Enhancing My Silver Skins Podcast

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When I started producing my Silver Skins podcast, I was often asked whether I'd cleared the music copyright. My argument was far from comprehensive, usually involving an explanation that I always talk over the beginning and end of my tracks in traditional 'Radio 1 Top 40' style. I also mumbled that much of my music is new material which is benefiting from exposure to a niche 'older but still cool' audience.

Silver Skins is a receptacle for music that I am passionate about. The intention behind the podcast was to appeal to a generation who, like me, still loved music and refused to be knocked into any kind of middle-age music box. The passion part also has a lot linked to my ideas behind Blowback: this isn't cycnical aloof abstraction about music industry trends but genuinely wanting to play the best music I experience - and pass on that experience. I've had fans of the podcast contact me, claiming that since listening to the show, they have gone out and bought the album, or seen the musician live. I've recently discovered this opinion is shared by UK Podcasters Association and was backed up by The 2008 MCPS-PRS Podcast License.

For a while I've sided with Andrew Dubber's view on copyright, musicians should benefit from exposure rather than try and claw back the potential money they might have been lost. Nevertheless, in a world where people are illegally uploading and downloading entire movies or albums I very much doubt PRS would be interested in the one compressed track that I rabbit all over. But if the request does ever come, I will take it down.

In the mean time, I might be able to offer one further justification. I was inspired by Mixmag's excellent podcast which provides enhanced capabilities. The fact that you can click on an image if playing in iTunes, (or possibly even on iTouch or iPhone - yet to test) you could buy the track in full from the store.

With my Enhanced Silver Skins, these are all bitly short links, so I will be able to measure how many people click through to the store as a result of listening to my podcast. Hopefully my case will be strengthened by recent reports that paid for downloads have boosted music sales.

There are other enhanced treats aswell, so have fun downloading and let me know what you think of the tweaked podcast. At the moment I realise that this podcast is a bit Apple-centric so if you have any idea of how I can reproduce the same effect in PC and on other audio devices then please let me know.

You can download the enhanced Silver Skins 3 by right clicking here.

Or you can subscribe to the RSS via my archive site.


The Final Stretch

For my MA Online Journalism assignment I chose to focus cycling, I tried to map some cycle data but then realised I was losing my audience. In the second phase I got back on track but still wanted to do good with my data. Especially when I noticed that my Birmingham Cycle Map had received over 1,100 hits.

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Finding My Cycle Route

This is the second part of my assignment for my MA in Online Journalism. In the first part I explained how I was determined to graphically represent my data but as I read through Birmingham Cyclist Blog's noticeboard I felt I was losing contact with the community and the story.

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Re:Cycling Experiment

If you’re a Hashbrum subscriber, or are a regular reader of this blog you may have noticed a recent obsession with cycling. The reason for this is it formed part of my MA Online Journalism Newsgathering Experimental assignment. Here it is, split into three parts.

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Birmingham Safe Cyclist Map

As visitors to the HashBrum site might know I've been working on this map for a while now.

My FOI Request of cycling accidents and their locations came through and I was able to put the details straight into Mapalist. I exported as KML and re-imported but for some reason the details about the pins didn't copy.

So, even though these pins look a bit untidy in the larger map, they nevertheless should help cyclists take more care in accident areas.

The key is on the larger map but the general gist is:
Blue hued pin = cycle incident
Pink hued pin = cycle hazard
Primary colour = fatal accident


View Birmingham Cyclist Map in a larger map

Staying Updated
Through an RSS from FixMyStreet I've been tracking potholes that have been reported to Birmingham City Council and also pinpointing any potholes mentioned on the Council's Twitterstream. I will also be tracking my own cycle journeys and keeping an eye on any other hazards I see.

If you would like to add any hazards please feel free.


Bike Away From The Kerb

Robin PC contacted me through Help Me Investigate. Robin suggested I shouldn't just look at mapping data. He commented 'The safe way to cycle is to “get in the way”'. I put Robin's advice to the test, see how I got on:


Sprocket Cycles

I went to Sprocket Cycles, off Allison St Digbeth where Gordon quick-fitted a new bike chain in 3 minutes.

I also grabbed a short audio interview with Gordon talked about cycling safety, National 'Bike' Service and just what is the correct kerb distance?

Listen!

Sprocket Cycles


Cycle Running

I decided it was about time to get out there and start tracking my own cycle routes. On the map below you can see my latest track. Click on the Recent Tracks tab and you can scroll through all my journeys as I wheel about, gathering cycle interviews and other usual daily Hashbrum business!

If you click through to Details beside each track, you can see I've written a short piece on each journey in my Notes section. These act as a summing up of my journey including any safety concerns I see. If you'd like to add your routes and comment on your experiences (and you have an Android or Smartphone) then this App should cost around £5.99. Once you've got it if you could let me know below and befriend me.

I'm also hoping to export this data and it will inform my next map based on experiences of people road cycling in Birmingham.

Find out about my first cyclemap here.


What The Hell Is Journalism Anyway?

Online News Association kicked off their 2010 monthly meet-ups by inviting renowned blogger Paul Staines (aka Guido Fawkes) to add his own incendiary opinion on social media, real time and data driven journalism of the future.

It was one of the best journalism discussions I had been to in a while. You can replay the liveblog below and or compare perspectives (it's the future!) with @brian_condon.

To view this window in a pop out click here


Spaghetti Junctions #1

I'm currently working on game based around a kind-of psycho-geographic version of the 'six degrees of seperation' idea. Basically, the game encourages players to (tenuously) link together Birmingham facts and myths. Here's a version played on Google Wave before Christmas:

[wave id='googlewave.com!w%252Bbh7I02lyA']

It was quite fun but as you can see it collapsed when we used Wave to discuss 'the process' of the game. And I couldn't engage enough people in Wave to make it worthwhile.

It might be more appropriate to run it in Twitter but I think before I jump on there I want to work out how to get people understand how the game runs. I was thinking I might put some rules up either here or on #Brum site.

If it has a click through Wordpress page to I might be able to take the game to a second stage and prove or disprove the facts or myths, offering more background and links away from the focus of gameplay. This might be the journalism but the degree of proven truthfulness could be used as a points system of sorts.

Well there's still a lot to work through... Would love to hear what you think of this idea, or if you have any strong opinions on the following questions then speak your brains below...

Is Twitter the best place to run the game?
Should I be wary of too many rules?
Any ideas how I can get more folk involved?
Should there be a live geo-tagging picture version - and might that get you extra points?
Is there anything we can use to graphically show the facts so it represents a load of spaghetti links?