[Imc-nh-tech] Re: [Imc-nh-editorial] Makin' Waves on the Newswire

Wed Dec 29 09:07:40 PST 2004

Since it's been a few days and no one has dissented, I went ahead and made 
the leftbar box for Making Waves.  I've also made an archive of past 
shows.

Radio folks that want to post new shows (Steve mostly, I guess) can now 
just upload the show through the media gallery rather than posting a new 
article.  This will keep Making Waves off the newswire, but it will still 
be featured on the leftbar.  I'll try and remember to update it every 
week, but feel free to bug me via email if I forget.  :)

What do editors want to do with the existing Making Waves posts on the 
newswire?

rob

On Sun, 26 Dec 2004, Michelle Racine wrote:

> the left bar solution sounds like a good one to me. Michelle
>
>> From: Rob Wolff <rcwolff at cisunix.unh.edu>
>> To: imc-nh-editorial at lists.indymedia.org
>> Subject: Re: [Imc-nh-editorial] Makin' Waves on the Newswire
>> Date: Sun, 26 Dec 2004 17:18:24 -0500 (EST)
>> 
>> 
>> Everyone,
>> 
>> I wanted to make sure that this thread continues, because I think it's a 
>> significant issue.  Making Waves currently constitutes fully half (6 out of 
>> 12 posts) of the local newswire.
>> 
>> I can put up another leftbar box like ftm press, and I agree with Nikki 
>> that this is probably the best solution.  The Making Waves shows could be 
>> uploaded just to the media gallery, and I'll try to update the leftbar as 
>> soon as I can after it's posted (usually on Saturdays).
>> 
>> After reading some older posts, it seems like most people support this, but 
>> I just wanted to see if anyone wants to dissent before I went ahead and did 
>> it.  So, please respond if you don't like the leftbar solution!
>> 
>> rob
>> 
>> 
>> 
>> On Thu, 9 Dec 2004, Nick Copanas wrote:
>> 
>>> Steve,
>>> 
>>> I posted an article with links to both media files on the gallery.  (I
>>> rated the article down so visitors won't see it.)  You can access the
>>> article at <http://nhindymedia.org/newswire/display_any/2029>
>>> Is there something wrong with this format?
>>> 
>>> Secondly, I don't think my perception is misplaced.  NH Indymedia news
>>> content is determined by volunteers.  I don't think we should expect (nor
>>> have we ever had) a completely new content every couple weeks.  We get a
>>> couple articles a week on the local section during times of high traffic,
>>> and a couple articles every few weeks during times of less traffic.
>>> 
>>> Ideally, I would like to see the site put to more use.  At present,
>>> however, with exception to the editors, I doubt our readers check the site
>>> daily or weekly.  For these people, the content we think stale is new.
>>> 
>>> Evidence that some of our readers only visit once in a while comes from
>>> the presence of new posts on old articles, or new results on old polls.
>>> For example, while I am by now sick of the election poll (and please,
>>> someone change it if you feel inspired,) I have noticed that in the past
>>> month, the results have steadily climbed.  Three weeks ago, our scientific
>>> polling revealed that NH Indymedia users wanted to celebrate democracy or
>>> work for justice.  As of now, the 'data' indicates secession, a party of
>>> opposition, and moving to Canada as viable alternatives to living under
>>> the second administration of Bush the Lesser.
>>> 
>>> My concern that the "Making Waves" posts are not different in kind is a
>>> concern for the local site content becoming homogeneous.  This could
>>> discourage the once or twice monthly readers (who probably constitute the
>>> majority of our readership.)
>>> 
>>> Nick
>>> 
>>> 
>>> 
>>> On Thu, 25 Nov 2004, Thorn wrote:
>>> 
>>>> 
>>>> Dear Nick, editors, and tech folks....
>>>>   Nick raises some interesting points that have relevant technical 
>>>> aspects,
>>>> so Rob and Art, please clarify accordingly.
>>>> 
>>>>> While posting to the newswires has slowed down in the last couple weeks
>>>>> post-election, I think the Making Waves posts are beginning to take up 
>>>>> too
>>>>> much room on the local newswire.  Making Waves is now a third of our
>>>>> recent local news postings.  Because none of these posts are different 
>>>>> in
>>>>> kind, but instead are two-part weekly posts of the same radio show, I
>>>>> don't see the need to continuously repost them to the newswire except to
>>>>> draw attention to the show.
>>>> 
>>>> The reasons are technical and practical, but before I get to them, I 
>>>> think
>>>> your perception of the problem is mis-placed... the high percentage of 
>>>> Making
>>>> Waves newswire articles could best be corrected with more local news
>>>> reporting.  Due to working on Making Waves, I don't have time to do this
>>>> myself, although we do some local news coverage as part of the Making 
>>>> Waves
>>>> show.
>>>> 
>>>>> Also, is there a reason you post to the newswire the broadcast in two
>>>>> parts?  Could you just post both files to the media gallery, and put two
>>>>> links in one newswire post, or am I missing something?
>>>> 
>>>> Yes, there is a reason.  Currently, a given newswire article can only 
>>>> have 20
>>>> megs of data attached to it.  That setting could be changed easily 
>>>> enough,
>>>> but would require discussion.  I currently use www.freewebs.com/sprav/
>>>> audio.htm to manually index the Making Waves show for easy browsing.  I
>>>> believe the settings on NH IMC against "hot-linking" (to prevent site 
>>>> abuse)
>>>> would also bar me from linking to just a file in the media gallery from
>>>> off-site.  So, I link to an article that links to the file(s).
>>>> 
>>>>> I suggest that either a.) Making Waves folks limit posting to the media
>>>>> gallery with one post per new episode to point people to both files in 
>>>>> the
>>>>> media gallery or b.) Making Waves gets a module like 'Free the Media'
>>>>> Press.
>>>> 
>>>> Option A:  Where possible, depending on the content of the show and the 
>>>> exact
>>>> length, I have been posting the entire show into one article.  If one of 
>>>> the
>>>> two hours of the show has no music, only voice, I can encode it to a 
>>>> lower
>>>> bit rate, and it sometimes fits with the other half in less than 20 megs.
>>>> Increasing the limit to just 25 megs would make this possible more often, 
>>>> 32
>>>> megs would work for every show so far.
>>>> 
>>>> Option B:  I want to limit how many things Rob or Art have to update 
>>>> every
>>>> week.  Also, it's important that the links are current within about 24 
>>>> hours
>>>> of the show going on the air, preferably right away, because that's the
>>>> highest fidelity way for people to hear the show if they're not in the
>>>> broadcast range.  Unless I'd somehow have access to update that module 
>>>> myself
>>>> or the tech folks could be sure they'd always be right on it, I don't 
>>>> think
>>>> that would be adequate.
>>>>  - Steve
>>>> 
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