Podcasts: Infinite Choices?

 How far back does this go?

Did you ever do this as a kid? It takes two mirrors facing each other. The reflections seem to go on forever. I often wondered how far back into the the past (or future) I could look. There had to be an end point or beginning, right?

It's kind of like the philosophical question about what came first. If there is infinity, are there beginnings and endings? 

What does Aristotle say about infinity?

Aristotle postulated that an actual infinity was impossible, because if it were possible, then something would have attained infinite magnitude, and would be "bigger than the heavens." However, he said, mathematics relating to infinity was not deprived of its applicability by this impossibility.

What?

What does this have to do with podcasts? Nothing, really. According to the latest statistics there are 2.4 million podcasts and 66 million downloads. 177 million people listen to podcasts. It just seems like there are an infinite number of podcasts. The top podcasts according to Riverside.fm are:

#1 The Joe Rogan Experience

#2 The Daily

#3 This American Life

#4 Stuff You Should Know

#5 Pod Save America

#6 The Ben Shapiro Show

After dropping below the top twenty, or perhaps 50 podcasts, there's the rest of us.

Measuring Success

According to improvepodcast.com, 5,000 listeners per episode almost guarantees a successful monetization. This is where a lot of interesting things start happening. Having more than 5,000 listeners per episode makes a podcast over 29 times more likely to be monetized successfully.

Slamagency.com predicts Less than 20% of the podcasts that have launched this year will make it to next year. Most podcasts fail. 

If most fail, why go there? Improvepodcast.com came up with 21 reasons you should start up a podcast. Here's a few:

• 1) You’re passionate about a topic or have something to say
• 2) Podcasting Is an Easy Platform to Create Content
• 3) You Can Create Long Form Content
• 4) Podcasting Can Help You Build a Personal Brand
• 5) Podcasting Can Become a Second Income
• 6) You Can Develop Multiple Different Skill Sets
• 7) There Are Minimal Start-Up Costs
• And for public media? You're on the platform used more often by a potentially younger audience.  Most podcast users are between 12 and 54.

Volunteers

In the not too distant past, volunteers were the backbone of public radio. They covered most of the airshifts. They helped with marketing, membership, IT, newsgathering and events.

Unfortunately, on the programming side, they took ownership of those shifts. That was something that held back growth at many stations. We had 28 different radio stations, not one. I was dropped into that situation to try to bring order and a sense of unity.

There were 28 community volunteers covering weekday, weekend and night shifts. They had all been doing their own thing for years before I was hired as a student intern to take some control of the music programming.

I set up guidelines covering break structure, forward and cross promotion, and certain expectations in music selection. And a set of rules about professionalism. Volunteers used to snipe at each other over music selection. Each individual thought they were the true purveyors of Jazz.

Some unity had to be instilled to create a stationality. Listeners develop loyalty to the station, not the individual talent. (This is a much longer discussion). 

Individual meetings and appreciative gatherings were instituted. The idea was to make them feel like they were part of something much larger. Some cooperated, some did not. 

I would like to say it was a success. Progress was made, but the issue of little cross appeal was never really solved. In the end, music was dropped in favor of news and information. A professional staff was hired. Volunteers helped with events and fundraising, but their on air presence came to an end. Not all at once, but over a relatively short period of time music shifts came to an end.

It would have been nice to have some guidance coming into that situation.  Today, tools and guidance are much easier to find. A ten minute on-line search, and dozens of ideas on training and expectations and positive reinforcement are a fraction of a second away.

A structure...some sort of expectations...would have made the job less frustrating.

Republicans & Murder Rate

 A Republican talking point is being tough on crime. But the facts don't match the rhetoric when it comes to the murder rate. "Nationwide, shootings are down 4 percent this year compared to the same time last year. In big cities, murders are down 3 percent. If the decrease in murders continues for the rest of 2022, it will be the first year since 2018 in which they fell in the U.S." -nytimes

Notice the rate started climb when #45 was in office. The upward trend continued for another year after he left office. Two years later the murder rate is dropping.

Are talking point effective? It depends on who's listening. No matter, the truth must be told. It must be out there.

Extremism

 Extremism is essentially a political term which determines the activities that are not in accordance with norms of the state, are fully intolerant toward others, reject democracy as a means of governance and the way of problem solving and also reject the existing social order. Ojp.gov

Seem familiar?

Resilience

 

We have a history of being gutted, and yet remember this especially ... we have also, of necessity, perfected the knack of resurrection.

- Clarissa Pinkola Estés, “Letter to a Young Activist During Troubled Times”

Deflection

It's not just for relationships.

How do you know if someone is deflecting?

Here are some signs your partner may be deflecting responsibility for what goes wrong in your relationship.
It's always your fault. ...
They blame their actions on… well, everything else. ...
They blame their reactions on everything else. ...
They don't communicate their feelings… and get defensive when you do. (joinonelove.org)

How do you talk to someone who deflects?

How do you deal with deflection? The best way to deal with deflection is to communicate how you feel by having a conversation. Point out that you feel the person is deflecting their fault onto you and that it is not appreciated. (betterhelp.com)

What is narcissistic deflection

Deflecting narcissists famously use the tactic of gaslighting, making comments or asking questions for the purpose of creating doubt about your truth. They hope to introduce enough confusion that you will drop the confrontation altogether. They may say things like: “You're misquoting me." It's a Trumpist thing. The people in Trumpworld do this all the time.

When the narcissist begins to think that someone will blame them for an action, they go into self-preservation mode and will deflect all blame from themselves and onto someone else. This is where the blame-shifting happens.(Minsettherapy.com)
Need some examples? Here's some classics from Mindsettherapy.


“If you wouldn’t have said that then I wouldn’t have called you names!”

“If you weren’t always nagging me then I wouldn’t have cheated on you!”

“You always do that!”

“You didn’t ask me if I was meeting up with my ex, you asked if I was talking to my ex”

“You never loved me.”

“It is all your fault.”

“You are always screwing things up.”

“If you didn’t always make me angry then I wouldn’t hit you.”

“If you weren’t always asking me questions then I wouldn’t have been distracted and gotten the speeding ticket.”


Trump is still deflecting. He's blaming the violence at the Capitol riot on Nancy Pelosi, saying it was her fault, and only she could stop riot.  He ignores his calls to action. He ignores the sworn testimony of the Republican witnesses before the January 6th investigators. He ignores his advisors, including Bill Barr and his daughter, Ivanka, that  the election wasn't stolen. And his supporters? They lap this stuff up.

Changing the Behavior 

You and I cannot change the narcissist. It is way above our pay grade. There are reasons people might be attracted. The money, the power, the seeming command and control they have may be intoxicating. Other reasons may be low self-esteem, codependency, and naiveté. It almost always becomes an abusive relationship. What we have control over is ourselves. Recognizing the need for change requires a self realization based on the truth of the situation, and a willingness to change.

The Court Ignored The 9th

Right to Privacy

The Ninth Amendment is an admission by the the authors of the Constitution that they couldn't possibly foresee all circumstances. That makes the court rulings based on the original intent a purely academic pursuit. The original intent was to leave room for change as circumstances changed. 

I turned to an interpretation of the 9th from several sources including Cornell Law School.

The Ninth Amendment was James Madison’s attempt to ensure that the Bill of Rights was not seen as granting to the people of the United States only the specific rights it addressed. In recent years, some have interpreted it as affirming the existence of such “unenumerated” rights outside those expressly protected by the Bill of Rights.

Just a little history on the 4th. (My first major was history)