Stilgherrian » Media

Covering the Federal Budget for Crikey

Stilgherrian — Tue, 13 May 2008 00:43:27 +0000

Joy (I think). I’m part of Crikey’s commentary team for Australia’s 2008 Federal Budget to be announced tonight at 7.30pm Sydney time. It’s the first budget for Chairman Rudd’s Labor government, and the first for treasurer Wayne Swan, so it’s bound to interesting.

My role — at least as I understand it, ‘cos I haven’t actually spoken with my editor yet — is to look at it from a geek perspective. That’ll include, I imagine, issues I’ve previously covered for Crikey: Internet censorship, the ABC’s move into Internet TV, social media, the national broadband network…

But what else should I look out for?

When I asked on the Link mailing list, here’s a partial list of the suggestions I got:

Functional separation of Telstra into wholesale / retail / pay TV entities.
The laptops for schools program — what hardware? networking? training? maintenance?
Copyrights & patents, including government-funded enforcement of music copyrights — something the music industry has been lobbying for.
Assistance for IT startups, both hardware and software.

I’m also wondering just how forward-looking the budget will be. The brain cells are already firing. What can you add to the list?

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Stilgherrian Live Alpha: episode 1 tonight!

Stilgherrian — Wed, 07 May 2008 22:51:35 +0000

I’ve just organised by first guest(s) for tonight’s inaugural episode of Stilgherrian Live Alpha. And, as you can see, we’ve spent half the night playing with graphics too.

I’ll be speaking with Adam Purcell and/or Jared Madden from Emerge.tv about tune-out.com campaign — their counter-campaign to the music industry’s propaganda film, Australian Music In Tune, which I wrote about the other day.

How can the music industry respond to the dramatic changed happening around them? Is it actually too late for them to change? And it’s interesting to note that the film on their website right now isn’t quite the same as the one originally released…

Since it’s the first program, I’ll probably tell you a bit about myself and what’s been on my radar this week. If there’s anything you’ve wanted to ask me, now’s the time.

Stilgherrian Live Alpha is recorded live at stilgherrian.com/live at 9.30pm Sydney time (1130 UTC), and I’ll be talking “talkback” via audio and video.

If you turn up early, you’ll probably see us doing some last-minute technical tests. And once the program is recorded, I’ll turn it in a podcast — details later.

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Stilgherrian Live Alpha: a program brief

Stilgherrian — Tue, 06 May 2008 22:28:02 +0000

Decided! The first episode of Stilgherrian Live Alpha will be “recorded live” on the Internet this Thursday 8 May at 9.30pm Sydney time. Oh shit! That’s tomorrow!

I won’t repeat what I’ve already written about my plans [1, 2]. This post presents a Program Brief — so I can clarify my thinking as much as anything else — and gathers a few recent thoughts. I’m intending to make the entire process transparent in the immodest hope that someone might find it useful.

Aims

Continue my process of moving from doing hands-on technical work to media production, executive production and consulting.
Build upon the “Stilgherrian as a blogger” brand to establish the core personal media global microbrand of “Stilgherrian as a presenter”, around which I can gather other projects.
Establish a regular audience who can become the core of my 1000 True Fans.
Develop and document production workflows so that we can produce similar programs quickly and cheaply.
Experiment with and settle upon a suite of hardware, software and services which works for me in this context.

See, there is method to my madness!

Program Brief

Title: Stilgherrian Live Alpha. Stilgherrian Live is the primary name, and will continue to be used for my personal live programs. The Alpha emphasises that this is pilot material. It will be dropped as soon as we’re happy that we’re moving to a beta product, i.e. all of the components have been individually tested. This may or may not take more than the initial 8 episodes.

In a nutshell: The world from the perspective of a Sydney-based geek. The program will naturally reflect my worldview and interests. However talking to people who have different worldviews will help clarify my own and, with luck, create interesting dialog.

Target Audience: Anyone who’s curious about the world they live in, with a geeky slant. Eventually I’d like to present a general talk show. However I currently work on geek stuff, and the potential audience is primarily geeks. Since I want to build a strong audience initially I need to take that into account.

Format: 8 x 30-minute video programs. The exact format is still to be decided, but I’ve identified some possible elements which I’ll talk about later.

Schedule: Thursdays 9.30pm from 8 May 2008. Live streaming will begin before the program start time for technical tests, and to give the “true fans” a behind-the-scenes view. Recording will start at 9.30pm sharp. Streaming will continue after the live program recording ends so that we can discuss technical issues.

This schedule may change. Tuesday nights probably offer a better audience, and I may need to work around other commitments. Plus there’s our Eurovision thing on Sunday 25 May.

Technical Plan

Live Broadcast & Recording: This is the set-up I’ll be using for the first episode — pretty much what I have lying around. I may upgrade various elements as I go along.

Camera: Logitech Webcam Pro 4000 USB. It’s pretty crappy, sure, but my aim in the first episode is to assemble a broadcast chain, now win an award for cinematography. It will be replaced by the built-in iSight when I get my new Macbook Pro.
Microphone: Logitech ClearChat Pro headset.
Video Mix: CamTwist.
Audio Mix: Audio Hijack Pro?
Video Monitoring: On-screen.
Audio Monitoring: Logitech ClearChat Pro headset.
AV streaming: Ustream.tv.
Primary Recording: Ustream.tv.
Backup Recording: Snapz Pro X?

Podcasting: The program will be podcast as soon as possible after broadcast.

Ustream: Automatic after recording.
YouTube: Automatic cross-post from Ustream.
Stilgherrian.com: Download after broadcast, do a top & tail edit, and post using podPress.
iTunes: Automatic cross-post from podPress.

Talkback

Yes, I will be taking calls. Initially this will be via Ustream’s system, so you’ll need a Ustream account. However I plan to take voice calls via Skype — which in turn will allow be to use SkypeIn to take calls from any phone line.

So, how does all that sound?

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I came for the gin, I stayed for the social revolution

Stilgherrian — Tue, 29 Apr 2008 23:23:41 +0000

“Television, the drug of the nation / Breeding ignorance and feeding radiation,” rapped American poet and musician Michael Franti of the Disposable Heroes of ~~Hipocrisy~~ Hiphoprisy”, now of Spearhead. Could this literally be true?

I’ve just read the most amazing speech, Gin, Television, and Social Surplus by Clay Sharky, which you can also watch on Blip.tv. It begins:

A British historian [argued] that the critical technology, for the early phase of the industrial revolution, was gin.

The transformation from rural to urban life was so sudden, and so wrenching, that the only thing society could do to manage was to drink itself into a stupor for a generation. The stories from that era are amazing — there were gin pushcarts working their way through the streets of London.

And it wasn’t until society woke up from that collective bender that we actually started to get the institutional structures that we associate with the industrial revolution today. Things like public libraries and museums, increasingly broad education for children, elected leaders — a lot of things we like — didn’t happen until having all of those people together stopped seeming like a crisis and started seeming like an asset.

Sharky goes on to argue that when WWII ended, we suddenly had to cope with another social surplus: all that leisure time thanks to a 5-day working week and all those new-fangled gadgets which made household chores a breeze. So what did we do? We slothed in front of the TV. For a generation.

As we turn off our TVs and connect to each other, this cognitive surplus is creating things like Wikipedia. An estimated 100 million hours of work has gone into it. Yet this is but a drop in the ocean…

How much time do we spend watching TV?

Two hundred billion hours, in the US alone, every year. Put another way, now that we have a unit, that’s 2000 Wikipedia projects a year spent watching television. Or put still another way, in the US, we spend 100 million hours every weekend, just watching the ads… People asking, “Where do they find the time?” when they’re looking at things like Wikipedia don’t understand how tiny that entire project is.”

Back in 1992, David Gelernter asked, in his book Mirror Worlds: or the Day Software Puts the Universe in a Shoebox… How It Will Happen and What It Will Mean, where the great public institutions of the information age were. Where were the equivalents of the great cathedrals? The grand Victorian railway stations and bridges?

Obviously Gelernter asked that before the web, and before Wikipedia and Google and YouTube and Facebook and… and… OK, some of those are commercial projects. But as Sharky points out, we could have 2000 new Wikipedia-sized projects every year.

The information revolution has only just begun…

I do recommend you check out the entire speech. Hat-tip to Daring Fireball via Garth Roxburgh-Kidd.

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So how will this podcast actually work?

Stilgherrian — Tue, 29 Apr 2008 10:45:43 +0000

My podcast thoughts are rapidly congealing into a nice creamy chocolate custard pudding filled with cocaine: edgy and invigorating, but still appealing to traditionalists. And deeply, deeply satisfying.

Conversations on Twitter this morning helped provide focus for the evolving plan… and raised some questions. I’m determined to make this program “live”, or at least “recorded live”. But how will it actually work?

I have the technology and experience to produce full “broadcast quality” audio material — see the pretty Sennheiser microphone? However I really want to explore the program format(s) and production techniques needed to produce micro-radio and micro-TV using whatever can be carried in my backpack. While audio quality may not be perfect yet, it’ll eventually catch up. For the time being the novelty value means the audience will endure it. Especially if I can keep the content fresh.

As I said perhaps a little too cruelly this morning, podcasts sound either like ABC Radio National (people talking to themselves), or the worst of community radio (ditto). Being able to interact with people while the program is happening is important. I admit my opinion is coloured by having produced (endured?) 4000+ hours of live talk and talkback radio.

So, further to what I said yesterday…

It will be a general talk show. I was pleased that @deanlk said “You’ve hit the right mix of geekery and [Australian] news & politics.” If I have to write a tag line now, it’s “How the world works, from the perspective of an Australian geek.”
Weekly, 30-minute programs. I know, the Internet doesn’t have to be exact, but it’s still a good discipline.
Format: video. The video is going to be mostly me, sorry, but I’ll always find some imagery to match the conversation. CamTwist allows you to automatically create a live slideshow from a Flickr photo stream, so that shouldn’t be much work.
Schedule: a weekday evening, time TBA. The schedule is the tricky bit. It needs to happen when the audience is available, and that’s either weekday evenings or on weekends. Tuesday night is traditionally the busiest night on the Internet, and hence the biggest potential live audience, but Thursday works better for me. And what time? 9.30pm Sydney time, when it’s 7.30pm in Perth, giving them an opportunity to join too? Whaddyareckon?

I’ve also had some thoughts about what I might cover in early episodes.

It’s my birthday, so introduce me; talk about Baby Boomers vs Generation X vs Generation Y etc and what it means; is it OK to lie about your age? Who should be my first guest?
China (various angles); the Federal Budget.
CeBIT Australia and the current state of geekery. Lots of material there!

I’ll spend the rest of this week brainstorming the possibilities, then decide on Monday 5 May how it’ll actually proceed. Please, more comments!

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Why The Chaser’s charges were dropped

Stilgherrian — Mon, 28 Apr 2008 04:44:36 +0000

Here’s why the Director of Public Prosecutions (for American readers, read: District Attorney’s office) dropped the charges against The Chaser crew for their APEC security-breach stunt.

This is the full text via Crikey:

Direction

Today I have directed that there be no further proceedings on all charges against 11 persons involved in The Chasers War on Everything entry into a restricted area during the APEC Meeting in Sydney in September 2007: Julian Morrow, Charles (”Chas”) Licciardello, Nathan Earl, Giles Hardie, Lauren Howard, Geoffrey Lye, Alexander Morrow, Benson Simpson, Esteban Alegria, Mark Kordi and Rodrigo Pena.

The matters are listed for mention in the Local Court tomorrow, 29 April 2008, when the charges will be withdrawn.

In the unusual circumstances of this case I consider it appropriate to give some explanation for this course.

Background

On Thursday 6 September 2007, during the APEC Meeting in Sydney, two presenting members of The Chasers War on Everything ABC comedy/satire team were charged, along with six Chasers crew and production team members and three hire car drivers, with entering a restricted area without special justification, contrary to section 19(1) of the APEC Meeting (Police Powers) Act 2007.

The legislation (which was in force from 4 July 2007 to 13 September 2007) provided for “declared areas” (setting in effect an outer perimeter of affected space) and “restricted areas” inside declared areas established around APEC Meeting venues and accommodation. The relevant areas for present purposes were along Macquarie Street, Sydney, north of King Street where a declared area was in place and north of a gate approximately 30 metres south of Bridge Street where a restricted area commenced.

Short Facts

The Chasers created a fake “motorcade” consisting of, in order: two motorcycle outriders, a black 4WD vehicle, a black sedan and another black 4WD. Five male members of the team (including Morrow who was directing operations) walked alongside the motorcade. After reaching Bent Street the motorcyclists dropped to the rear.

The three vehicles had obviously bogus APEC identification stickers and Canada identification stickers on their windscreens. The sedan had Australian and Canadian national flags on its bonnet. All had tinted windows. The five runners also wore obviously bogus identification. One of the motorcyclists wore jeans.

Nine cameras were in operation, some fixed, some handheld and worn and some with audio recording. Recordings from those cameras have been taken into consideration.

At about 11.30am on Thursday 6 September 2007 the fake motorcade approached along Macquarie Street from the south and stopped at the intersection of Bent Street. One of the motorcyclists and Morrow pointed forward. Police waved the motorcade on and indicated in a northerly direction along Macquarie Street towards the restricted area. It then proceeded through an open gate further into the declared area.

The motorcade then stopped briefly before moving north again towards a second open gate which in fact marked the beginning of the restricted area (although police in the vicinity were unaware of that and the Chasers were uncertain where the restricted area began). The motorcade then stopped just short of the second gate. Morrow asked people with whom he was in contact about the restricted area and was given to understand that it commenced at Bridge Street. The motorcade then proceeded again through the second open gate towards the intersection of Macquarie and Bridge Streets. There was no attempt by police lining the route to inspect or stop it.

The motorcade then stopped short of the intersection of Bridge Street and Morrow told police that there had been a change of plans and that they needed to turn back. Morrow suspected that they had entered the restricted area, which he had not intended to do. Macquarie Street had been narrowed by fencing and barriers between Bent and Bridge Streets and it was necessary to advance into the intersection to turn around. Police waved the motorcade forward into the intersection to enable that to occur.

The motorcade then stopped in the turn, Morrow consulted with Licciardello and he (dressed as Osama Bin Laden) got out of the sedan and with Morrow started to walk south in Macquarie Street. Police then arrested the 11 accused and seized items. (The two motorcyclists rode away.)

The Chasers had carried out an examination of the area on 5 September 2007 when police procedures had been different from those followed on 6 September 2007. The Chasers had also conducted a planning session on the morning of 6 September 2007 and some video and audio recording of that has been considered.

The evidence establishes that the Chasers plan, in what was considered the unlikely event that they were allowed to pass through any gates, was to stop short of the restricted area and to get Licciardello out of the vehicle.

Referral to ODPP

Police prosecutors were primarily responsible for the conduct of the prosecutions, they being for summary offences in the Local Court.

A large amount of evidentiary material was made available to the police prosecutors, along with representations on behalf of the accused and advice from senior officers and the Crown Solicitor.

Police could have prosecuted or withdrawn any or all of the charges. The case was first referred to the ODPP for the purpose of giving advice on 13 March 2008. On 14 March 2008 it was decided that the ODPP would conduct the matters and they were then taken over from police.

The matters have been assessed in this Office in the usual way for all briefs received. Regard has been had to the applicable law, the admissible evidence and the Prosecution Guidelines. There has been some urgency in the treatment of the matter by reason of the elapsed time since the events and the listing of the matters in court.

Reasons

It was an offence to enter a restricted area without special justification. Special justification was defined in section 37 of the Act and included circumstances where a person was permitted to be in the area by a police officer and where the person was required to be in the area for a work-related purpose.

The offence is one of strict liability. Consequently, the defence of honest and reasonable mistake of fact is available to the accused. Put another way, it is a defence to establish, or to raise a reasonable doubt that there existed, an honest and reasonable but mistaken belief in a set of facts which, if they had existed, would have rendered the conduct innocent.

In the cases of all 11 accused I am satisfied that on the evidence presently available the prosecution would not be able to negate, beyond reasonable doubt, the existence of an honest and reasonable (but ultimately mistaken) belief that they would not enter or be taken into the restricted area and that, when they did enter it, it was with the permission of police (given by waving them through the Bent Street intersection towards the first gate north along Macquarie Street, then allowing them through the second gate unhindered and then directing them to turn in the intersection of Bridge Street). Police permission in fact constitutes special justification for entry.

Accordingly, there is no reasonable prospect of conviction and for that reason the prosecutions should not proceed.

In the cases of Licciardello, the six crew and production staff members and the three hire car drivers a further defence may be available that they had special justification by reason of their requirement to be there for work-related purposes in the circumstances that unfolded. Morrow was directing the progress of all who were employed for the purposes of the stunt and they either followed or were swept along by the directions that he gave.

I am also satisfied that, if the prosecution proceeded against Morrow only on the basis that his situation could be distinguished from the rest, the court would be bound to find that the motorcade entered the restricted area in error and if the offence were otherwise proved (which I consider unlikely) it would be probable that a magistrate would dismiss the charge without conviction under section 10 of the Crimes (Sentencing Procedure) Act 1999 (considering also Morrow’s otherwise good character). That would provide an additional discretionary basis for not proceeding in Morrow’s case, in accordance with the Prosecution Guidelines.

There’s also a story at ABC Online. My comments to come tonight.

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Podcasting seems supported

Stilgherrian — Sun, 27 Apr 2008 22:40:22 +0000

Well, the comments so far indicate this podcasting idea is a Good Thing. I’ll do some more technical tests later this week. Episode 1 will probably be 8 or 9 May.

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To podcast or not to podcast? Podcast!

Stilgherrian — Sun, 27 Apr 2008 06:03:29 +0000

You’d think that with more than a decade’s experience in radio I’d have started podcasting ages ago.

Three years ago I bought an iPod so I could listen to podcasts. It’s languished in a drawer ever since because, to tell the truth, I don’t like blocking out the world and living within a music bubble. Life does not need a soundtrack, but it does need more people paying attention to the reality around them.

I’d also resisted podcasting because as a (former) broadcast professional there was creeping perfectionism. I wanted any podcast o’mine to be really good, lest I be judged by my former peers. But no more.

This Internet thing looks like it’s actually going to catch on. The time has come to start using my production and presentation skills. So, a podcast… How and what, exactly?

Here’s my thinking so far. I’d like your comments.

Content: general talk show, I reckon. While I could focus on some special-interest topic, the bulk of my work with ABC Radio was in general daily talk programs. I’m thinking I’ll cover the same material as my blog.
Frequency and duration: weekly, with 15- or 30-minute program. In so many aspects of life, regularity is the key to success. Internet media needn’t follow a strict broadcast-style timetable, but you still need a reasonably predictable schedule so people incorporate your program into their lifestyle.
Format: I’m not sure. Certainly audio-only is easier to get going initially, but I reckon that it’s worth doing a video podcast for three reasons:

If I use Ustream or Justin.tv or whatever to allow a “live audience” to chat back as I record the show, then it’s trivial to add moving pictures.
Video allows me to show images or even short movies of what I’m talking about.
Many people expect video, and if nothing else it helps promote my image as a brand. People remember faces — even non-glamorous ones like mine.

Style: personal, somewhat sarcastic. Have a listen to The Bugle and you’ll get a feel for what I mean.
Schedule: TBA. I need to find a regular slot in my week for program preparation (pre-production), recording and post-production. Those slots can probably move around a bit, since in the Internet age we all live 24/7. However it does strike me that the Snarky Platypus and I generate so many script ideas after our gym sessions that we could well build the schedule around that.
Title: TBA. Does it need a title? Maybe “Stilgherrian Live” will do, eh?
Starting date: soon, very soon. I don’t want to build my production environment on my battered old PowerBook G4 because it’s being replaced with a shiny new Macbook Pro in a week or two and I don’t want to re-do that work. Or is that being perfectionist again?

Anyway, they’re my thoughts so far. What do you reckon? Are there any topics or styles of material you’d like me to cover? Anyone you’d like me to interview?

Meanwhile, what use is a 60GB 3rd-generation iPod that can’t play video?

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What you can do with copyrighted works

Stilgherrian — Sat, 26 Apr 2008 22:04:59 +0000

I’ve just been reminded that the best Australian source for information on copyright is the Australian Copyright Council, especially their information sheets on permissions, compliance and infringement and websites, the internet and software.

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Eurovision for Geeks 2008

Stilgherrian — Fri, 25 Apr 2008 21:57:52 +0000

Eurovision for Geeks! After an evolving conversation on Twitter, on Sunday 25 May we’re organizing a night at our local “Irish” pub, Kelly’s On King, Newtown, to watch the final of the Eurovision Song Contest 2008. The delayed broadcast starts 7.30pm Sydney time on SBS TV, so we’ll be avoiding spoilers. We’re probably also organising a live Internet link-up with pubs in other cities — because we can. Details to come later, but is “Eurovision for Geeks” an OK name? Geekvision?

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Laurel Papworth on 9am

Stilgherrian — Fri, 18 Apr 2008 03:37:28 +0000

Social networks guru Laurel Papworth was on Channel Ten’s 9am with David and Kim this week. Have a look, ‘cos it’s interesting to see how out of touch mainstream media professionals are in all of this. I write about that in my comment to Laurel’s post.

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Fox News’ legacy to the world

Stilgherrian — Sat, 12 Apr 2008 01:15:58 +0000

Even though George W Bush’s presidency has more than 6 moths to run, Fox News has already started writing the hagiography. The Daily Show’s John Oliver has responded.

If the video doesn’t work for you, go directly to part 1 and part 2. Hat-tip to Peter Black.

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Ranting in the Sunday Age

Stilgherrian — Mon, 07 Apr 2008 02:00:52 +0000

Following my semi-snarky review of ABC Playback in Crikey last week, journalist Melinda Houston thought I might have something valuable to say for her piece in Melbourne’s Sunday Age yesterday. Apparently I did, ‘cos my quote led the piece, and there was a slab of me later.

The article opened thusly:

“I SUSPECT many people who have had extremely successful careers in television are baffled by what’s happening now,” says former broadcaster and now new media consultant Stilgherrian (yes, just the single name — very 21st century). “They need to spend an afternoon with a bunch of 15-year-olds.”

The self-confessed uber-geek is one of a coterie of middle-aged men who have lost patience with traditional broadcasting. But if he was 15, or even 25, he’d be the norm. Rumours of the death of television may be exaggerated, but there’s no doubt it’s taken a hit.

It’s worth reading the entire article, because it’s a good summary of how the Internet is affecting TV, aimed at a mainstream audience. However I’ll quote my own bits here, just in case Fairfax decide to take it offline one day.

“Commercial television networks have an infrastructure built around the industry, and the world, operating in a certain way,” says Stilgherrian. “And it doesn’t work that way any more. They’re used to fixing viewers into a habit — 7.30 Sunday night, sit down and watch television.”

But teens and those in their 20s are used to the exact opposite. “The next generation — and I’m talking five years from now — will be astounded to think of television as a big box in a dedicated room, just as the idea of having to go to a particular part of the house to make a phone call now seems completely ridiculous,” Stilgherrian says. “Fast connections and portability mean that young people are very fluid in the way they use these technologies. They’ve never known a time when there wasn’t the internet. It’s like a time before cars or phones or electricity or running water.”

The broadcasters are largely relying on compelling content to counter this trend, but it’s a strategy with inbuilt flaws. “There’s no allowance for the fact that just because someone didn’t watch something at the time it was broadcast, that doesn’t mean they don’t want to watch it,” Stilgherrian says.

But it is impossible to measure — and therefore generate revenue from — the other ways things are watched. You can look at the number of downloads from a website, but where does it go from there? How many more times is it distributed? That’s when it gets tricky.

“Free-to-air television won’t die. Any more than radio died, or newspapers,” Stilgherrian says. “But it will have to evolve. The broadcast signal needs to become less important as a proportion of the total revenue mix. And there are people in these organisations who understand that. The question is, are they decision makers?”

Now, where can I get a hard-copy of the Sunday Age in Sydney…?

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I didn’t do the proof-of-concept podcast

Stilgherrian — Thu, 03 Apr 2008 19:34:00 +0000

Yesterday I said I’d create a proof-of-concept video podcast last night. Later I decided I couldn’t be arsed, but didn’t bother telling you. I hope you’re not too disappointed. I haven’t decided when I’ll do it yet. You’ll just have to live with this additional uncertainty in the world.

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Creating podcasts on a Mac, Part 1

Stilgherrian — Wed, 02 Apr 2008 23:27:24 +0000

Podcasting is now far, far easier and cheaper even than I’d imagined — even for complex productions. I’ve been experimenting. Here’s a very quick summary of what I’ve learned so far about doing this on a Mac, my platform of choice.

Now if your podcast is just you talking then you can take a much simpler approach. Read no further.

However this investigation was inspired by the “live recording” of the 2web Crew. Having an audience contributing comments and questions via text chat created an interesting dynamic — similar to talkback radio but less formal. I wanted to explore further.

The technical challenge is combining all of the audio elements before the audio or video stream is piped up to Ustream or wherever. There’s probably quite a few ways to do this, but my starting-point was The UStream Tool Kit — which also covers Windows.

For an audio podcast, you can use either Ambrosia Software’s WireTap Studio or Rogue Amoeba’s Audio Hijack Pro to prepare the original sound. You can use a microphone for one voice or something like Skype or (yes, I am paying attention, Simon Rumble) Google Talk to record online conversations with others. Both tools can mix in audio from any running application — sound effects and music from iTunes, for example — and both can stream the audio to uStream or Justin.tv or wherever.

Once your program is recorded, you can use any number of audio editing tools to clean it up and remix it before uploading it as a “permanent” podcast. Audacity is a free open source multi-channel audio editor for Windows, OS X and Linux.

For a video podcast, you can of course record vision on any digital video camera or webcam and edit it in any video editing application. However an amazing free tool called Cam Twist turns your Mac into a complete live video mixing desk.

Cam Twist has camera switching and fades, text overlays, special effects, drop in pre-recorded movies and more. There’s even things which are possible only on a computer, like automatically turning a Flickr photo set into a slideshow, or running a text crawler across the bottom of the screen which is pulled in from an RSS feed. Again, you can use Ustream or Justin.tv to involve a live audience, and even route it through Skype to involve remote participants.

Cam Twist doesn’t do audio mixing, but you could run one of the audio tools in parallel, or have a second Mac doing the audio mix, or route the signal to an external audio mixer and then bring it back in. which approach you take depends on the complexity of your mixing needs.

The video in Cam Twist is standard “video chat” 320 x 240 pixels. However as computers become more powerful and bandwidth increases, Cam Twist or its successors will surely handle broadcast-quality material.

The final step is publishing the podcast and its associated RSS feeds. The simplest method is probably to use WordPress as your blogging platform, and add the podPress plug-in to deal with everything else.

podPress uploads and inserts your media file (audio or video) into the blog post with a player for formats including MP3, RM, OGG, MP4, MOV, QT, FLV, ASF, WMV and AVI. It automatically generates feeds for RSS2, iTunes and ATOM and BitTorrent RSS, and automatically submits the new episode to podcast directories including iTunes, Yahoo! Podcasts, Podcast Alley, Podcast Ready and Blubrry.

OK, that quick overview skipped a lot of important details. However each tool has comprehensive tutorials, and my main aim is to record my thinking as I develop my own podcast toolkit.

Tonight I’ll produce a test video podcast as a proof-of-concept exercise. Stay tuned. Details posted later today.

I’m not expecting too many problems. When I was with ABC Radio and elsewhere, I produced some fairly complex outside broadcasts. One involved tying together a program from Port Adelaide where one presenter was up in a lighthouse and the other was 300m away on a wharf without line of sight, and we had to incorporate live crosses to a cricket match at Adelaide Oval, a rowing race in Launceston, Tasmania, and of course the news on the hour. Oh, and did I mention we took talkback calls and had a live band? This is a doddle.