Last night I posted my first Madison-produced Mindcast show, Episode 75, and I would like to share my nifty setup with everyone, what I’m working on to create more media capabilities, and what this means for the show in the near and long term.

First, when I moved from Davis, CA to Madison, WI, my local radio station roots were ripped up. KDRT has provided me a unique opportunity to be able to experiment with producing a radio show on my own, without which I may not have been able to do anything more than imagine what it would be like. I would have been able to get a show on KDVS, but it might have been short, inflexible, and at an odd time of the day. Prime time is great for getting off work, riding across town, and plugging my mind into the radio console.

So without the studio, microphone, recording equipment, know-how of the staff, what is a podcaster to do? Well, spring for the equipment! Some of it, I already had.

First, there’s my Firewire audio device, AudioFire4 by Echo Audio. I bought it in 2006 as a solution to getting those interviews where the interviewee can’t make a live show. It has come in handy for interviewing everyone from Jonathan Eisen in his Genomics Center office, to phone-in interviews with Chris Mooney and the discussion between PZ Myers and Ken Miller.

I also have an iRiver mp3 player, which I bought for the purpose of recording interviews, talks, checking how the show sounds on the air, (Yes, iPod fanatics, it is possible to have an mp3 player that records, and plays FM…one wonders why Apple hasn’t made one, unless you think about where you have to buy your iPod music from) and it can mesh well with recording things on-location where the laptop is cumbersome. Plus, my Audiofire4 can provide line-level audio without my computer involved, so high-quality mics can be used, rather than the fuzzy watch-battery microphone I originally bought for the iRiver.

In Davis, this combination worked fine, because I could always borrow a microphone from the station to go record in the field, or at home for my chemical commercials. So when I got here, I realized that I would need my own broadcast-quality microphone and boom. Plus, some soundproofing foam was required to keep people from hearing echoes everywhere. There’s still some bleed-through of outside sound, but what are you going to do when you live in university housing? The metal door to the hallway from the second bedroom studio is surprisingly passive to sound.

In addition, as I learned from the dual-interview with Ken and PZ, I would have to something more sophisticated than Skype to get a good quality dual-interview show recorded. So I bought a phone hybrid that allows me to separate sound from the caller or from me, and I can also give them sound from another source, which could be skype, or a track, or an embarrasing audio clip of the caller for them to respond to… t’will come in handy for interviewing the antiscience types.

I may need to get a small mixing board to make this work easier, and I’m still testing out what the capabilities of this setup will be, but as it stands now, I give you the Haro von Mogel Studio:

Now what does this mean for doing my show in Madison? I’ll be able to get higher-quality interviews for sure, both local and abroad. I’ll be able to stack up pre-recorded interviews before it comes time to record the news portion of the show, which might mean that when I’m busy with school and research, the show won’t suffer for content. The recording of my show will have to happen at home, and from last night’s recording session, it looks like a good 2 1/2 hours to make an hour-long show, with the starts and stops, and previewing. There is a disadvantage here, because this means that for part of one night out of the week, Ariela is inconvenienced with having to be quiet - which if you know anything about her, is hard for her to do! :)

But there is one big limitation with this setup - no ‘live’ shows. Sometimes I would get a few calls on the air at KDRT, not too many, but the potential was still there for that to happen. I grew up on talk radio out of San Francisco, and I very much want people to join in the discussion - because what comes out is way better than a monologue. To make it possible for a little feedback and discussion, I’m going to make it possible for listeners to send in audio comments that could be aired the following week, let’s say if I talked about a controversial issue and you wanted to add something. Unless I were to someday set up a live stream, or get behind the console at another radio station, however, the Mindcast will only have limited back-and-forth capability for the time being.

What about getting on a local radio station? Well, I have submitted an application to WORT, an independent radio station here in Madison, the Midwest equivalent of KDVS in Davis, however not run by the school. They already have a science show, and their schedule is full of programmers who have been there forever, so getting on their regular schedule, let alone a prime time spot, would take a long time.

- HOWEVER -

WORT is starting up an HD radio channel, piping in pre-made content from elsewhere. (This is a typical practice for new HD channels - which is partly why it has been so slow to adopt, who wants to listen to something piped in from who knows where?) The reason for this is that they don’t have another studio to make shows in-house. Having my own studio setup at home gives me an edge for this channel - a locally-produced show that can be brought in, complete, ready to broadcast. So they’re considering my show for their HD channel right now. Perhaps by this time next month I’ll be walking over there once a week to upload the Mindcast.

Why stop there? I’m talking to someone who may help me format my show and put it online in a form for other radio stations to download and broadcast for free - KDRT in Davis could once again air my show! When this potentiality is actualized, The Inoculated Mind may be coming to a station near you! (You could request it…) I look forward to the possibility of saying ‘Citizens of Earth’ to more and more people.

There’s also a big, super-secret project on the horizon, which will make a public debut sometime in May, that I’ve been asked to participate in in some capacity. Actually, I don’t have to do anything but keep doing what I’m doing. And I will.

Finally, I’m adding a new podcast feed, to be called The Inoculated Mind - Mindcast Extras. It will be for recordings of talks, extended interviews, videos, and special commentaries that don’t fit the format of my show. It shouldn’t be any more than one download per month, but it will allow me to get more and different things out there for mass consumption.

So that’s the news I have to report right now. Over time, I intend to write reviews of the equipment I have and the crazy setups I got to work, which may help other podcasters who are thinking about making their stuff sound better. For now, help me spread the word!

And do let me know how you think I can improve the show, and if there are any guests/topics you would like me to cover. Let’s make the Mindcast more bi-directional!