Public Radio Redux

I seem to be posting a lot of non-radio items these days, but when you come across something as good as web guru Charlie Nesson reading the introduction to Born Digital, a book by Berkmanites John Palfrey and Urs Gasser, you have to share with as many people as you can.

When I worked at the Berkman Center, John and Urs were in the very early stages of drafting this book, one of the outcomes of the Digital Natives project, a project that focuses on the implications of a generation "born digital" (those who grow up immersed in digital technologies). So I've read the introduction a few times. Never did I imagine it sounding quite like this. And that's all I'll say about it. Enjoy.

I recently came across this article and accompanying video in The New Yorker (the magazine that most induced guilt in me, piling up faster than I had time to read it). Trapped in an Elevator explores the "lives of elevators," but perhaps the most captivating (and is what I've linked to) is the story Nicholas White, who spent forty-one hours trapped in an elevator in New York City’s McGraw-Hill building. He was working late that night and had left his office for a cigarette break, telling his co-worker he'd be back soon. The video here is a "condensed look" at what White experienced. Using just a haunting melody to accompany the security-camera images, what results is a powerful documentary of an experience that we have all probably feared at one point or another.

If you scanned the headlines of the New York Times yesterday, you probably learned that NPR is canceling the Bryant Park Project. Now, I have never been a huge huge fan of the show (does anyone remember their failed Sigur Ros interview?), but I also recognize that it takes time for a program and hosts to find their groove. When the last episode airs later this month, they will have only been around for ten months - less than a year. I would've liked to have seen how The Bryant Park Project developed - if only their budget wasn't a whopping $2 million, perhaps we would have found out.

Over the past couple of weeks, Salt alums have been discussing a multimedia piece that was published in the Howard County Times, Hungry, by Salt photography alum Maisie Crow. I won't give any of the story away, but know that it's, at once, sad, inspiring, and captivating. And it's the first time she produced a multimedia piece. Wow, huh?

For more about the specifics of the discussion and the effect of silence in Maisie's piece, check out Salt alum Sam Greenspan's blog.

Thanks, Amy O'Leary, for sharing "Hungry" with us!

I heart Transom. I really, really do. I love how helpful they are, how encouraging and informational. Transom.org, for those of us who are just starting out, is like a nice cup of hot tea on a bone-chilling day. Comforting. Reassuring.

Most of all, Transom is accessible.

Nothing shows that better than the most recent Transom Showcase, How Are You Who You Are? by Eric Winick and Jay Allison. Eric got started working on this piece through encouragement and advice by Transom and Jay - three years ago. After coming up with a draft version, Jay invited Eric to come to Woods Hole and spend a few days reworking and editing the piece together. The result is a powerful story of identity, family, and loss. The beginning question, "What if someone you loved changed so completely that you barely recognized them? Would you still love them?" grabs your attention and stays with you throughout. I was listening to this as I was doing other things and mid-way through, during a tear-ful conversation with Lynn, the wife, I stopped and stared at my computer. I felt like she was talking directly to me, the feeling was so intimate. This is what radio is all about. Thanks, Transom, for making stories like these possible.

Just last week my boss, the super cool Sue Schardt, told me about a site that just blew me away. Most of you probably already know about it, but for those of you who are still in the dark like I was just a mere few days ago, let's give a shout out to:

www.publicradiofan.com

... the most helpful site around for the public radio fan in all of us. Traveling through Syracuse and want to know what time Day to Day is on the local NPR station? Check out www.publicradiofan.com As their site states, publicradiofan.com "features schedule listings for thousands of public radio stations and programs around the world." No more poking around on NPR's site for, oh forever, trying to find the info you need. Just set your time zone on publicradiofan.com and that's that.

I'm contemplating making it my home page.

I know that we focus on audio here at PRR, but I just wanted to show a film from one of my students and also let folks know they can go to blip (http://icafastforward.blip.tv/) to see the others.

This is called The Appointment and it was created by one Adeline Rutkowski-Ansell. Enjoy!

Is it wrong to use the Public Radio Redux blog to send birthday wishes to our beloved Jen Nathan?

Happy birthday, Jen Nathan, my friend, colleague, and radio partner!

(This is a pic of my niece eating my mom's birthday cake - no hands. This is what happens when Deda watches her.)

So this past week I basically lived at the Institute of Contemporary Art in Boston where I'm helping the Fast Forward students prep for their big film screening this Friday. One of my students did an amazing documentary on bottled water vs. tap water and she has really good interviews with some experts in the field. One section of her film has someone telling a story for a good two minutes and she says the same thing many times. If this were an audio piece, it'd be pretty easy to condense these two minutes down to 45 seconds or so (OK, maybe "easy" is an overstatement... let's say it'd be doable). But in film, unless you want to have a bunch of jump cuts, making your expert look like she's twitching, you have to have B roll or interesting visuals to cut to to make the editing invisible. Sometimes this isn't possible, which means you have to include the whole two minute clip.

I know I'm just rambling, but I've been thinking a lot these days about the difference between audio and video and how glad I am that I'm an audio person because I just like internal editing too much.

Oh, and to all you Melodium fans out there, know that the band gave one of my students permission to use their song, "Minsk" in her short film. I knew I loved them, but I love them even more now.

More to come after the screening...

I haven't been doing much listening these days. Unless you count listening to the office sounds I've been editing for a piece I am producing for a client of mine. Or the sounds of the pre-schoolers who romp around and scream on the playground directly below the window at the AIR office. Or even the sounds of the students who I work with at the ICA, whose click click clicking of the keys will lead to great work being produced for our May 30 screening (if you live in Boston, please come! 100 Northern Avenue, 7 pm).

So the point is that I have been listening to anything but radio this month, which leaves me with nothing to post to our beloved blog. But once the madness of May dies down, I will be back - listening and posting like a fiend.

But I wanted to let folks know that I'm still here. And that I appreciate Jen basically producing this blog on her own while I'm lost in the day-to-day madness of juggling my crazy schedule (even though she has a crazy schedule of her own). So yay to Jen for keeping us all in the loop on what we should be listening to. She rocks.