Subscribed 023: Cooking Stoned with James Stone

February 1, 2013 by Douglas E. Welch

Subscribed is my series highlighting the Podcasts, YouTube Channels and Blogs that I follow on a daily basis. Check out this entry, and past entries, for some great New Media Content — Douglas

Cooking Stoned with James Stone

I am always looking to branch out in my subscriptions, so it is great to find some new YouTube programming that isn’t gaming or geek related. Cooking Stoned are short (2-5 min) cooking video on a wide variety of dishes. One of the best elements is James seems to be enjoying himself a lot, which is always important in any video. His dishes fit within my fussy eating habits for the most part and some reach just far enough beyond that I am tempted to check them out at least once.

Cooking Stoned is “snackable content” in both senses of the term.

From Cooking Stoned YouTube Channel…

“Fresh and simple vegetarian recipes by DIY chef Jerry James Stone. Inspired by the San Francisco Bay Area and California cuisine, Cooking Stoned is a series of quick and tasty recipes and easy-to-follow HOW TOs.”

Link: Cooking Stone YouTube Channel

Link: Cooking Stoned Web Site

What are some of your favorite Subscriptions? Share them here in the comments!

Previously highlighted on Subscribed:

LIVE: Watch and donate to Child’s Play Charity Today and this Weekend!

February 1, 2013 by Douglas E. Welch

A couple of my favorite Minecraft YouTubers are spending the weekend live streaming their gameplay for Child’s Play Charity — raising funds that provide games and toys for hospitalized youth.

Watch Live Here

Watch live video from Juicetra on www.twitch.tv

My Favorite New Media Things for January 2013

February 1, 2013 by Douglas E. Welch

My Favorite Things

It looks like I shared lots of Food and Gardening items in the past month. It is interesting to watch how my interests rise and fall over the course of the months.

As always, let me know what types of interesting items you would like to see and I will keep an eye out for them especially. — Douglas

Links to all of these items, and more, are on my Pinterest Feed.

New Media Vocabulary: RSS (Real Simple Syndication/Rich Site Summary)

January 31, 2013 by Douglas E. Welch

New Media Vocabulary: RSS (Rich Site Summery or Real Simple Syndication)

“RSS Rich Site Summary (originally RDF Site Summary, often dubbed Really Simple Syndication) is a family of web feed formats used to publish frequently updated works—such as blog entries, news headlines, audio, and video—in a standardized format.[2] An RSS document (which is called a “feed”, “web feed”,[3] or “channel”) includes full or summarized text, plus metadata such as publishing dates and authorship.” – http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/RSS

The way I typical explain RSS and RSS feeds to new users is this…where a web site is designed to be readable by humans, RSS feeds contain the same content as the web site, but they are designed to be consumed by other computer programs, such as RSS Readers, Podcatchers (software the downloads individual podcast files) and other software.

RSS takes the relatively unstructured data that makes up a blog post on a web site and adds tags and meta-data that software can use to perform specialized tasks. One important piece of data is machine-readable date field that can be used to qualify new blog posts and new podcasts that are available for download.

RSS files are simple text files and can be handwritten, if necessary, but usually they are created programmatically by blog software, like WordPress or other custom web site software. RSS files are also extensible so that new tags and new meta-data can be added. For New Media producers this added information includes a series of tags required by iTunes to contain all the specialized information used to build your show entry in the iTunes Podcast directory including the location of your podcast logo, categorization, Podcast Title, Author and more.

People are fond of predicting the death of the RSS, but for myself, I rely deeply on RSS feeds to monitor web sites and bring information to me instead of constantly having to visit hundreds of web sites to check for new information.

Do you have questions, comments or clarifications to this New Media Vocabulary term? Add them to the comments!

For more information on RSS:

Previously on New Media Vocabulary:

New Media Gear 009: Dan Hughes from The Treasure Corner and others

January 28, 2013 by Douglas E. Welch

New Media Gear 009: Dan Hughes of In The Treasure Corner and others

Dan’s podcasts include:

In the Treasure Corner – http://thetreasurecorner.com
In the Softball Corner – http://thesoftballcorner.com
In the Old-Time Radio Corner – http://radiofun.info

Dan uses this equipment in his productions:

Dan also built his own Mic Box for recording. You can check out his build in this post:

Build a Microphone Isolation Box For Two Bucks!

New Media Equipment:

If you have any questions about Dan’s podcasting equipment, please drop them in the comments.

Previously on New Media Gear:

Subscribed 022: Backyard Farmer from the University of Nebraska

January 25, 2013 by Douglas E. Welch

Subscribed is my series highlighting the Podcasts, YouTube Channels and Blogs that I follow on a daily basis. Check out this entry, and past entries, for some great New Media Content — Douglas

Backyard Farmer from the University of Nebraska

I just recently discovered Backyard Farmer when I friend forwarded me this video on Cleaning Garden Tools. They are an excellent source of gardening information and you can subscribe in a number of ways. There are vides on everything from trees to ponds to drought to chainsaws to ponds. I am just starting to delve into their collection of past videos myself, but I also look forward to whatever new videos they produce.

Link: Backyard Farmer Web Site

Link: Backyard Farmer on YouTube

Link: Backyard Farmer on iTunes U (Subscribe as a podcast)

What are some of your favorite Subscriptions? Share them here in the comments!

Previously highlighted on Subscribed:

New Media Vocabulary: Plugin

January 24, 2013 by Douglas E. Welch

New Media Vocabulary: Plugin

“In computing, a plug-in (or plugin) is a set of software components that adds specific abilities to a larger software application. If supported, plug-ins enable customizing the functionality of an application. For example, plug-ins are commonly used in web browsers to play video, scan for viruses, and display new file types. Well-known plug-ins examples include Adobe Flash Player, QuickTime, and Java Applets.” – http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Plug-in_(computing)

To expand on the description above, plugins aren’t usually complete programs in themselves, but rather programs that run inside of — and expand the features of — other software. Plugins are very popular because they allow the extension and addition of new features to software without have include the feature directly in the base product. This also allows you to add only those features you most want or need to a product. This reduces complexity of the software and also allows you to limit how much memory the software might take to run. There is no need to load all the features when you use only 2 or 3 of the added functions.

For New Media producers, you will often see plugins as part of audio and video recording/editing software. Most all software provides for a plugin structure which allows other companies to produce niche features that might only be needed by a limited number of users who purchase the overall software.

One important item to remember is that plugins need to updated, just like the software they extend. Keep track of plugin updates to insure that you don’t run into issues with existing bugs or miss new features. Also, be aware that plugins often only work with one specific version of the base software. If you rely on a particular plugin, you may need to postpone upgrading your base software until the plugin manufacturer releases an update to work with that newer version.

Do you have questions, comments or clarifications to this New Media Vocabulary term? Add them to the comments!

Previously on New Media Vocabulary:

News: Update Powerpress WordPress/Podcasting Plugin ASAP

January 24, 2013 by Douglas E. Welch

It looks like there was a security problem with one of the audio players used by the PowerPress WordPress plugin that many podcasters use on their sites. There is an update waiting and Blubrry says “Everyone is strongly encouraged to update their copy of PowerPress immediately!”

Taking their advice, I have done just that on all my WordPress blogs and you should too. Visit your WordPress Dashboard to perform the quick update.

Here is a snippet from the PowerPress Changelog for this version…

Powerpress 4.0.6

Released on 1/23/2013

Everyone is strongly encouraged to update their copy of PowerPress immediately!

Due to concerns of possible security exploits, the 1 Pixel Out Audio Player has been removed from PowerPress. Learn More

Notices added in both the WP dashboard and in the Audio player settings page that the 1 Pixel Out player has been removed.

If you’ve configured your web site with the 1 Pixel Out Audio Player, Flow Player Classic will be used. Go to the PowerPress > Audio Player settings page to change this player if you like.

Read the entire changelog here

Audacity Audio Recording and Editing Software Upgraded to 2.0.3

January 22, 2013 by Douglas E. Welch

Audacity, the free audio recoding and editing software, used by many podcasters and other new media producers, has been upgrade to version 2.0.3. A complete list of fixed bugs and new features is available in the Audacity 2.0.3 Release Notes.

Audacity is available in Windows, Macintosh and Linux versions.

Link: Audacity Web Site

New Media Gear 008: Zoom H1 Handy Portable Digital Recorder

January 20, 2013 by Douglas E. Welch

New Media Gear 008: Zoom H1 Handy Portable Digital Recorder

This series started with a conversation on the Facebook Podcast Community Group. You can ask your questions and find lots of podcasting discussion there.

Zoom H1 Handy Portable Digital Recorder

Capturing great audio for your New Media projects can be even more important that capturing good video The Zoom H1 Portable Digital Recorder makes capturing great audio easy and inexpensive for almost everyone.

Dual microphones bring in high-fidelity in a small package and MiniSD card recording allows you to easily swap in a new card when you need more recording time out in the field. The easy-to-read display with active metering makes it clear when you are recording and how well you have set your levels. Also includes includes external mix input for use with lavaliere and shotgun microphones with 1/8″ audio plug connectors.

If you have any questions about this podcasting equipment, please drop them in the comments.

Previously on New Media Gear:

Subscribed 021: Make Magazine, Make Blog, YouTube, Podcasts

January 18, 2013 by Douglas E. Welch

Subscribed is my series highlighting the Podcasts, YouTube Channels and Blogs that I follow on a daily basis. Check out this entry, and past entries, for some great New Media Content — Douglas

Make

Make is a print magazine, but it also has a huge presence on the web as a blog and also a YouTube Channel.

“MAKE brings the do-it-yourself mindset to all the technology in your life. MAKE is loaded with exciting projects that help you make the most of your technology at home and away from home. This is a magazine that celebrates your right to tweak, hack, and bend any technology to your own will.”

I am always amazed at the great content I find in both the blog and the YouTube Channel. I don’t DIY nearly as much as I would like, but Make encourages me with great ideas for projects that I might like to build — everything from hands-on woodworking and the creation of functional art pieces to electronics projects using the tiny Arduino computer system.

Subscribe to both the the blog and the video channel to get everything the Make has to offer.

Link: Make

Link: Make on YouTube

Link: Make Magazine Podcasts on iTunes

What are some of your favorite Subscriptions? Share them here in the comments!

Previously highlighted on Subscribed:

Elsewhere: IK Multimedia’s iRig HD adapter for iOS, Mac lets guitars ride the Lightning port

January 17, 2013 by Douglas E. Welch

IK Multimedia’s iRig HD adapter for iOS, Mac lets guitars ride the Lightning port

Engadget.com

IK Multimedia spent a lot of time at CES 2013 courting Android musicians, but we neglected to mention equal attention spent on iOS at the show through the iRig HD. The company’s new adapter pipes audio from a guitar or other instrument with a quarter-inch plug into Lightning-equipped Apple devices, keeping them in IK’s musical world (and inviting terrible Metallica puns).

[…]

Read the entire article

New Media Vocabulary: Condenser Microphone

January 17, 2013 by Douglas E. Welch

New Media Vocabulary: Condenser Microphone

“The condenser microphone, invented at Bell Labs in 1916 by E. C. Wente[2] is also called a capacitor microphone or electrostatic microphone—capacitors were historically called condensers. Here, the diaphragm acts as one plate of a capacitor, and the vibrations produce changes in the distance between the plates. ” – http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Microphone

When you see folks using those big, studio microphones, chances are they are condenser mics. What is a condenser mic? Since there are far better descriptions of condenser micrpohones available online, I am going to refer and link to them rather than create my own, poor, definition.

For me, in general, condenser mics are great for recording my voice as they tend to add bass and an overall richness to my somewhat high voice. The proximity effect kicks in when working close to these mics and, for spoken word podcasts, can really enhance your vocal sound.

You can hear an example in my own work using an MXL 2001 Condenser microphone on my my podcast, Career Opportunities.

More information on Condenser Microphone:

My own condenser microphones

MXL 2001 | Blue Snowball | MXL 990

Do you have questions, comments or clarifications to this New Media Vocabulary term? Add them to the comments!

Previously on New Media Vocabulary:

New Media Gear 007: Charley Hays

January 13, 2013 by Douglas E. Welch

New Media Gear 007: Charley Hays

Link: Charley Hays on Facebook

This series started with a conversation on the Facebook Podcast Community Group. You can ask your questions and find lots of podcasting discussion there.

If you have any questions about Jack’s podcasting equipment, please drop them in the comments.

New Media Equipment:

Previously on New Media Gear:

Subscribed 020: Lifehacker

January 11, 2013 by Douglas E. Welch

Subscribed is my series highlighting the Podcasts, YouTube Channels and Blogs that I follow on a daily basis. Check out this entry, and past entries, for some great New Media Content — Douglas

Lifehacker

We all know about hacking in computers and technology, but what exactly is a Lifehacker. A Lifehacker is someone who experiments with their own life, their own work, their own productivity and is constantly looking for ways of making themselves more effective, more efficient and, in a lot of cases, happier.

Lifehacker seeks to give you to the tools and information to help you along in this endeavor. Whether it is organizational tips or advice on how to go paperless, each tip is dedicated to making your life just a little bit easier. On the blog you’ll find tips that are high-tech, low-tech and no-tech at all.

If you are looking for ways to make some improvements in your life, subscribe to Lifehacker and see what they can do for you. I know for myself, I have found a wealth of ideas there.

Link: Lifehacker.com

What are some of your favorite Subscriptions? Share them here in the comments!

Previously highlighted on Subscribed:

New Media Vocabulary: ftp (file transfer protocol)

January 10, 2013 by Douglas E. Welch

New Media Vocabulary: ftp (file transfer protocol)

File transfer protocol was one of the first technologies developed for the infant Internet. Often shortened to its acronym, ftp, file transfer protocol dictates how files should be moved from one computer to another and provides the software interfaces to facilitate it. Most New Media users encounter ftp when they set up their first web site. Most web sites use ftp to upload the various pages, graphics, photos, audio and video necessary.

Ftp is a client/server protocol. The ftp server runs on the web site server and listens for connections from an ftp client program. When it sees a connection, it challenges that program for a username and password and then allows access to the file structure of the web server (the hard drive) if those credentials are correct. The user can then upload files to the web server, download files or re-organize files.

The original interface for ftp was as a command-line program, but now there are many free and commercial ftp client programs available to make the process easier and more intuitive. My first recommendation for my clients at this time is Cyberduck, available for both Macintosh and Windows computers.

More information on File Transfer Protocol (ftp):

Do you have questions, comments or clarifications to this New Media Vocabulary term? Add them to the comments!

Previously on New Media Vocabulary:

Technology and New Media News out of CES Las Vegas this week

January 8, 2013 by Douglas E. Welch

This week the Consumer Electronics Show (CES) is running in Las Vegas, NV and the technology and new media news has been coming fast and furious. I have been highlighting interesting products and information on my social media accounts and I wanted to gather up these links for the blogs.

Since there is a lot of crossover between the general technology news and those products useful in new media, I am sharing the post with both my Careers in New Media and my TechnologyIQ blogs. I will add to this list of links as the week progressing and new news arises. Enjoy!

New Media Gear 006: Chuck Tomasi of Technorama

January 6, 2013 by Douglas E. Welch

New Media Gear 006: Chuck Tomasi of Technorama

I have known Chuck for a long time as he is a a fellow member of Friends in Tech our rather informal podcasting consortium. Technorama is one of his long-running shows which he produces weekly with his co-host, Kreg Steppe. Technorama is “a light-hearted look at all things tech, science, sci-fi, and all things geek.” They have a great “studio” audience in their chat room and cover some of the funnier and geekier sides of culture.

Link: Technorama with Chuck Tomasi and Kreg Steppe

This series started with a conversation on the Facebook Podcast Community Group. You can ask your questions and find lots of podcasting discussion there.

Behringer Xenix 802 mixer
Shure SM7B microphone (other mics available as guests/co-hosts appear)
iPad 2 (used as a sound board)
Zoom H2 (recording device)
MacBook Air (for conferencing & chat)
Griffin iMic to allow mix-minus-one back to Skype/G+/etc.

If you have any questions about Jack’s podcasting equipment, please drop them in the comments.

New Media Equipment:

Previously on New Media Gear:

Subscribed 019: Building with BDoubleO

January 4, 2013 by Douglas E. Welch

Subscribed is my series highlighting the Podcasts, YouTube Channels and Blogs that I follow on a daily basis. Check out this entry, and past entries, for some great New Media Content — Douglas

Subscribed 019: Building with BDoubleO

This is another one of my Minecraft (and other gaming) subscriptions. BDoubleO (John) is a member of the same Mindcrack server as Vintage Beef, KurtJMac, and PaulSoaresJr, mentioned earlier in this series. He is very funny, highly personable, and also great at sharing his experiences of transitioning from his previous contracting job to a full-time YouTube producer. Not only do I enjoy his Minecraft videos, but I have also learned a lot about how to manage and fill a profitable YouTube Channel.

BDubs has several series currently in production including Building with BDoubleO, Mindcrack Server and Feed the Beast (with all his fellow MindCrack members) and, for those not interested in Minecraft, Race to Commander :: B-Team Black Ops II and NBA 2K12 Season 2. John’s collaborations with recent Mindcrack addition, GenerikBB are greatly entertaining and I always look forward to those special B-Team episodes.

Finally, BDoubleO also holds regular live streams, Cocktail Tuesdays, where he interacts life with his audience while playing a variety of games. Between the building, the talking the fighting and the playing, BDoubleO presents an excellent and entertaining channel.

Link: BDoubleO on YouTube

Link: BDoubleO on Twitter

What are some of your favorite Subscriptions? Share them here in the comments!

Previously highlighted on Subscribed:

New Media Vocabulary: Raw Log Files

January 3, 2013 by Douglas E. Welch

New Media Vocabulary: Raw Log Files

When speaking with podcasters (and other who need to track their web statistics) you may often hear the term “Raw log files.” While many of us use web statistic packages such as Google Analytics, Analog or custom statistics delivered by our blog hosting company (WordPress.com), Raw Log Files are the end-all-be-all of web site statistics.

Raw log files are text files created by your web server software. Depending on where and how you host your web site this might be done using the Apache program or Microsoft’s IIS (Internet Information Services). Whenever anything is accessed on your web site — HTML page, graphic, picture, audio file or video file — this access is recorded in the raw log file as a one line entry. Typically this line contains the IP address of the computer that accessed the file, the date and time, the name and pathname of the file, the browser they were using and, perhaps, which web site the user arrived from.

These raw log files are the input for statistics programs that can summarize and analyze all these individual entires into a human-readable report of activity and trends over time.

Sample Raw Log File Entry:

IP.IP.IP.IP – – [01/Oct/2012:14:18:08 -0700] “GET /career/video/2012/careercompass-2012.mp4 HTTP/1.1” 200 21467820 “-” “iTunes/10.7 (Windows; Microsoft Windows 7 x64 Home Premium Edition Service Pack 1 (Build 7601)) AppleWebKit/536.26.9”

For New Media producers, though, raw log files provide one important piece of information — the number of downloads of particular podcasts, audio and video files. Statistic services such as Google Analytics cannot easily track these New Media downloads, so producers have to look to their raw log files for this information. These files are the only definitive way to track audience numbers for a podcaster such as myself.

It is important to note that if you a re using a hosted blog such as WordPress.com or Blogger.com, you do not have access to raw log files, but only the summary statistics that each of these services provides.

For more information on Raw Log Files…

Do you have questions, comments or clarifications to this New Media Vocabulary term? Add them to the comments!

Previously on New Media Vocabulary:

Careers in New Media

Helping to Build New Careers in New Media

Category Archives: New Media

Subscribed 023: Cooking Stoned with James Stone

LIVE: Watch and donate to Child’s Play Charity Today and this Weekend!

My Favorite New Media Things for January 2013

New Media Vocabulary: RSS (Real Simple Syndication/Rich Site Summary)

New Media Gear 009: Dan Hughes from The Treasure Corner and others

Subscribed 022: Backyard Farmer from the University of Nebraska

New Media Vocabulary: Plugin

News: Update Powerpress WordPress/Podcasting Plugin ASAP

Audacity Audio Recording and Editing Software Upgraded to 2.0.3

New Media Gear 008: Zoom H1 Handy Portable Digital Recorder

Subscribed 021: Make Magazine, Make Blog, YouTube, Podcasts

Elsewhere: IK Multimedia’s iRig HD adapter for iOS, Mac lets guitars ride the Lightning port

New Media Vocabulary: Condenser Microphone

New Media Gear 007: Charley Hays

Subscribed 020: Lifehacker

New Media Vocabulary: ftp (file transfer protocol)

Technology and New Media News out of CES Las Vegas this week

New Media Gear 006: Chuck Tomasi of Technorama

Subscribed 019: Building with BDoubleO