every kind of device.  It's not demanding.  It only requires one sense (the ears rather than the eyes).

And even though there is nothing new about audio to the listeners.  It's not something everyone in publishing does, including the indie community.  Sure, everyone wants to make an audiobook of their novel, but that's kind of a luxury.  It's a niche -- like getting a hardback edition printed.

And podcasting or radio? It's not actually a part of publishing. It's a totally separate venue -- a place to promote your book.

Because, after all, the vast listening audience -- the audience way bigger than the reading audience -- doesn't pay for what it gets.  And when it does pay, it wants it cheap.  The radio/podcast audience is the pulp audience. They are the equivalent of those who buy cheap and used paperbacks, and comic books. Who can't often afford hardbacks.

Amazon, always the leader in business, is working to crack that general audio market by offering cheap Whispersync deals on audiobooks.  Which is incredibly cool, although even there, it doesn't touch  major parts of that audience.  It doesn't touch the huge audience of people who don't habitually buy books, even if they would like audiobooks (because after all, audiobooks are expensive as a rule. You only get that Whispersync deal if you are a READER first.)

And from the publishing side, even the indies, all I hear is whining about how the discount cuts into royalties.  Publishers, including indies, are just not interested in that huge audience, because they don't pay.

But here is the thing: people are used to watching television without paying -- but they still buy DVDs of their favorite TV shows.  They buy a whole lot of other stuff realted to those shows, too.

They do this because free TV, and before that radio, created a generation of people who want TV.  People are willing to pay for something they want.  Even though they can get it free.  People are weird that way.

They pay ten times as much for coffee which they could easily make at home, too.  Cheaper, hotter, better.

And when people in publishing think about that, they whine about how that coffee money isn't being spent on them.

But here is the other thing: It's free and cheap coffee at home and at work that habituates people to coffee. It's the ubiquity of coffee that makes people appreciate great coffee.

And it's growing up with TV available all the time that makes people love TV enough to collect their favorite shows on DVD.

This is another subject which has been on my mind for months -- and maybe I'll post about that next week.  

So much of today's publishing landscape depends on things given for free or very cheap earlier on. And I'm not talking about free samples or the sort of things indie publishers do as a marketing gimmick.

I'm talking about things that are free or cheap as a class:  Pulp fiction.  Children provided with books by their parents and schools and libraries for years before they have money to buy their own, soldiers in WWII given books by all the major publishers.

And more recently, the early indie publishing pioneers who provided a disenchanted audience with ultra-cheap or free books.

In my opinion, writers like Amanda Hocking and Joe Konrath didn't just capture an audience.

They created an audience.

But more about that another time.

Suffice it to say that I think podcasting is an opportunity to make a difference in the world.

Also, for all that recording is a pain, I am a production geek.  I actually do enjoy the editing and technical part of the process. 

And I'm really surprised to find out how much I enjoy the performance part of the process.  My skills are still pretty rudimentary, but it's really cool when I bring the story to life.   Maybe not as well as I'd like, yet often way better than I imagined I could.

As a result, I think I will start recording some of my old blog posts -- the best of the Daring Novelist, if you will -- for a monthly writer podcast. This post will be the start.

If I can carve out the quiet time when the furnace isn't going, and the cats aren't yowling (or purring), and the firetrucks aren't roaring....

See you in the funny papers.