So, this happened.
Like Robinson Crusoe, episodes #1-5 are as primitive as can be.
The above is my showing off what was once our guest bedroom. It’s now my office. Bigger tax deduction because bigger floor space. More importantly, it’s carpeted and on the top floor, so I don’t freeze. My old office didn’t have that luxury.
The Minioncast is something I’ve toyed with for a few years. I probably could have started it during the lockdown, but life really didn’t pause just because the economy did. I worked from home and still do. And btw, prospective future employers, that’s a requirement if you want to lure me away.
As I state in the various episodes, I need to master technologies like Streamyard, which lets you simulcast on YouTube and Facebook, video editing, and graphics. This last makes me nervous. I suck at graphics. I do have one person who just started writing who’s obsessed with thumbnail images and can’t stop harping on how I simply pick a frame from the video and consider it done. I do want something besides a video frame, but it’ll do for now.
So far, the podcast has been little more than a vlog. Once I get comfortable with being on the other end of Streamyard and managing the intro and outro videos live, I’ll have guests. Inevitably, someone’s going to put up their hand and go, “Me! Pick me! Pick me!” I’m deliberately not scheduling anyone yet because 1.) I don’t know when I’m going to start booking guests, and 2.) I’m not sure how regular this is going to go. I have a few ideas on who I want, but scheduling is going to be a challenge.
There are some who say, “Well, you work from home. How will they know if you do it during the day?” For starters, the live feed. Also, “work from home” means I sit in a room in my house, not in a cubicle. Work still has to get done, and office or home, I have enough distractions as it is without setting up for a 20-60 minute podcast on YouTube that can be seen by my boss.
My most recent episode was a reading from Checkmate, so I may follow on editor Kalene Williams’s podcast Kalene’s Story Time. That, I can solicit writers to send me their work. If the writer sends it in, that eliminates copyright issues. So, forget Starship Troopers or Iain Banks’s Use of Weapons as it’s unlikely their estates are going to ask an unknown scifi writer to cold read those classics.
The real challenge is that I’m doing this from home. With people around. Not too long ago, I did a guest appearance on the BAMF Podcast. During the show, my wife called to tell me something before remembering I was on the air live. There are other problems. The most recent episode occurred on a day with a lot of thunderstorms. I caught a quiet period, but there could easily have been the sound of artillery blasts and monsoon rains midway through.
Most likely, the show will be irregular in schedule. More or less every couple of weeks, and not always live. But it’s a fun way to get out there and help out other writers.