For those who missed (or dismissed) PodCamp Atlanta 2007, it was truly a great event. So often those of us here in the South get slighted when it comes to tech conferences, with most meetups and such taking place out West or up North. This event, along with SoCon '07 in February, definitely shows that Atlanta can carry its own in that arena. And things are only looking up. According to organizer Amber Rhea (one of the fabulous team of people who put together this event), PodCamp Atlanta not only made national news, but was also the 8th most popular search term on Technorati on that Sunday the 18th (pic)! I went with Eric and J., and I really got to meet some great people (including Tiffany and Tamar and Laura) and got to pimp my new cards which I didn't get a chance to distribute freely at SoCon. All in all, a great event.

Here's some information and take-away links I gleaned from both days of PodCamp Atlanta after the jump. (Careful, there's a lot of information.)

Saturday

Blogging, Podcasting and the Social Media Movement: Led by Josh Hallett of Hyku. What was interesting to hear was how social media is really a big media term. I had to think about that…it really is. I sure as hell don't go 'round saying what I do is social media, but wrapping it in that phrase helps. Sorta like putting pills in ice cream, I guess. A Pew Institute study shows that 60% of teens are online. They're probably all on Myspace or Facebook. A quote: "Everywhere you go, you're on the record". A common misconception to people who don't create content for the Web is that we don't "have a life". Quite the contrary: by blogging and podcasting and videocasting, if anything, we're richly documenting our life in a public space. Take that. YASP = Yet another social profile. I've definitely got plenty of those. The big meme slowly creeping through the blogosphere now is creating the notion of a "lifestream"; basically, a place online where all these YASPs come together in a chronological timeline. I wonder if Wordpress has a plugin for that? Oh, and do you blog on the first date? I need to expound on that topic not only from here, but also from SXSW. The next boyfriend has got to be comfortable with my online persona.

Take-away Links:
Hyku
The New PR

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Monetize Your Podcast with Advertising: Led by Mark Juliano of TalkShoe. TalkShoe serves advertising for over 2000+ podcasts, and podcasters receive 50% revenue. Not too shabby! There's different ways of doing podcast advertising (market and sell a product, affiliate product sales, donations, ads, etc.). Even heard of the new term "podcast consultant". I think I could qualify as that. There are definite pros and cons to doing podcast advertising. It could degrade the "quality" of the podcast (I've heard some that are downright intolerable), it could be an audience turn-off, the ads might not be relevant, and your audience could think you're selling out. On the other hand…it's money. Advertisers are looking for the following things when they want to advertise on a podcast: a target audience, the ability to convey a message frequently, and demographics. Sounds pretty simple. Most companies looking to advertise on podcasts do so because it's new media aimed at a niche, passionate audience, and has a higher listening/watching rate than radio or television. A captive audience. Mark even went deeper into how to get advertising, how to pull demographics, and current podcast ad rates. Great information to know if you're looking to start a podcast for some cash.

Take-Away Links:
Heather Vale
Kiptronic
TalkShoe
Fruitcast
BlogTalkRadio

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Legal Issues in Podcasting: Led by Amanda Witt of Lord, Bissell & Brook. It was very good to hear about these legal issues from an actual lawyer! Sadly, what it all boiled down to were that podcasters are kinda screwed since nearly anything can constitute copyright infringement (especially playing RIAA-artist music bumps). Copyright law includes five rights: reproduction, adaptation, distribution, performance and display. Any breach of these is considered copyright infringement. The consequences are pretty steep: $200 - $150K per violation and potential criminal liabilities. Publicity rights are state specific. Fair use and Creative Commons help podcasters, but they're not ironclad, unfortunately. Hell, even imitating the distinctive voice of a singer can get you sued! Only two of the 50 top-rated podcasts were music-based; copyright law doesn't know how to treat podcasts. The best bet to go if you want music is to either create your own or use podsafe music.

Take-Away Links:
Podcasting Guild
Podshow
Sounddogs.com
Magantune
Podsafe Music Network

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Better Sound With the Gear You Have: Led by Stephen Eley of Escape Pod Another great session on tools to use and even small improvements you can make to improve your audio quality. The best thing I took away from this was Stephen saying it's best to have an "upgrade plan". In other words, you can run out and get all the best gear, but if your show bombs, then won't you be out of some dough? It's best to start small, get a following, then improve. Reverb, noise, mic placement…all of this is very important in achieving a great sound. The "pops" in most audio can be eliminated with the use of a pop filter or a windscreen. Stephen also gave a bunch of great tips, some good mic suggestions, and even a few software tricks to improve your sound, including switching to a USB mic with some good headphones.

Take-Away Links:
Zoom H4
Giant Squid Lavalier Mics
Samson G-Track Mic

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Misadventures in Podcasting Led by Amber Rhea. This was basically a roundtable discussion on what goes wrong in podcasting. I was kinda surprised to hear that for most folks, recording was the biggest issue. I think I've only lost one episode due to that, and even then, I was able to go back and retrace what to talk about. I shared my Morehouse experience, and a lot of people were surprised to hear that the content can be a killer too. Who knew?

Take-Away Links:
None

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OK, so I started mentally checking out right after this sessions, so I bounced to different sessions before settling into the iProng session at 4:00pm. I did win an O'Reilly book on podcasting hacks, which I've been leafing through here and there. Great resource.

How to Interview Famous People (and Not-So-Famous People) and Live to Tell About It: Led by Bill Palmer of iProng. The best thing I took away from this was that if you're going to try and get an interview at an event, try to get included as part of the press/working media of the event. Usually, you can just ask the event coordinator of the facility or the show manager for this. Some of the information was standard interviewing know-how (go in with your questions already answered, formulate a conversation, etc.), but there were some good take-away points on dealing with publicists and making sure not to go over the time limit specified with said publicist. Someone did make mention of joining the Atlanta Press Club in order to get media credentials. Novel idea (even if their site doesn't really specify anything about individuals joining)! BTW: iProng had these kick-ass Smartwrap headphone keepers as schwag.

Sunday

Building Communities Through Podcasting: Led by Amber Rhea and Rusty Tanton. They both talked about using podcasting and blogging to bring light to local and regional events, as well as how to help build and foster communities through those mediums. One good idea was having some sort of activity that kicks off a community, like a contest or forums or a local event. One thing Amber said which really struck a chord with me was how people say that social media is democratizing the Internet because not everyone has Internet access or the wherewithall to download podcasts and such. Here here. Building Communities Through Podcasting I remember there were two people there from Davis on Draft asking on how to increase their sponsorship and community efforts. A blog and podcast about beer? Sign me up!

Take-Away Links:
None

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Queercasting: An Introduction: OK, this was the session that I headed up and I'll tell you…for an unconference, I was unprepared. Well, not totally; I mean, I typed up some stuff, but ended up going off the cuff after seeing how effortlessly Amber did it in the session prior. Luckily, there weren't that many people, so I didn't look like a total stuttering fool. I do remember saying that the definition of queercasting is still evolving and that a queer podcast, just by nature of it being queer, means people will flock to it…but only if it's not some 2nd-rate Feast of Fools knockoff. When you copy others, you can copy their mistakes too. One young lady there said she wanted to start a podcast around academic queer theory, and I told her to go for it! The mainstream media, for the most part, still represents the gay community in a bad light. So long as you're doing a queercast that's a different voice or different perspective outside of pop culture, cocktails and being faaaabulous, you'll attract a crowd. Trust. Oh, and I think I said something about the Southern Voice article too, but not a whole lot.

Take-away Links:
Qpodder

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Editing Techniques, Tips and Music Mixing: Led by Penny Haynes of 1st Podcast Publishing An overall kick-ass session on eliminating those pesky p's, noseblows and other distortions from your audio. While most other sessions I was in showed Audacity as a freeware audio editor, Penny used both WavePad and MixPad from NCH Software. Like Stephen's podcasts before, she made the suggestion of editing audio as you go (I usually wait until after) and working specifically on using automatic gain control and multi-band noise removal, both unique to WavePad. Great stuff.

Take-Away Links:
WavePad
MixPad

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Lunch: I'd be remiss if I didn't mention lunch. Lunch on both days was great, and I think everyone was very impressed with Sunday's selection. Grilled salmon…sesame chicken…crab cakes. Crab cakes, y'all! And spinach salad! It might be silly to say, but I think the food really helped everyone open up and chat more. I got to chat with Tiffany, Amanda and J., and had good long talks with both James Harris of ListenShare on local podcasting opportunities and with Tamar Orvell about my life back in Alabama before coming to Atlanta. It's going to sound cliché, but really, those conversations were one hell of a birthday present for me.

Take-Away Links:
C'mon…it was lunchtime.

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Podcasting for Non-Profits: What's your story?: Led by Joe Winter of the Atlanta Coalition for Performing Arts (and Joeventures). It was good to hear about how podcasting works in the non-profit space; there's a local gay non-profit group I was working with, who when I introduced to them the notion of podcasts to get their message across, was brutally rebuffed. Oh well. There was also talk of using open-source tools to help non-profits spread their message effectively and with little cost. A good way to wrap up the conference.

Take-Away Links:
Georgia Center for Non-Profits
Techbridge
Technology Association of Georgia
Better World Public Relations

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Whew! So that's my PodCamp Atlanta 2007 experience. I still have a bag full of business cards and other schwag to weed through, not to mention upload my pictures to Flickr. Hopefully, those reading this will see what kind of information can be gathered from these kinds of sessions. I know there's a PodCamp NYC planned, so if you're in NYC and interested in the topics discussed in this post, then head on over and sign up. Hell, if you still need a reason, they've easily provided ten of 'em. And best of all, this information and these sessions are free, free, free. Even if you're just remotely interested, it would be good to check out.

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