The Dream Realm Update!

Lots of things still happening over at Dream Realm Enterprises. Not only are there new Dr. Who episodes, but they have also been re-releasing the first season of Robotz of the Company, as well as podcasting their Sci-Fi and horror mini-series, The Realm Weaver!

When you need to escape the influx of family during tomorrow's Turkey Day- be thankful for audio cinema! ;-)

And for those who still heart their radios...

From Cnet:

Sony's awesome but ridiculously cheap AM/FM HD Radio!

Posted by Steve Guttenberg

Sony's XDR-F1HD HD Radio has developed a real buzz among my audiophile pals, on second thought maybe buzz isn't the right word. It's the quietest, noise-free radio I've ever used.

These guys can be real snobs and only listen to ultra-high-end components, and some wouldn't be caught dead using mainstream gear with their hi-fis, and yet they're all going ga-ga over the Sony. We're all thinking it's too good to be true.

I originally heard about the Sony from Steven Stone, a writer friend, and then from an engineer at an American high-end audio company known for making awesome tuners that sell for thousands of dollars. The engineer was positively gushing about how good the XDR-F1HD is, not just that is sounded great, but also because it pulls in tough to receive analog stations with lower noise and distortion than tuners that sell for big bucks. You can read my full CNET review here.

I rushed right out and bought an XDR-F1HD from Amazon, and sure nuff, it's true, the little Sony is no baloney. Analog FM stations came in like gangbusters, clean as a whistle, and HD stations, like my favorite jazz station WBGO had "CD quality" sound. That phrase is tossed around a lot, but this time it's for real. Listening to WBGO with the Sony over my high-end system with Magnepan 3.6/R speakers the sound is amazing. It's day and night better than what I get from Sirius Satellite Radio, which is almost unlistenable over those speakers.

Right, Sirius sounds like a crummy MP3 over the Maggies. That's why I listen to Sirius over my Tivoli PAL table radio. Good enough sound is what most people put up with, and that's kinda sad.

WNYC, my local NPR outlet, multicasts HD on three channels: one is the same program as the analog FM station, the second is a 24/7 classical music stream, and the third is WNYC's AM feed, but in FM HD. One of my favorite shows, David Garland's "Spinning on Air" is a weekly musical journey; The October 26 all-theremin show was a mind trip, and sounded positively ethereal in HD. The theremin is an early 20th Century electronic instrument, it's featured on the Beach Boys' hit "Good Vibrations."

Thing is, not all HD stations sound great, in New York WPLJ and WXRK sound dreadful. So you see, HD Radio technology doesn't guarantee sound quality, its up to the stations to follow through and not mess with their signal. The XDR-F1HD is a gateway to the best of over-the-air analog and digital broadcasts.

Need a second opinion? Check out Gary Krakow's The Street review to learn more.

Steve Guttenberg is a frequent contributor to magazines and Web sites including Home Entertainment, Playback, and Ultimate AV. He is a member of the CNET Blog Network, and is not an employee of CNET. Disclosure.
http://news.cnet.com/8301-13645_3-10106377-47.html

Merging Isn't Always A Good Thing

Found this post via The Consumerist. Seems satellite is going the direction traditional radio has. Maybe Clear Channel will take it over someday...

Sirius XM Merger Reveals True Face: Fewer Channels And 'Sanitized' Programming

By Chris Walters, 1:55 PM on Fri Nov 14 2008

This week, Sirius XM began consolidating its channels. In reality, this mostly meant jettisoning XM channels wherever there was a tenuous overlap with something Sirius already offered, which is bad news for anyone with a favorite station on XM who woke up Wednesday morning to find it missing. Alex wrote in to tell us that the four Spanish music channels have been condensed to one without regard to genre, and that the uncensored "urban music" station Hot Jamz has been cleaned up, rechristened "The Heat," and now leans toward radio-friendly R&B. The Motley Fool suggests that the new lineup may drive people to downgrade their subscription—it's "an incentive to downgrade to the cheaper plan that costs $6 less a month and lets users cherry-pick 50 stations."

In addition to the latin and urban channels, Alex wants to know why Sirius XM couldn't have better prepared its listeners:

First off, why such secrecy? Millions of subscribers were blindsided yesterday. No announcements of any kind were made over the air to let people know what was going on. To them, everything was fine on Tuesday, but all of a sudden on Wednesday, their favorite channel was deleted or changed fundamentally. This was a breach of trust between the provider and the consumer. We are the subscribers. We are paying for this service. We deserve a voice over what it is we want to hear. More importantly, we deserve input about programming we are willing to pay for.
Second, we the consumers, Congress, and the FCC were assured that allowing the merger would increase diversity and choice. Wednesday's change showed you acted in bad faith. On the XM side, we lost 75% of the Spanish music choice. To clump together the previous 4 genres of music offered by Aguila, Viva, Caricia, and Caliente into one channel shows either cultural ignorance or contempt for diversity. My congressional representatives will be hearing from me about this.
Third, the new censorship. I bought Sirius to free myself from the shackles of FM. Hot Jamz has been neutered into "The Heat," essentially a satellite version of my local R&B station. I simply couldn't listen to it today. The songs were heavily edited and censored. This is the antithesis of what Sirius once stood for, what bringing Howard from FM symbolized. Fact is, urban music is written in the vernacular. What "The Heat" did to Hot Jamz is an insult.
Fourth, continuing on the theme of less choice. Sirus XM acted in bad faith when it shrunk the available choices:

No more electronica from Boombox — now pop2k... isn't there enough pop with 90's on 9, the Pulse, and Alt Nation?

No more Old Skool.

No more Punk.

No more Fine tuning/free form.

No more educational radio via Discovery channel. (I'm still raw over that)

Instead we get less choice and shallower playlists on what used to be Fred, Lucy, and Ethel.
Mel et al., you really should listen to what you customers have to say.

http://www.orbitcast.com/archives/first-impressions-now-with-combined-channels-what-do-you-think.html#comments
http://newsblogs.chicagotribune.com/towerticker/2008/11/xm-radio-sirius.html?cid=138920090#comments
http://www.xmfan.com/viewtopic.php?t=96996 (these are your most ferverent fanatics, and yet their poll shows less that 33% are satisfied)

If you had asked us to begin with, you may have avoided this heartache.
Dual-sub non grata,Alex

As an aside, if you're a Mitsubishi Outlander owner experiencing problems with Sirius updates, Andy has figured out how to fix it:

Sirius recently merged with XM and my radio received an update as part of the merger. It killed the radio in my Mitsubishi Outlander with an "Antenna Error" message. I argued with 4 or 5 CSRs at Sirius that this was not a hardware issue, the timing is too perfect. I ended up pulling the #7 fuse and it reset the radio. Voila, the radio is back up and running. However, every time they send an update I have to pull the fuse. I hope this helps other MMS owners, and I hope Sirius gets this figured out asap. This is a factory installed radio part of the Mitsubishi Multi Messaging System premium radio system.
Here's a link to my forum post: http://www.mitsubishiforum.com/fb.asp?m=240820

"Sirius XM Has Crossed the Line" [The Motley Fool]

What Makes A Podcast A Podcast?

As I was browsing through the reader today I happened upon a great blog post on Podcasting via Radio Drama Revival. It's very in-depth and lengthly, but touches on many points I agree with, and reminded me of exactly why I love podcasting as a medium above all others (I know, like I need reminding?). An excerpt of a part I sorta-kinda agree with:

Podcasts do not Have to be Polished and Professional

This one is non-negotiable. I was horrified and offended at Podcast Michigan by a presenter who spoke about how podcasts have "lowered the playing field." Among his talking points were many words to the effect of "be professional."

I couldn't disagree more. The podcast world is vast, and contains multitudes. "Polish" is code for "make it sound like everyone else does, or we will look down on you." "Professional" is code for "people without a lot of money need not apply." Oh, and also "people who want to record something important and true to them, but that won't fit into a recording studio, or sound just like NPR, need not apply." Really? I love some of what goes down on NPR, but it ought to be obvious that there is an NPR "style," and expecting everyone to conform to it is just as bad as expecting everyone to conform to the commercial FM radio style.

Read the entire entry here:
http://generalpurposepodcast.blogspot.com/2008/11/what-is-podcast.html

Why do I sorta-kinda agree? Well, the thing I love the most about podcasting is there are no boundaries, no limits. Only what you place upon yourself. That being said, in some cases I agree that there is no need to ever have that polished sound, depending on what you're podcasting about. (See the last entry and the audio on reasons your podcast sucks to get more details on that). It really depends on your audience and the reason you are podcasting (i.e. who you are podcasting for). There are also so many inexpensive and free choices out there to record/edit some very decent audio, which definitely can help anyone have a decent show if they are willing to put even a minuscule amount of effort into it.

Of course in special cases, such as a audio cinema podcast, some polishing is certainly necessary, but even then not 100% required. The beauty of it all is there is no one else you need to answer to other than you.

These of course are just my opinions of one part of a big blog post, and I'd love to know what you other audio addicts think!

Discuss! :-)

~Dani

5 Reasons Why Your Podcast Sucks (and on iTunes!)

I'm finally getting around to posting some of the audio/video links to some of the Podcamp AZ goodness!

Podcast AZ was streaming all day both days, and many guests stopped by to partake in the fun. You can watch some clips from the weekend riiiiight..... here. Dan and CJ of the Love Long and Prosper Podcast were amazing taking on the task of running the podcast all weekend.

Unfortunately audio was scarce (and if you have audio from the weekend please post it in the comments!), but a couple of great sessions were headed by Evo Terra. He also had a cool slide show to go along with his sessions. Click and enjoy!

*5 Reasons Why Your Podcast Sucks
*5 Reasons Why Your Podcast Sucks on iTunes

PS, clicky on the photo to get more photos from the weekend courtesy of the talented Sheila Dee!