Discussed topics include Dallas’ job as a programmer and writer at Microsoft, his metamorphosis into and out of the goth world in high school and college, his feelings on the Crossfit workout and Paleo diet, and his thoughts on the SPPP project.

Links:
www.crossfit.com
www.offtopic.com

Dallas

Don’t miss: Northern Voice 2010, Friday, May 7th.

The Seattle People Podcast Project: A Case Study and Discussion of DIY Social Networking with BuddyPress

Ever think about starting your own social network?  The technical part is easy. The hard part is getting people interested in your affinity group, the channels for participation, and the benefits of membership.

In this discussion-based session, we’ll talk about how to position a new social network among the existing networks, and create a framework for attracting participants, setting ground rules, and generating excitement. Plus, there will be a brief tour of the BuddyPress extension for WordPress for the moderately technically inclined.

As a working case study, we’ll delve into the Seattle People Podcast Project (SPPP), a brand-new community-based, participatory social network dedicated to the art of conversation and the craft of the interview. Instead of allowing participants to “friend” every casual acquaintance, SPPP asks participants to connect with people through a recorded audio interview  to be posted on the site as a podcast, with the goal of creating deeper interactions, richer personal profiles, and greater community engagement.

Direct marketer Denny Hatch frequently cites “the emotional hot buttons that make people act” as Fear, Greed, Guilt, Anger, Exclusivity, Salvation and Flattery. After 9/11, Hatch added “Patriotism” to the list but in his most recent columns it’s back to seven.

Sadly, the copy I’ve written so far to solicit participation in the Seattle People Podcast Project has not been very effective. To determine why, I decided to evaluate my own work using the Hatch criteria.

• Fear: In this case, Fear actually motivates people to avoid participation. If you’re afraid to speak out, if you don’t want to put yourself in the public realm, if you don’t like to hear your own voice, or if you fear being judged by others, you probably won’t want to participate in SP^3. To properly use Fear as an emotional hot button, I’d have to turn it around by creating copy that plays upon Fear of failure from not being able to successfully participate in an interview. For example, if you’re not ready to do a podcast, what else aren’t you ready to do? Speak in public? Ask someone out? Stand up for yourself?  “We have nothing to fear but fear itself.” And so, I need copy that sells “Fear of Fear.”
• Greed: For this to work I’ll need to highlight examples of how showcasing yourself online leads to new job opportunities. After all, presence in social media and demonstrated skill in multimedia have become core skills in the labor market. If you don’t have an intelligent online presence, that in itself says something about how you want to be perceived in the world — as invisible — a trait usually missing from the “must-have” list of recruiters and hiring managers. What better way to develop an online persona than by your own words, talking about subjects which most appeal to you?
• Guilt: The SP^3 can be described a community-oriented project that will enable people to help one another by first finding out things about one another. It’s essentially the “discovery” phase of social engagement. As such, participation in SP^3 can be framed as a very simple first step to getting more involved in the community, in such a way that makes your talents and interests visible. To the extent that people feel they haven’t done enough for their communities (and who really has?), the Guilt factor comes into play.
• Anger: Don’t make me resort to this hot button, because I’ll do it.
• Exclusivity: By participating in SP^3, you’ll be part of a groundbreaking social experiment with the opportunity to have a high profile as a thought leader, etc. Also exclusive in the sense that not everyone has the fortitude to participate given the “Fear” aspect as described above.
• Salvation: When the Big One hits, make sure that people know and care enough about you that they’ll work really hard to pry you out from underneath the collapsed rubble. Or something like that.
• Flattery: Being a participant in an interview signals that you’re important and that people are interested in what you have to say.
• Patriotism: This is America! We have the right to free speech and a free press, and what better way to celebrate our rights than by participating in the act of public conversation? In fact, if the SP^3 doesn’t instantly appeal to you, you’re in the wrong country, bub. (Aside to Denny: this hot button is a keeper.)

Which hot buttons speak to you? Let me know.

The Seattle Channel has a show called Seattle Voices, which features half-hour interviews of local personages in various walks of life.

It would certainly be a worthwhile goal for the Seattle People Podcast Project to build as impressive a lineup as theirs: Business owners, executive directors, on-air personalities, heads of not-for-profits, leading scientists, published authors and much more.

Until that happens, I’m more than happy collecting interviews with baristas, direct reports to semi-important people, unpaid interns, beneficiaries of not-for-profit services, paid test subjects for scientific experiments and people who browse bookstores to pass the time. And, of course, the early adopters (Thanks, Leah!) helping to get this off the ground.

That’s because the idea of SP^3 is not to master “The Art of the Get” — convincing the biggest name in town to come on the show. Charlie Rose, I’m not.

Instead, this project is all about reflecting upon the art of conversation, the skill at discovering something unique about a person, and doing so with an awareness that you’re not just talking to one person, but rather creating a dialogic pod to be cast into the infinity of streaming media.

As this is a brand-new, half-formed, ready-fire-aim project, I can only speak from my own limited experience in describing the benefits of participating. I can tell you that when you place a microphone between you and someone else, your mutual awareness of the invisible connection to any number of future listeners serves to broaden the scope, depth and vitality of the conversation beyond what happens in a private face-to-face. And then, the heightened awareness of the public/private distinction makes the shift from public to private once the microphone is turned off that much more palpable.

These are conversations that should speak to the shared passions and interests of the participants, putting SPPP conversations on a different plane from those that typically happen, at least in my experience as a business writer, during an interview with media-savvy PR and marketing professionals. The world of podcasting shouldn’t be limited to a step-by-step recanting of pre-prepared talking points; instead, the act of discovery itself is worthy of documentation.

We’re looking for people to interview and be interviewed. Join the chain of connections in continuation of the Seattle People Podcast Project experiment, and you’ll be the more connected for it.

Or just stay tuned to this blog for more updates and participate when the mood strikes you. Or when someone you know invites you for coffee and then pulls out an MP3 recorder, cell phone or tape deck. It may happen sooner than you think.

March 5, 2010. Online Coffee Co., Capitol Hill, Seattle.

Recorded using a Blackberry 9700 which shut off after 30 minutes of voice recording. Part 2 may be available after noise reduction efforts on recording made using backup device.

Leah Kaminsky,  co-founder of Northwest Tutors, is a freelance writer and consultant who specializes in developing clear, effective vehicles for her clients’ messages. Her approach is holistic, focused not just on narrative construction but on uncovering what makes her clients tick as well. Clients include high school students writing college application essays, college students honing writing skills, and grad students refining thesis ideas. She also provides consulting services to people who are seeking to improve their online identities, from dating profiles and Facebook pages to “About Me” pages on company web sites.

Leah is from Ithaca, N.Y., home of Ithaca Hours.

We discussed the possibility of the Seattle People Podcast Project as a means to facilitate greater community connection, networking and other forms of mutual assistance. We started by talking about the logistics of the project, including the prospect of distributing recording devices that people could use to record an interview and then pass it on to the interviewee, with the resulting interviews eventually being returned or uploaded to a web site. We discussed other possibilities of the SPPP, including the potential roles of the interviewer/interviewee, and the need for tagging and rating tools.

Leah mentioned the StoryCorps project, which I misunderstood as being closer to spirit to the now-defunct CityTV (Canada) program Speakers’ Corner. She pointed out how the concept of recording podcasts in the field introduces the idea of mobility, which “on a metaphorical level, mirrors the Internet age.”

After I had difficulty forming a coherent question, I brought up the prospect of using audio editing tools to clean up podcast files before publication. Leah suggested that there were ethical issues involved that were worthy of further discussion. I then asked whether I could use AutoTune across the entire podcast, which was unresolved. In the end, I did make some very minor edits to the first few minutes of the sound file which do not materially affect the content of what was said.

Leah

Friday, March 5, 2010. Seattle bus.

Antoine, late thirties, is from Chicago and has been in Seattle since 1995. He aspires to attend cooking school. He drinks an estimated 12 beers per day as a way of coping with difficult memories from the past. Most recent event triggering heavy drinking was the death of a close cousin. Another cousin, 35, is in jail on drug charges, sentenced to eight years for possession of 18 bags.

Recorded with Sony IC Recorder ICD-U60, which does not have a built-in camera.

01 Antoine.mp3

Post-production using Audacity. Applied noise removal filter to duplicate track mixed with original.

UPDATE: Audio is essentially unlistenable until such point as I get some editing chops. And some new equipment.

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The initial impetus for the Seattle People Podcast Project came about because I’m still new in town and want to meet people in Seattle. Also, on a professional level, I’d like to improve my interviewing skills beyond the fields of financial services and technology while also gaining experience in the medium of podcasting.

But when I considered doing all of the meeting, interviewing, and podcasting myself, I ran into the problem of having to decide between focusing on just one of my interests to the exclusion of others, or indulging all of my interests to the exclusion of anyone else possibly being interested.

That’s when the idea of a collaborative project took root. After all, I’m probably not the only one who wants to meet people, improve interviewing skills and gain podcasting experience. With a few simple guidelines, anyone can be an interviewer and a podcaster.

From this, I envisioned a social network with two simple criteria for joining:

1. You can join if an existing member interviews you for a podcast; and
2. You get a page of your own when you interview at least one other person in Seattle.

The result promises to be a dynamic, personalized and vibrant social network, offering a level of depth that goes way beyond Facebook friends, Twitter followers, and LinkedIn connections. Every link in the SPPP chain will consist of a 20-to-30-minute interview about topics near and dear to the participants themselves. Because all participants will be able to trace how they’re linked to all other participants, the project should foster a greater sense of community awareness and connectedness to people that ordinarily would be just a friend of a friend of a friend.

Each participant will get a page on the upcoming SPPP website, highlighting the interview of the participant as well as those interviews conducted by the participant. Listeners will be able to browse the interview chains linearly from person-to-person, chronologically as they appear, or through tags based on content and subject matter. Participants are welcome to start multiple interview chains according to their interests and how they want to present themselves via their page on the forthcoming SP^3 website.

And the fun of it is, nobody really knows where it might go next.