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The Book Club problem.

edited July 2010 in GeekNights
As I see it, the book club's format of requiring you to have read the book in question before you can enjoy the episode runs opposite to it's goal of getting people who don't read books regularly to give reading books a try.

While it would take some form of poll to determine if people are actually going out of their way to read books beforehand, I suspect that most people just listen to the first half of the episode and turn off when Rym says "Before you continue, go read this whole book.".

The reason for me suspecting as such is that, most of the things I have tried due to them being recommended on Geeknights, have been things I later came across and Geeknights' recommendation is what made me choose the item over another.
Another related reason is that, when I'm casting around for something to enjoy, I'll often go through Geeknights episode categories and listen to whatever takes my fancy and I skip over the final thoughts episodes, as I assume most people do.

In short: Making books approachable for people who've rejected books most of their lives as being something that requires a lot of effort to appreciate begins with imprinting as much of a positive expectation of the entertainment contained within. Final thought's episodes should be kept for things most people have experienced.

I propose that, for the book club following The Lies of Loch Lamora, you do the book reviews as a standard review show and ask people to email in or put poll on the website to ask if they felt more or less compelled than with a normal final thoughts style book club.
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Comments

  • We'll try the same format we use for deep reviews - the spoiler line - with this one. And we'll likely switch up the format for the next book.
  • While we're on the subject of making the podcast accessible. Could you spend fewer episodes reviewing conventions. One or two a year wouldn't be so bad but they're mostly telling use about things we'd expect. Having an episode devoted to important new developments in the convention/panel circuit and another as a more general "You'd like this convention if you like this." with interesting highlights would save on having you talk about badges being or not being mailed out every episode.

    While Scott has a staunch non-political thing going on. You seem to talk about things directly relating to society, and thus politics, quite frequently (The Nimbys and Bananas issue, Problems with public transport, technological acceptance, vaccinations.) so having some Society and Civilization Thursday episodes would be appreciated.
  • Could you spend fewer episodes reviewing conventions.
    We get 50/50 feedback on this. Half the listeners want more convention reviews, and half want fewer. It seems to be directly tied to whether or not they're convention attendees in general.
  • Since I have no access to conventions what so ever, and I'm lazy to look for info online of what happened there, I like to listen to cool stuff that happens at the cons, so even if it's mostly meta I listen for the journalism bits.
  • edited July 2010
    I'd suggest reviewing all the conventions as a block to reduce repetition and making their episodes longer (Run it to 1:20 like you did with the Conneticon episode and cut off the front.). It's more that they're getting in the way of other topics so often and seem (Though may not actually be.) repetitive that's bothersome.

    This said, I think things like the Mocca should be kept separate but if another Mocca crops up, it would be combined with the Mocca episode.
    Post edited by Omnutia on
  • It's more that they're getting in the way of other topics so often that's bothersome.
    We'll see. You have to understand that half the listenership disagrees.

    I have a whole thing about how convention culture is going to be very important in the coming decades, but that will have to wait for its own show.
  • I doubt the number of email is an accurate measure of the listeners. I take it Apple isn't Google when it comes to analytics of who listened to how much.

    The problem also lies in how many people were "Meh." or "That was pretty good." center of the bell curve people who are hard to make respond.
  • edited July 2010
    I doubt the number of email is an accurate measure of the listeners. I take it Apple isn't Google when it comes to analytics of who listened to how much.

    The problem also lies in how many people were "Meh." or "That was pretty good." center of the bell curve people who are hard to make respond.
    Well, if we do things the Google way that means we're going to look closely at the download, web site, and forum statistics. Then we're going to figure out which episode was the most popular, and do more episodes like those. If those continue to be more popular, we'll just keep with those and can the rest.

    If we do things the Apple way, we won't even look. We'll just do what we want to do, and what we feel is best. Then we'll impose our will upon you, like it or not. You'll complain at first, but you'll listen anyway.

    I think right now we're doing a pretty good combination. We have a vision, and we follow it. We do what we want, and not what the listeners ask for. However, we do listen to feedback, and make alterations where the feedback agrees with us, and we just hadn't thought of it before.
    Post edited by Apreche on
  • I doubt the number of email is an accurate measure of the listeners. I take it Apple isn't Google when it comes to analytics of who listened to how much.

    The problem also lies in how many people were "Meh." or "That was pretty good." center of the bell curve people who are hard to make respond.
    Actually, that's a good point - there have been a few episodes where I've said "Nah, I just can't get into this one" and deleted it without finishing it, and never said boo about it, despite the fact that I'm in contact with Scott and Rym via the forums more often than I'm in contact with my aunts. Okay, bad comparison, my aunts are horrible, but you get what I mean - I have a ridiculously easy way to contact Scrym, which I would have been doing, dissatisfaction with an episode or not, but I don't think I've ever complained about anything like that, the only thing I've done is very occasionally have a bit of a natter about some part of the content.
  • Oh, I want to hear about all of your dissatisfaction. Don't ever shy from telling us when we suck!
  • Oh, I want to hear about all of your dissatisfaction. Don't ever shy from telling us when we suck!
    Indeed. Just don't assume we are going to obey your demands.
  • @Rym:

    Re: Book Club episodes - I think the spoiler-line type of episode is probably the best way to handle stuff like this. I personally enjoy in-depth discussion of a book and its plot. Top of the episode should be the usual chit-chat and fluff, a mention of the book you're going to be discussing along with a short, spoiler-free synopsis, a quick recommendation (Yea/Nay) and then the reveal of the next book to be read. Following that, spoiler line break so that anyone who hasn't read the book can stop listening, and then the in-depth discussion of the book, not just a "Yeah, this book was so awesome"-fest.

    Re: Convention episodes - I'm on the fence about them myself. While I do enjoy hearing about other peoples' experiences at cons, it becomes monotonous if the tale drags on. Plus it loses quite a bit when the episode devolves into 'Remember that one panel?' 'Oh yeah, how awesome was that panel?' 'So awesome.' 'Remember that one guy?' 'Yeah, how awesome was that guy?' 'So awesome.', especially if the listener wasn't able to attend the same con. When I was typing out the extended show notes for the ConneciCon episode the whole listening experience seemed to drag because you guys kept flipping back and forth between the meta and "So Awesome". Don't just name-drop on the panels you thought were awesome - tell us more on why they were awesome. If you saw some dude in a wicked-cool cosplay outfit and you want to mention it, have pics to put up in a flickr stream, and link us to it. If someone was doing something really cool that other people could have seen (like the hypnotism guy), tell us about why it was cool (which you did, in that case). If it was just something cool that someone did for you (i.e., "oh mans, that dude who went and got me a burrito was so awesome") then save it for the shout-outs. If you're worried about the episode running long then don't do it stream-of-consciousness style immediately after the con. Take down notes of the stuff you thought was cool, let it rest a day or two, figure out what you want to talk about, and edit out the fluff. Make it more entertaining for the listeners that weren't there and I guarantee you'll see the hating on the con episodes go down and the number of people attending the same cons you do going up.
  • Oh, I want to hear about all of your dissatisfaction. Don't ever shy from telling us when we suck!
    Well, alright, I will, the next time you do.
    Indeed. Just don't assume we are going to obey your demands.
    I wouldn't waste the metaphorical breath to make them.
  • Hey Rym, I started writing something and that got me thinking. The convention episode problem has become so pronounced is that you've really been slipping on the other episodes. You did Zelda as a cop-out when it should have been on the level of the Tribes 2 and NS1 episodes. TOTDs are mostly re-posts.

    There was a time when GN was worth waiting up until 4AM for because I was learning all new stuff but now it feels like there's so much meta, here's what we did today stuff (Yes, isn't there forum.) and now, more than ever, is the time when listening to all nights versus just the ones you are already interested in seems at it's lowest.

    Meta and reviews of the same old stuff = Bad.
    Examples: Non-lego, Anime Scott fell asleep watching, Living in the City.

    Learning, discovering and discussing things we didn't previously know about = Good.
    Examples: Shock, The complex tech episodes, What happened to programing, Internet Ruins.

    You aren't going to please everyone all the time but that doesn't mean you can't please more people more efficiently.
  • RymRym
    edited July 2010
    Anime Scott fell asleep watching
    That was a very popular episide comparatively.
    Living in the City.
    That episode generated surprising feedback, and again, was very popular.

    Just some perspective. ^_~
    TOTDs are mostly re-posts.
    Like?
    Post edited by Rym on
  • edited July 2010
    TOTDs are mostly re-posts.
    Like?
    The episodes when you say, it's another thing from college humor or boingboing, like today's.

    What are you basing the popularity on? Email is susceptible to the vocal minority while download numbers tell you how much interest was shown in an episode which, in the case of Geeknights, isn't a great metric as many people may listen to just the first half.
    Post edited by Omnutia on
  • The episodes when you say, it's another thing from college humor or boingboing, like today's.
    Every thing of the day is something we found on another web site. Everything you find on BoingBoing or CollegeHumor is actually originally from yet another web site. Even though sites like CH and BB are extremely popular, it's shocking how many people haven't seen our TotD until they become TotD.
  • I like long episodes, the longer the better. But It would be cool if there was a more informative approach to those episodes, with meta, but with details about what was actually going on at the con.
  • What are you basing the popularity on? Email is susceptible to the vocal minority
    The forum is a vocal minority. You guys are a tiny subset of the listenership. ;^)
    The episodes when you say, it's another thing from college humor or boingboing, like today's.
    So, how are these reposts? Or are you saying that we should never link to the same aggregator more than once? Anything worth being a totd makes the rounds on all of the popular sites over time. They're new things, that most of our listeners haven't seen.
  • The forum is a vocal minority. You guys are a tiny subset of the listenership. ;^)
    And half of them just hang out in the forums and don't listen to the show :-p
  • If you condense your coverage of cons into a limited number of episodes, wouldn't the quality suffer b/c you are recording them way after some of those cons have passed? Not only is the info stale, but the memories have faded. I would just make a conscious effort to do con coverage aimed at those who cannot attend the con. Make it rich with detail as others have suggested, but don't hold back from doing the episode just because you are worried about having too many con shows.
  • What are you basing the popularity on? Email is susceptible to the vocal minority
    The forum is a vocal minority. You guys are a tiny subset of the listenership. ;^)
    Yes, this is the point I've been making. We need to find out what listeners as a whole.

    Hold on with the re-post problem, I'm working out what's wrong and I'll report back when I put my finger on it.
  • I enjoy the convention episodes since they are not a list of what they did but some comment of what they liked and how it was. I go to a few conventions a year and it's good to help me look out for what I should see.
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    Feature the book club books more prominently on the site/forum and set a fixed date for the episode.
  • edited September 2010
    I see a different Book Club problem. Book Club episodes prior to Cosmos aren't showing up in the Thursday RSS feed. Doesn't seem they're even labelled as Thursday shows on the site anymore. They're all gathered up under here instead - http://frontrowcrew.com/geeknights/book-club/ - and there's no easy way to reach that link except from another Book Club episode.
    Post edited by Eryn on
  • I think they are trying to keep the book club seperate from Thursday now.
  • edited September 2010
    But Cosmos is still in the Thursday feed, and the Book Club episodes aren't linked anywhere on the front page or in the sub-headings. Unless their intent is for only the people who listen to the full show feed or who know which titles to search for in the archive to hear them, I think it's a feed/site problem.
    Post edited by Eryn on
  • I'm going to make a book club section, and it will all be fixed.
  • Awesome. Sounds good.
  • I live in New Zealand and have never been to a big convention, and probably never will. I LOVE hearing about them.
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