VHL 20 in 20 #11: Voices

[sterling 1,997]

Voices

For the first few seasons of the league’s existence, the main ways of earning practice hours were to write media articles or to make graphics. The tasks had to be league-related and had to be relatively well done in order for a person’s player to earn practice hours. However, as time went by, the emergence of the podcast as a means of earning practice hours for your players came about and these days, the podcast has been installed as a permanent fixture in league media. Due to a lack of time, I was unable to find quotes for this episode, but I feel that I have enough experience in this field to provide you with a solid overview of the rise of the podcast.

While the podcast is a relatively recent addition to the activity task scene, we have to go back to the beginning of the league to find the first ever VHL podcast. This first series of podcasts took place so long ago that I don’t even remember what the name of it was. It was a series of short podcasts featuring two legends of the VHL’s early era: Scott Boulet and Scotty Campbell. The podcasts didn’t last very long compared to the current podcasts we see today. The podcasts were usually transmitted over youtube and generally stayed on topic and lacked any real enthusiasm. The first podcast came out around the midpoint of season 1 that featured these two characters. I would estimate that there were about 4 or 5 podcasts in this series before it faded away. For whatever reason, this podcast failed to generate any real enthusiasm towards the art of podcasting. For the next few seasons, the podcast was a dead form of point task that seemed like it would never be resurrected.

It would be several seasons before we saw another podcast in the VHL. This podcast featured two unlike partners in Robbie Zimmers and Lenny Robbins. Again, the podcast was rather short and seemed very awkward. The sound quality was very low and it seemed like they struggled to get on the same page. However, they would also come back for a couple podcasts, but again, it would take a while for them to pick up any enthusiasm towards podcasting from the general public. One day, however, I had just finished listening to one of Robbie and Lenny’s podcasts, and I decided that I wanted to start a podcast of my own. On an impulse, I went off and bought a microphone at the local store of technology. I went back home and downloaded Audacity, Skype, and Skype Recorder. These are three vital programs for making and recording podcasts.

Skype is a program that is meant for verbally communicating with others over your computer, while Skype Recorder can easily record your conversations on Skype and put them in an MP3 format. At that point, your podcast, as an MP3, can be uploaded to the Internet for all your listeners to access and enjoy at their own will. Audacity is the program I used to record my solo podcasts, but some people have been able to use it for multi-person podcasts.

Anyway, once equipped with a microphone, I quickly posted a notice on the league website to inform the league that I was looking for a podcast partner. The first response I got was from Lucas Tannahill, also known as PensFan101, the longest-serving general manager in league history. I didn’t really know Lucas that well, but he was the first person to get back to me, so I agreed to do the podcast with him, and the longest-running podcast in VHL history was born. Podcast Without A Name ran for over 25 episodes and generally started a strong era in podcasting of big, 30-50 minute podcasts that often mixed in league news with some humor. We were always criticized for talking about our own teams way too much (both of us were GMs as the time), but I found that people enjoyed our shows in general.


Pictured: Pens Fan

The podcast boom occurred around this time. Robbie and Lenny would come in every now and then with another edition of their podcast, while Joey Kendrick also began producing his own solo productions. This boom gave berth to the most controversial podcast in VHL history: Five’s a Crowd.

Five’s a Crowd was a podcast that was less league-related, and more random nonsense than any podcast we had seen before. The regulars on this show were Zimmers, Travis Willcox (now inactive), Josh Smith (now banned), an up-and-comer named Bearcub, and myself. These podcasts were often intentionally long, and we always set out to break our own length records. This was back before the podcast was made a weekly point tasks, and a podcast was worth an automatic 2 points per week, so it didn’t matter if we were terrible or not.They likely didn’t garner very many listeners, but when we stepped out of line, people noticed. The real source of controversy came from a comment made by a non-regular member in Matt Defosse. He made a comment about Joey Kendrick’s family. The comment definitely put a black mark on our show’s already unfavorable reputation, and likely led to the end of the show. We’ve tried to reunite, but I don’t think some of us would even be willing to do so. Looking back, I think we can all acknowledge that Five’s a Crowd was a generally terrible podcast that brought very little productivity to the league.

However, this only led to more podcasts being formed. With new editions of Podcast Without A Name becoming less frequent, I became a solo podcaster, but would frequently have guests on my show. There are several people whom I would not have otherwise bothered to talk to had it not been for my foray into podcasting. The guests I had on my show included Bearcub, Defosse, Zach Arce, Matt Bentz, David Knight, Greg Harbinson, Josh Smith, Travis Willcox, Sterling Labatte, and Scotty Campbell. Alex “Bearcub” Cooper would join Matt Defosse on Ode to Aramark – a good podcast that I really enjoyed. It often consisted of Defosse ranting, with intermittent inputs from Bearcub.

Sterling Labatte and his good friend, Max Weinstein (THC), would introduce a podcast version of Pardon the Interruption, which was one of my all-time favorite podcasts in league history. I found that PTI was well structured, had a good balance of league talk and joking around, and the podcasts weren’t too long. They were very self critical of their podcast, but I enjoyed it very much and was very excited when they asked me to be on their “Five Good Minutes” segment. If I had to pick one podcast that I could bring back, it would be this one, but THC is not very active anymore. He makes appearances every so often, but hasn’t been able to be consistently active for a long time now.


Pardon the Interruption

As time went on, more podcasts sprouted up. Another long-running podcast was VHL On The Fly, from good friends Matt Bentz and Zach Arce. Bentz and Arce often fielded questions from the league public, more so than most other podcasts in VHL history. This took up most of their shows, but they would frequently have guests (myself included) and it was always a good time. Another podcast was Between the Pipes with Greg Harbinson and Tyler Edgar. I seem to remember being a guest on this podcast also, and these guys also had some great chemistry together. Kendrick was always putting out solo podcasts throughout this time, and we even saw some solo work from the notorious Brett Slobodzian. It was this time that podcast activity hit its peak.

Since then, podcast popularity has decreased slightly, but we still see productions from Greg Harbinson, Joey Kendrick, and the Knight brothers. We’ve also seen the emergence of live podcasts. I did a live podcast during the Season 18 VHL draft where I interviewed several members, and was also able to interact with others through the comments section of the stream site. Since then, the Knights have also done call-in shows, and Knight has even got Zach Arce back into the mix. The VHL magazine had even tried to pick up an official radio show, but that seems to have lost steam. Still, we can safely say that the podcast has firmly engrained itself within the fabrics of the VHL’s mold. Another tendency that has come up is the fact that there aren’t too many “set duos” that do podcasts together every time. Now, you have a lot of single podcasters that can pair up or group together arbitrarily and randomly. Either way, the podcast is clearly here to stay.

There is something exciting about hearing your name mentioned in a podcast. Sure, it’s nice to have a graphic made of yourself, and it’s just as nice to see your name written down in a new article for whatever reason. Still, hearing your name spoken by a human voice broadcasted over the Internet for all to hear is exhilarating. As a podcaster, I often took questions for my solo podcasts, and it was very obvious to see when people would ask questions just so I could mention their names. They would ask questions that fit into a specific niche. For example, a rookie defenseman would ask me a question about the best rookie defensemen that season. I often went out of my way to avoid mentioning people who had tried to do that, but in the end, I decided to let them have their glory. I realized that I had a lot of power – me speaking their name somehow validated these listeners who obviously spent some time carefully composing their questions so as to be assured that I would be forced to discuss their players. I was like Marie Antoinette, and let them eat cake (though she actually never said that, but that’s for another day).

For me, the podcast was one of my favorite ways of producing activity tasks back when I had activity troubles, where it became difficult to produce weekly tasks for my player. Accumulating practice hours had become a chore instead of a hobby, and the podcast was a great way to get my involvement in the league back to a maximum. Unlike the carefully-scripted media spots that I often wrote every week (and, in my opinion, were well-liked by you guys), the podcasts often gave me room to go off the script and talk about whatever came to mind. I also enjoyed how podcasts gave you some ability to incorporate humor and off-topic subject matter into your point tasks, because with a 30-45 minute output, you were obviously given some leeway to talk about things that were happening outside of the VHL’s walls. It’s because of this that I’m surprised that, while popular, the podcast never really became a “super popular” means of accumulating points for your player.


VHLers doing a radio show

Perhaps it was the technological limitations that prevented more members from joining the podcast scene. Like I said, a podcaster needs a microphone, Skype and/or Audacity, and a recording program that converts your work to MP3 so it can be uploaded onto the Internet. Another thing that limits the popularity of podcast creation is the time it takes to produce one. It can take upwards of one hour to get a podcast recorded and posted to the website, and that’s if there’s no editing involved. If you’re working with a partner, or several partners, then it’s an issue of finding a time during which everyone involved can be available for a couple hours to get it done.

Another reason that limits the popularity of podcasts coming onto the VHL website is the time it takes for them to be graded. A 45 minute podcast takes 45 minutes to grade, and if 3 or 4 podcasts are up there are waiting to be graded, then it become a very long chore for a grader to grade them all. Even the most interesting and compelling podcasts can become mundane if you’ve already listened to 4 podcasts before it, and podcasts often go ungraded for a longer time than other point tasks.

As mentioned previously in the article, the podcasts have been a source of controversy over the years. We’ve had comments being made over podcasts that have often struck a few nerves. The incident on Five’s a Crowd is only one of several occasions where something said over the Internet radio ended up having a negative effect on the other members in the league. With some of the thin-skinned members that we have in the league, it isn’t surprising to hear that we’ve had some controversy thanks to thinks said over the podcasts in the VHL.

I also think a lot of people are shy. They may not want to speak over the radio and have their voice heard by everyone. I was like that at first – a bit shy to voice chat with people whom, before the podcasting era, I had never communicated with other than through text-based chat. Also, it’s very possible that people see the group of podcasters as a tight-knit group that is difficult to enter into. This is not true at all. Personally, I always went out of my way to make sure that I got new members on my podcasts whenever I could. I always wanted to integrate more and more voices onto the podcast scene, and whenever we “converted” someone to “podcastism”, it was a big success.

In the end, the podcast era in the VHL has seen its high points and low points over the seasons, but we’ve always risen back from the ashes to triumph over its detractors. I’d do podcasts more often if I weren’t working on this series, and plan to get back into them once the series is over. The camaraderie that I’ve developed over the course of all the podcasts I’ve done is awesome, and I’ve met some truly awesome people through this. I absolutely do not regret my time on the Internet radio as I still routinely talk to people I’ve podcasted with in the past. I don’t think I’d be as well-known on the VHL if it weren’t for my time in the podcast circuit, and while this sounds a bit shallow, I’m glad to be in the position I’m in on this league.


This league needs a Bob Cole

If I had to forecast for the future of VHL podcasting, I’d say that we’re going to eventually see more and more live podcasts, where people can call in and talk to the host(s) write while they’re recording the podcasts. There are sites that even allow for listeners to comment in a chat box, which provides for a third dimension of live interaction. If someone can come in and fully utilize all of this to its full potential, we can get some truly amazing podcasts on the air. Another thing that I’ve always liked to try was live VHL games that can be commentated by our VHL members. I’ve done it once and I thought I did pretty well, but it was long and it wasn’t easy to maintain the flow and the enthusiasm. Again, it would take the right person or people to fully maximize the effectiveness of live games for it to work.

If I had to summarize, the podcast has been a very solid addition to the point task family in the Victory Hockey League. As long as we get routine participants to the podcast production scene, then we can expect to see and hear podcasts as a part of the league for a long, long time.

End of Part 11