Happy 4 year Anniversary to the LA Podcasters!

Today I attended the LA Podcasters meetup at the LA Farmer's Market, where it had originally begun. While it was a pretty laid-back, casual gathering, its use now, as it has always really been, was to gauge where we are as podcasters and where our industry is.

When I headed back to the benches near E.B.'s Beer and Wine, I really had no idea how profoundly this meeting would affect me. But in truth, we have all been through a lot. 

The story of podcasting, very similar and parallel to the story of the LA Podcasters, is this: Lots of people get into it at first, then realize that this podcasting thing is actually a lot of work, and drop out. Or realize that the riches are not going to fall from the sky from doing it, and drop out.

So those of us still left standing after four years (and in attendance) included: Tim Coyne from The Hollywood Podcast (and now leader of the LA Podcasters); Dan Klass of the oldest podcast in the group, The Bitterest Pill; two of the Tres Jefes; Bill Palmer from iProng and me (Whispered Pearls and MicheBelz Hollywood).

All along, it seems, the thread we've been following has been: what is this podcasting thing? Where is it leading? Who are we along the continuum? 

And the answer, shocking to me, though it shouldn't be, is simple. Podcasting is where new media is, though old media refuses to accept it. This new world that we are entering, or in, is an inclusive one. One that reflects the sitting around the campfire mentality of old more than the "how fast can I become a celebrity?" mentality that has replaced people's hopes lately.

Those who have veered off of the path along our podcasting travels are those who head in the direction of that fast buck, or even the bucks in general. As you look back over four years of podcasting, you can clearly say that those who self-destructed were of two kinds: those who weren't willing to do the work, and those who sought fame and fortune from it.

I consider myself neither famous nor making money from my podcasts (although I do make some, it's not a livable wage). And yet, I'm still here, doing it.

The thing about the get-rich-quick schemes is that it's an old business model. I think it's one of the ways that causes old media to flounder when they look at the new media on the Internet. "So how do you make money at this?" they say, and have said since 1992, while their own industry dies around them. And to them, $$$$ is the bank they make after decades in their industry of choice (newspapers, magazines, TV, radio).

There isn't that kind of money to be made right now in podcasting. But is that a reason to stop doing it? Does that mean it's not successful?

We shall see who the ultimate victors are in this nascent industry. All I do know for sure is that those people at that table tonight podcast because they LOVE it. They podcast because they have to. They podcast because they have something to say, and, if you ask me, say it quite well. Slow and steady wins this race, and I'm proud to know all these guys and be a part of this group.

My roommate and I were chatting about the online experience. I was trying to get her to enjoy Twitter as much as I do, or at least understand what it's really all about. (She still doesn't.)

She's quite a wonderful, gregarious person with many friends. It seemed like it would be a natural transition for her. I think today I finally realized where our great divide is. She really doesn't get the whole "online" thing. Mind you, she's an Internet person. The bulk of her income is derived online. But it's the very things I think she's most good at IRL that baffle her online: the chatting, the social, the life.

Which mystifies me. Until she said one thing today which explained everything to me, and made me wonder how many others have this same boggle with Twitter. She said she doesn't like chat rooms and doesn't understand their function.

For me, and I consider myself to be a tech-savvy geek girl with a wide variety of friends, my online experience began in the chat rooms of AOL, back in the early 1990s. Mostly I was just trying to (much as I still am now) figure out what this is all about, where we are, and where we are going with this. Certainly the "normies" of the time accused me of spending too much time online, much as the "normies" now do too.

My response then, as now, is: You don't understand. This is where I live.

This is where I socialize, this is where I learn about things, this is (hopefully soon) where I work.

Not that I neglect my real life to do online things either. I think it's essential to have balance about it. But the way I look at it is that the online experience has replaced the bars and smoky rooms of former days. And if I have an interest in antique cars, for example, I'm quite sure there's a chat room or online group out there somewhere where I can talk to others with just such a passion. 

I thought about it after my roommate and I chatted, and most of my very closest friends today: those who've helped me through thick and thin, who've helped me move across the country, even--I met in a chat room, or online.

For me, the online experience has enriched and enlivened my life. Chat rooms and online worlds and places like Facebook and MySpace and Twitter are my constant online party. I can circulate from this tech guru to that movie director to this hot guy in the space of a few hours. Or, I can put on my "I'm looking for a job" hat and search the job forums.  It is work, it is play, it is my life, and you never know who you're going to meet here, or who is going to give you that special tidbit that helps you make it through your day.

The online experience is so deeply a part of my psyche that I cannot imagine life without it. When I was without Internet briefly in January, I palpably felt like I was missing so much of the ongoing conversation. It's become a spiritual experience, a romantic connection, a comedy club: whatever it is I'm in the mood for, whatever part of myself I need to express, there is a way to do that online. Even expressing my fantasy self in Second Life, if I like.

When I first got on AOL, I felt like I wanted to talk to the whole world. And now, with Twitter, I almost feel like I can. I have people on my Twitter stream who tweet in German and French and Spanish (languages I understand). I helps me to broaden my horizons in ways I didn't know I needed my horizons broadened.

Someone recently said that, with Twitter, they no longer need to check a newspaper. They get all the news of the day right there, from the people who most care about what they care about.

My roommate is in her early 70s. Maybe it's too late for her to ever get it. And maybe I don't get it as much as a 20-year-old. But boy, am I glad that I'm able to be part of this conversation. This is where the world is turning right now. I'm excited to see what the future holds. 

In response to this blog post:

http://blog.teamnimbuswest.com/2008/11/why-social-networking-locally-and-digitally-can-be-a-bad-idea/

I have this to say:

Boy, do I disagree with this premise.

First of all, perhaps 148.7 is the maximum number of relationships someone could have in 1998, according to some anthropologist (and even that I disagree with). But a lot has changed in the interim 11 years.

Things just don't work the way they did in 1998. We are an accelerated culture. Things are moving faster, our communication methods move faster, we get and lose friends (and social contacts) faster.

Perhaps you could argue that those few friends whom you could sit around the coffee table with, pouring out your soul are few and far between (as you do state later in the article), but I really don't agree with that either.

The nature of our interaction has changed with this new technology too.

The model, as you state the case, used to be that we'd be uptight and bottled in around our business colleagues and the public at large, only "letting our hair down" with a "few people." It isn't that way anymore and I certainly don't operate that way.

I have become my brand, and those who know my brand know me. I'm a podcaster and an author, I blog frequently and am active in nearly every social network. And anyone who knows me in any of those places knows me, complete and unvarnished. There isn't anything I hide from anyone.

Anyone in the blogosphere who cares to knows everything about me, from the fact that coffee ice cream is my favorite to the fact that I was sad about losing my job recently as newspapers dissolve.

I have a large listening audience (which I'm contractually obligated not to disclose), 17,000+ friends on MySpace, 1,100+ friends on Facebook, 2,900+ following on Twitter. Which of those would I be sitting down to have coffee with? Well, any of them that ask. Who am I going to glean information from? Build business relationships with? Advance strategic partnerships with? All of them.

Instead of parceling out morsels of information to my close associates, I can now share what I know with anyone who needs to know, and they share theirs with me. Who knows what types of questions I will ask my audience on Twitter? or they ask of me?

It's become an ebb and flow of constant information, and constant relationships. I expect and hope that these people trust me, as I trust them, because that's how it works now. I am honest and open and real with everyone in the blogosphere, to the best of my ability.

My connections are WIDE AND DEEP. And no, having 73,000 followers on Twitter isn't meaningless. It increases the chances that whatever I ask will get answered by someone. That's huge. It also says to me that those people think that what I have to say has some value. That's important to me, whether it's 73,000 or 7 who are really listening.

But, as much as I do consider myself to be a brand, who hopefully one day will make money by my presence and my insight, I sure don't look at those 73,000 followers as people who can help me "make more money in less time." For heaven's sake.

And, frankly, someone like you who was just talking to me because he was looking for a business opportunity "to make more money in less time" would be someone I bounce immediately from my Twitter connections list. Cause that person just doesn't get it.

In reference to this article: 

http://www.davidhenderson.com/2009/02/28/should-traditional-media-fear-its-social-sibling/

I have this to say.

Listening to some of the voices online at the minute, it’d certainly seem that way. Yet history doesn’t bear these opinions out.

TV would kill radio.
DVD’s would kill movie ticket sales.
CD’s would kill vinyl.
The Internet would kill traditional media.
Music downloads would kill traditional retailers.
Maybe I’m looking at the wrong picture, but I still see all of the things that are meant to be dead by now. If anything, many of the doomed mediums are thriving and actually performing better than their replacements.

Obviously, he isn't seeing what I'm seeing here. Way back in the day, people used to sit around their radios and watch them. TV came along, with all its fancy pictures, that sure ended. Sure, people continued to listen to radio, but it was in a very different way than it was previously. The dominant media force became the TV.

As far as music, the only people listening to and enjoying vinyl records are the diehard collectors, who probably even have a few 78s in their collection. For that matter, CDs aren't as prevalent with the youth of today as digital music. In case you haven't noticed, buying online, listening on your iPod or computer, has replaced what was previously.

And last I checked, Tower Records has gone out of business. You can argue that there still are record stores around, but it's all a question of time and priorities. The fact of the matter is that 20 years from now, everyone will be buying their music digitally, and not even think about what they have lost by not having vinyl around or brick-and-mortar record stores, for that matter.

Until recently, DVDs pretty much had put a serious dent in traditional movie ticket sales. Why go to a theatre, when you can sit at home with your friends and watch on your big screen TV, with the surround sound? People are going back now, interestingly, because of the recession, it is posited. But moviegoing has become less of a "we must do this in a theatre" proposition, and more of a "let's get together with our friends at the theatre tonight" kind of deal.

What is succeeding in theatres is what cannot be done at home: big explosion type movies, great special effects, 3D things. Moviegoing has become quite a different thing than it was even ten years ago.

So, really, the only one left in that list is "The Internet will kill traditional media."

Look around, my brother. For my money, newspapers are dead and dying daily. People get their news, their sports scores, their entertainment coverage, their crossword puzzles, their classified ads--everything they went to newspapers for, they now get online.

People who work at traditional media can piss and moan about how they wish this wasn't so, and how it just "couldn't happen." It's already happening. There was a story yesterday about how Hearst wants to "save newspapers" with a Kindle-like device on which people could read their daily paper. Are they kidding? Newsflash to Hearst: I already have such a device. It's called an iPhone.

The only newspaper which seems to really embrace the changes and be adapting to it (the New York Times) is there, in an iPhone app, and I happily read it there.

Furthermore, the other item that traditional media--radio, TV, magazines, newspapers, I'm talking to ALL of you--seems to be blissfully ignoring is that people are CONSUMING information quite differently than they used to. Traditional media is busy arguing whether or not newspapers are dead, while people seek their information through Facebook and Twitter and whatever news aggregator sites they prefer. I like Digg. Radio is arguing about whether or not terrestrial radio is more viable than satellite while we are seeking out music through online stations and our iPods. TV is scratching its head about why viewership seems to be down everywhere, and doesn't seem to notice how popular Netflix is, how many of their TV shows are being watched and sought out online.

It's happening, people. Keep your head in the sand as long as you want to, it's already changing all around you. And for us, the consumer, this is a good thing. Podcasts give us a breath of fresh air, where people speak truth and are free to swear if they want to. Why wouldn't we seek that out instead?

If traditional media wants to save any vestiges of what it's got left, it needs to quit bellyaching about whether or not it's dying, and figure out some way to get those journalists and those radio DJs and those TV anchors onto the web, and find a viable way to pay them to do what they do so well, but do it THERE.

It's not that we don't want it anymore, we just want it in this new format in our time-shifted patterns, and wish to hell they'd quit staring at their vinyl records, and figure it out already.

I realized today why I am a true Los Angeleno now.

I exist at the moment, in the greatest depression since my father died 30 years ago (certainly thus far the worst year of my life). Heck, so far all that's happened this year was a job loss, an industry that I worked for disintegrating, a radio station that I adored going online only, the bottom dropping out of the financial markets, and the man I love choosing someone else. It can only go up from here!

But that last statement is what made me really realize that I truly belong here, here in Los Angeles.

This is a strange city. One that, blissfully, the rest of the country doesn't really seem to understand, and probably wishes would just drop off into the ocean already. So let me explain.

People come here, with their dreams bundled on their sleeves, believing in their deepest hearts that they write better screenplays, or are better actors, or know the movie business better than anyone else. They probably come here, with stars in their eyes, or at least (as I did) with big dollar signs in them. Foolishly believing that this city was gonna be the path to riches. In reality, I have been broker here than I ever have been in my life.

Here's what I have found in story after countless story of this brutal town. You get two years. You come here, naive and full of hope and optimism. The city quickly shows you that things aren't going to be handed to you on a silver platter. EVEN IF you are the best actor, writer, dancer, musician or cinematographer this town has ever seen.

You get two years to tough it out. Many leave in the first six months, slinking back home with their tail between their legs. Many more struggle with not enough to eat, chasing that dream that brought them here. And if you can tough it out for two years, I think you'll probably be here to stay.

The magical formula to succeed in this town is one that rears its head whenever times are toughest, like now. You have to BELIEVE at your deepest core, that whatever things look like now, it's gonna turn around for you. Something's gonna happen. Some combination of circumstances, some chance meeting, some accident of preparedness meets luck is going to fall into your lap and voila, you are back on top. That is, after all, how this town really works.

You have to believe in yourself with a fierceness that would make others quake. You have to keep plugging away when, in any other city, it would seem like every single door is closed to you. When you have absolutely no reasonable hope left, you have to pull more hope from your inner reserves.

Although the flip side of this is that the town is then also filled with people who are never going to succeed at screenwriting or acting or directing like they think they are, but they plug away anyway.

What one discovers as one walks this perilous path is that if you truly love something, it's something you HAVE to do, no matter the odds, no matter what anyone else tells you, no matter how people like you (as old as you, as heavy as you, as weird as you, as whatever as you) never can succeed at this. Case in point: who would've thought a few years ago that Mickey Rourke would be an Oscar-nominee?

And that is it. That is what drives me. This almost pathological impulse to continue when everything in the world tells me not to. To believe deeply that things will turn around. That those closed doors will open up, that that guy's heart may turn around one day, and even if I try and try and try and nothing happens, it's all about the journey, anyway, right?

That, my friends, is the essence of succeeding in Los Angeles. I am truly home.

The Ills of Detroit

OK, someone asked me to comment on this subject, so here goes.

Like most ex-Detroiters, it's not a blanket thing for me. I can't write about the stuff I hate without also writing about the stuff I love and vice versa. It's a complex passion. After all, the city of my birth gave me a heart that beats with the music of Motown and Iggy Pop. But then, it also gave me the Joe Lewis fist. It's like that.

So:

Reasons Why I Left Detroit

Joe Lewis Fist

No Hudsons

No Stroh's Brewery

No Tiger Stadium

Poletown leveled for a Cadillac plant, later left vacant

Everyone movin to the suburbs

Vacant houses

the "People Mover"

the great architecture left vacant

Windsor doesn't let girls in strip clubs, the bastards

the series of bad mayors

Reasons I Love Detroit

Greektown

Mextown

the Fisher Building

Motown/Iggy/etc.

the great architecture

Attic Theatre

the bridge and the tunnel

the Tigers!

the Red Wings!

it's home.

So many articles and treatises written now about the death of newspapers. This is a commentary, partially, about one of them, written by John Battelle, formerly of WIRED magazine (http://battellemedia.com/archives/004781.php). 

In the thick of this first in a series of "death of newspaper" articles, he mentions how much Google wants to help the newspaper industry. They have money. They could give them money. All of this ignores what seems to be so very obvious. Why is no one seeing it? They state the facts, then they come back with: but what can we do about newspapers?

The facts being that everything about a newspaper that people liked/wanted, they can now find easier on the Web (classified ads, sports results, even breaking news, thanks to Twitter). Print costs much more than any webpage. And on and on.

So the answer seems simple. Close up the newspapers and move on. Was technological change ALWAYS this hard? Or, if you are a major newspaper like the New York Times, take the necessary steps, which they seem to be starting to do, into the online space. Make widgets. Give me a usable iPhone app with your newspaper on it. Make a newspaper viable for those who now live online.

As long as you continue to try to push square pegs into round holes, you'll continue to get nowhere, and technology will march on past you. It already is. People go with what's easy and cheap. Period. Especially in this Depression we are in.

And now you're going to start whining about the loss of "quality journalism" and "ethics" because we're on the Web. Well, I'll clue you. There are plenty of real journalists and ethical people out here in the Wild Wild Web. In fact, I would argue there are MORE people who hold politicians' feet to the fire out here. There are people who care. People who aren't fat and cushy from a cake job, but who've had to reinvent themselves, even daring to do it for no money (as many podcasters, myself included, have done). They do it because they have a passion about it. They do it because it needs to be done. They do it because they have a voice that no one else has.

Isn't that what newspapers used to be about? Where was the newspapers' hue and cry when habeas corpus got taken away from us in the last Administration? Just as one example?

Nobody sobbed into their beers when the grammophone died. Or when Betamax became a useless technology. Newspapers are gone, people. It's time for them either to get their butts onto the Web, where they can still make a difference, or move on.

Nothing is going to make newsprint and its delivery viable again as a business model. Realize it. Google should spend that money they want to throw at newpapers to create a real, viable newspaper on the Web. Cause people will never stop seeking fresh news. They have an insatiable desire to find out what's happening around them, in the world, which has gotten increasingly smaller.

The sad thing for the newspaper industry is that technologies like Facebook and MySpace and Twitter have made us realize that we can connect with people easier and faster and in more real ways than a traditional newspaper can offer us. And the news we find there is no less valid. In fact, it's more real because it hasn't been filtered through the corporation first.

So enough of all this whining. Let's move on. Newspapers are on the Web. Long live newspapers.

Wow. Someone on Facebook told me they Googled me. It has been awhile since I Googled myself. I wondered what they came up with. Surprise. Number three on the list was me sitting here with a blog in Blogger. Since 2002. Probably haven't been here since 2003.

A few things have happened since then.

I'll try to catch up. Oh yeah. Sadly, we are still at war. :-(

I don't care if no one posts here but me. This is just eating me up.

Feeling now the sadness of more than twenty years ago that I couldn't allow myself to feel then. Hearing the so-familiar Iraqi dialect of Baghdad that used to be music to my ears.

They had a thing this morning on the radio about the Ba'ath Party. Again. Reminds me a lot of Hitler's National Socialists, actually. Kinda funny. Didn't know I dated a gangster.

I don't know what tears me up more--that our romance died, that he must've lived in hell these past twenty years, or that our son might've grown up to be in the Army too, maybe tortured people too. All of these run through my mind these days,with each Iraq report.

Why didn't I care this much after the first Gulf War? Why didn't I strive to look him up then? Whatever is the urgency now?

Mostly I just feel how much, after all these years, I still love him and wish him well. Wherever he and his family are. In my morning prayers, I send him love. Love to him, his family, and those he loves. Yes, even that Iraqi girl he married instead of me.

Well, no one's posting here. Why do some blogs work, and others don't? I ask you.

I'm feeling depressed about the war, about poverty, about the state of our country. What is to become of us?

Ravenous about news about Iraq. Things keep going through my head. Statements the boy made to me way back when. "Do you know what is Ba'ath Party?" Me, stupid me. Sure didn't. At least I knew where Iraq was on a map, and that it's capital was Baghdad. More than most American college students could say.

I was thinking that recently. How they laughed at me, stupid American girl. Didn't know where Basra or Tikrit was. Didn't even know that Iran was fighting Iraq. Naive, stupid girl.

At least, back then, I knew that Iraq had a long illustrious history, that the Arabian Nights took place in Baghdad, and that it used to be a place of magic. Not a place of fear and torture and death.

And where is he now? My sweet-faced Iraqi boy? I can only wonder. And pray for him.

Well, I'm waiting for Mikey to post to answer that, Sal. He has quite a different view of this war thing than I do.

Yes, it's wartime. It seems like having a place to vent right at the beginning of it would be a good thing. And trust me, if Mikey gets involved, there'll be quite a bit of debating.

And Rene, the Blog thing has become quite common web parlance. I'm just entering that game late. (As are you, apparently.)

PS--Thanks to David for relinking me. Sheesh. I thought I had it bookmarked! :-)

thanks for the invite Michelle.
yes, we are in uncertain times...and they may be that way for quite some time to come. the question is: are we adaptable enough to learn how to live our lives inspite of the uncertainty?

War, war, war. Such uncertain times we live in. The economy about to die. What are we to do? But this sure seems like a cool site to be able to talk about it. More later...