Knives Out! Podcast Fiction Vs The World

There's a lot of drama in the podcast fiction world and a lot of comedy. Now, while this genre of podcasting oftentimes has the toughest time being excepted, it also enjoys perhaps the biggest collaborative spirit among all creators and listeners alike.

Hello and welcome to another podcast. Pontifications with me. Evo Terra. If you haven't listened to podcast fiction yet, you are really missing out. I am a huge fan of podcast fiction. Yes. I listened to the news stories and I've even listened to a sports program and some comedies and lots of talky talk back and forth and in depth investigative journalism.

But I'm telling you, this podcast fiction thing is really kind of cool. Now, if you're thinking that it's, Oh, it's just audio drama, it's just repurposed from the 1930s radio. No, actually that's not, that's not what it is at all. It certainly can be if that's what someone is trying to replicate, but it's a much.

Wider playing field than that with full cast audio dramas that are being produced on a regular basis with amazing soundscaping sound effects. Really talented voice actors. There are solo efforts where one person narrates and reads a piece of fiction oftentimes that they have written small cast.

Everything in between. Whatever the podcast fiction is, science fiction. Sure. Lots of scifi and fantasy, but there's every kind of fiction, just regular fiction for regular people. There's a lot of fiction out there that's good for the LGBTQ community. There's fiction for everyone out there on podcasting, and I encourage you to go find it and have a listen because it is wonderful entertainment.

Listen, if you'd like to read and you like to watch TV, and I'm talking specifically about fiction. Fiction television series, fictional books that you read, go to the movies that are fiction. Check out podcast fiction. You will be blown away by what is out there in the marketplace. I promise you. Now, title of the show says podcasts fiction versus the world because podcast fiction oftentimes gets skewered.

It oftentimes is misunderstood. And there is seems to me that there is a constant bubbling of, I don't understand this thing, but I've been assigned to write about this thing. So here goes approach for many of the journalists that are either in the space or getting into this space right now. And it's, it's kind of a, a big challenge.

And that's why it's versus the world, because podcast fiction people. Constantly struggle to have their voice heard by the larger podcasting community and just generally gain acceptance overall. And that's a problem. And that's why I'm pointing out to you that you should go try to listen to some podcast fiction so you can have a better understanding of what it's about.

Now. Let's get some some realities of things. There are some problems in the world of podcast fiction. There certainly are there. I would, I would be lying if I said that everything was perfect and fine and the biggest issue that plagues podcast fiction, in my opinion, as a person who is not a podcast fiction producer.

However. I have had some influence on podcast fiction in the early days. I, we're not going to go into that, but the biggest problem that I see with podcasts fiction today revolves around issues of quality. Yeah. Just because a podcast fiction series is out there doesn't mean that it's great. And in fact, if you randomly sample various pieces of podcast fiction, you will likely find some, not great content, but.

That's the same way any creative endeavor works out, right? I mean, when's the last time you went to a writing group? A creative writing group where people, usually small groups of people, sometimes large, either in person or online, get together and share their work. Those stories oftentimes aren't great and mine, my opinion, right?

They're not. Have you been doing open mic night. We're musicians, hop up on stage and play. All right? If I go to one of those things, I'm usually cringing when I hear the voice or I see this person playing the guitar. I can't even go to a local comedy club because you know, I'm looking for some comedy and the ostensibly, that's what's up there, but I didn't find that all that funny.

Okay. I said all that, but that's just me. The people at that writing group, they go every single week. The people who sit in that open mic night are clapping and singing along and encouraging people. Same thing for the comedy club. People are laughing, they're having a great time, but just because I personally am not, doesn't invalidate the entire system, and in fact, it just means maybe that's not for me.

And that's, Oh, another problem with podcast fiction is they're often locked out from the advertising boon that many podcasts are seeing these days. That's for a number of reasons. Primarily because the people who sell the advertising on podcasts don't really know about podcast fiction and don't understand the very different nature of listening to a piece of fiction on podcasts as opposed to a news or interview type show.

But at the same time, I think they're missing the boat because what's the one type of advertising that podcasts. Went out over radio and other areas. That's the live host read. Who better to do a live host read than people who were making fiction than the act doors who are behind the microphones. That's great stuff.

You can incorporate that live read into the story. It's wonderful. Another problem with podcast fiction is that it's a lot of hard, hard work. Listen, just from the writing stage. Writing content that is to be consumed via the ears only is very different than writing content that will be consumed either with eyes on screen or eyes on page.

Giant paragraphs that make you sound really smart and print. Don't work in the audio world. The things that you think might make a lot of sense on screen don't work when we don't have our eyes to work with it. It's just our ears. That's just the writing. Then there's the process of actually making it, finding talented actors to do it, finding someone to sound, it's a giant, giant amount of work.

So what can we learn? Those of us that do not do podcast fiction, what can we learn from the podcast fiction community? I think there's a lot we can learn, but are Allston the biggest thing to me, centers around comradery. If you spend any time at a podcast conference or in a, the local groups where the podcast fiction people hang out.

These people genuinely love each other. They are supportive. They've lift each other up when it needs to be lifted. They are happy to sing the praises. They are as tight knit of the community as I have seen in podcasting. Way more in my opinion, than the other genres of podcasters. So even if you are not making podcast fiction, if there's a podcast fiction group in your area, I highly recommend trying to find them, spend some time with them at the next conference you go to where there will be podcast fiction tracks.

Go sit. Listen, don't cringe. Just sit and listen and watch the community around them. And I guess I'm tempted to leave with this. What can they learn from us? Yeah, right. I'm not about to go there. Right. Cause I'm pretty sure that one less old white man telling these people who create podcast fiction what they should be doing would be a good thing.

So no, I will not do that. I will ask you however, to let me and your fellow podcasters know what your favorite podcast fiction. Is I maintain a list of shows that I really enjoy on pod chaser. I will include a link to my pod chaser list. It's called evil licious podcast fiction. Very good quality podcast fiction.

That'll be in the episode details here in the app. What you're listening to right now, as well as on the webpage, share that idea with your friends. Have your other fellow podcasters. Think about, well, I think about, actually listen to some podcast fiction. Share some ideas with them, so send them a link to this episode and say, Hey, Eva says we should be listening to podcasts fiction.

I think it should be this one. Let's see if we can get some more understanding of the podcast fiction out amongst us and help knock down some of these problems. That's it. I shall be back tomorrow with yet another podcast on suffocation. Cheers.

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