Heh, I’m pretty sure this post is directed at me. Which is fine, I deserve it. :)

Things have been busy around here. The book with Brogan is really happening, so I’m learning to write a bunch. It’s actually pretty interesting– if any of you have problems with writing, just consider starting something, even if just a paragraph, to see where it goes. Usually it ends up just fine, and starting always seems to be the hardest part.

Another thing I’m noticing is that reading a book leaves me much more patient than reading on the web. I allow for periods of boredom to get to the good stuff when words are printed, but not when they’re on a page.

Not sure what that means for how I should be writing, though, there’s still a bit of trial and error that’s happening there.

Either way, I’m still alive, I have a tiny podcast project (one I cooked up with Bob at PAB2008), and I still read all your blogs and listen to your podcasts. :)

And things are happening. Thanks for coming by. :)

Filed by Julien at 3:14 pm under projects, random
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So I’m on this CBC show Test the Nation on January 20th. I’m really not sure what it’s about, but it’s with a ton of other bloggers including Amber Mac, Andy Nulman, and tons of others (there is, in fact, a whole blogger ‘team’). I imagine I’ll basically annihilate any chance of my team winning.

Anyway, it’s being filmed live, so I won’t get a chance to see it. If someone from Montreal could TiVo it or whatever, it would be awesome.

Update: Hugh McGuire would also like to inform you that he is also on the show. So there we go. So is Craig Silverman, for that matter, and we’ll probably get wasted while we’re there if he has anything to do with it. :)

Filed by Julien at 12:01 am under projects
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Big news of the day: Podshow and Sirius have officially ended their contract together, starting May 1st. I just got the email yesterday.

What does this mean for me? For those of you that didn’t know, my podcast is/was syndicated onto satellite radio every Friday, which was pretty cool. It led me to produce shows every week, which was a nice challenge. The ability to do shorter shows will be nice though– they were previously constrained to being at least 24 minutes due to the slot I was filling.

More than anything, though, it was nice to be able to impress non-webbies with the fact that I did real radio. Never mind that it’s a dying industry, and that radio people are generally known to be the lowest on the showbiz ladder (til podcasters showed up). Radio impresses regular people. Me telling them that my show played on the station next to Howard Stern’s had a certain value too.

At the same time, though, I’ve always been more devoted to the web than to terrestrial radio, and always believed the audience was coming my way, not theirs. I believe even more in the web than I did in July of 2006, when I began. So, all in all, I’m a little disappointed, but this was by no means as good as it’s going to get.

More than anything, I want to impress upon everyone my deep respect for people like PW Fenton and Brian Noe, who persevered with me to create episodes every week. I’ve really come to believe in myself a lot because of those guys, they’re stand-up dudes. So cheers, and onto new things. :)

Filed by Julien at 3:46 pm under projects, podcasting
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Though Canada.com won’t archive the article, I still feel pretty good about JD Gravenor’s article, Podcasts: Letting parents hear what teens have trouble saying. It focuses on Listen To Your Kids, a project started this year to connect kids with parents. Go give it a read while it’s still online.

Filed by Julien at 12:33 pm under projects, podcasting
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So I’m in San Francisco right now, chilling in a house we rented with Patrick and a certain girl. The next few days involve recording a podcast and general vacationing, getting together with some Podshow peeps and listeners to the show. Yesterday was Flickr’s 3rd anniversary party, which was super fun.

The Podcamp Toronto thing thatweall organized was seriously awesome. Here’s a few things I learned:

1) Mitch said one thing that I suspect will ring true for us a number of years from now– that social networks and dating sites will soon cause a drastic drop in the divorce rate.

2) Twitter is all over the place! Chris Brogan had it on his slides; Chris Penn did too. Scoble just added his 700+ fans to his friends list, as a radical listening experiment. This may be the coolest thing I’ve seen someone do in 2007.

3) Podcasting may finally be ready to move beyond the simple monetization methods that have long held the medium hostage. Through ourTrust Economies session I feel that some momentum is pushing the idea of networks-as-ROI forward. Take a look at the video here (it requires Quicktime), and please leave your comments if you’re so inclined– I’d love to hear them.

Filed by Julien at 9:23 pm under projects, travel, community, podcamp toronto, trends, podcasting
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Click here to listen to it, and here for more info. I’ll be on again as of midnight Eastern time, for the open mic hour. Peace!

Update: This is seriously fucked up.

Filed by Julien at 7:07 pm under homeless nation, projects
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Next week I’ll be participating in the Homelessness Marathon, a 14-hour ordeal of a radio broadcast which is distributed across over 35 stations in Canada and the US. With me will be other members of Homeless Nation as well as a bunch of other radio volunteers, all of whom have devoted themselves to producing 14 hours of non-stop broadcasting. And get this, it happens between 5 pm and 7 am the next day.

So yes, there will coffee, and no, I have no idea how I’m going to do it. I’m handling tech duties as well, I think, so it’s by no means an easy task. I kind of think I’m insane, but you know… oh well.

Filed by Julien at 2:04 am under homeless nation, projects
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My ChangeThis manifesto, titled Keep It Real, was published yesterday at ChangeThis. Check it out, download it, etc. etc. Feedback is appreciated.

Filed by Julien at 10:03 am under projects
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So this Listen To Your Kids thing– it’s happening, man. Subscribers are rising quickly after a week, and it continues to go up every day. We got our first call a few days ago, and with the 800 number coming in by next week, things should move pretty quickly. I have to say, I’m pretty excited. :)

Update: Thanks to Dave Lamorte, who did an interview with me on the subject– Dave discusses the future of teaching through his podcast, which you can find here.

Filed by Julien at 12:02 pm under projects
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Listen To Your Kids is a project that I’ve been thinking about it since the Podcast Expo in September of 2006. Today, I am happy to say that I am launching the site.

What does it do? Listen To Your Kids connects kids that want to share with parents that want to listen, all through very simple, existing technologies.

I’ve always felt that the most effective innovations are created through connecting already powerful elements (think podcasting). Here, there is a telephone number, and a podcast feed. Anything (relevant) that gets said by kids in one end will come out the other, to be heard by parents all around the world. I hope we can make this a valuable learning tool for people everywhere.

So that’s it. If you’re a parent, you’ll hear kids talking about what’s going on in their lives. If you’re a kid (of any age), you can call and talk about whatever’s going on in your head– questions, problems, whatever you need to discuss. It will not be censored.

Please subscribe to the feed in iTunes and spread it to your friends. I think that, as this project evolves, we’ll be very enlightened by what we hear.

Filed by Julien at 9:08 pm under projects, podcasting
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