http://www.idlewords.com/audio/manifesto.mp3
AN
AUDIOBLOGGING MANIFESTO (00.00-04.25)
Transcribed
from http://www.idlewords.com/audio/manifesto.mp3
Prelistening
Post read quickly for main ideas
Blog a sound file incorporated into
web page
Blogger online
writer
Search
engine move from one web page to another
Skim publish
on the internet
Audio
post internet programme which
finds webpages (e.g. Google)
Link web log, or internet diary
2. What
kind of internet user are you?
Consumer? Producer? Other?
First
listening
Put the
following arguments in order. You can
make a guess with a partner, then listen to the talk to see if you were right.
The
speaker has also posted a written version of his rant.
Using
audio files is going against the modern trend towards more use of written
texts.
Bloggers
have recently starting posting audio files in addition to their typewritten
texts.
He meant
that technology for its own sake was pointless.
Audioblogging
means posting speech on the internet.
Audioblogs
pose a number of problems for internet users which can make it difficult or
impossible for people to access them.
Audiobloggers
are just self-indulgent and should get back to written word.
Thoreau
objected to a telegraph connection between Maine and Texas, saying these two states
‘may have nothing important to communicate.’
Another
problem involves the rate at which we comprehend speech and written words:
reading is faster.
Bloggers
would do better to improve their composition skills instead of using audio
files.
Second
listening
Listen
again to the first part of the argument segment by segment and try to find the
word or expression that means that same as:
Answers
Post publish on the internet
Blog web log, or internet diary
Blogger online writer
Search
engine internet programme which finds
webpages (e.g. Google)
Skim read quickly for main ideas
Audio
post a sound file incorporated
into web page
Link move from one web page to
another
2. What
kind of internet user are you?
Consumer? Producer? Other?
First
listening
Put the
following arguments in order. You can
make a guess with a partner, then listen to the talk to see if you were right.
2.
Bloggers have recently starting posting audio files in addition to their
typewritten texts.
3.
Audioblogs pose a number of problems for internet users which can make it
difficult or impossible for people to access them.
4.
Another problem involves the rate at which we comprehend speech and written
words: reading is faster.
5. Using
audio files is going against the modern trend towards more use of written
texts.
6.
Bloggers would do better to improve their composition skills instead of using
audio files.
7.
Thoreau objected to a telegraph connection between Maine and Texas, saying
these two states ‘may have nothing important to communicate.’
8. He
meant that technology for its own sake was pointless.
9.
Audiobloggers are just self-indulgent and should get back to written word.
10. The
speaker has also posted a written version of his rant.
Second
listening
Listen
again to the first part of the argument segment by segment and try to find the
word or expression that means that same as:
As
broadband expands and as blogging tools become easier to use, a world
of
temptations has opened up to the online writer.
The latest of these has
been
audioblogging, or posting snippets of speech. Videoblogging is
following
on its heels.
At
first blush,
audioblogging sounds like a natural extension of online
writing. What better way to convey your own ideas
than through your
own
words, spoken in your own voice?
Bloggers like Halley Suitt
(http://halleyscomment.blogspot.com),
Dave Winer
(http://www.scripting.com),
and Adam Curry (http://live.curry.com) have
taken
this idea and run with it, mixing frequent audio posts with their
text
content. In the highest-profile audio
blog post to date, Winer
even
announced the cancellation of a blog hosting service - affecting
hundreds
of users - in a ten minute audio file (you can hear it at
http://cyber.law.harvard.edu/blogs/gems/crimson1/aboutWeblogsComHosting.mp3).
But
before you jump on the audioblogging bandwagon, remember this - the
power of
the Web is the power to choose. You make
your own trails, and
your own
links. You read what you like and skip
the boring bits. And
audioblogging
takes that power of choice away. Your
listeners become a
passive
audience - they have no power to skim, they can't skip the
boring
parts, they can't link or excerpt your post effectively. Your
post
becomes invisible to Google and other search engines. And anyone
who has a
hearing problem, or a dialup account, or doesn't speak your
language
too well, anyone who is trying to surf your site from the office,
or from
an Internet cafe - well, they're just plain out of luck.
5. join
the trend
6. there
is nothing they can do
Consider
also this - the average person speaks at one hundred, perhaps
one
hundred fifty words per minute.
Meanwhile, an accomplished reader
can read
ten times faster - up to a thousand words a minute, and that's
straight-up reading, not even skimming. You're forcing people to listen
to you at
a speed that's barely faster than the speed at which they can
type. Why are you wasting their time? Is your voice really that
beautiful?
7.
ordinary
From the
invention of the alphabet, to movable metal type, to the advent of
cheap
paper, universal mandatory public education, universal literacy,
the
Internet - the modern world has built on the back of text! This is
not by
accident! This is not a mistake!
8.
introduction
Transcript
As
broadband expands and as blogging tools become easier to use, a world
of
temptations has opened up to the online writer.
The latest of these has
been
audioblogging, or posting snippets of speech.
Videoblogging is
following
on its heels.
At first
blush, audioblogging sounds like a natural extension of online
writing. What better way to convey your own ideas
than through your
own
words, spoken in your own voice?
Bloggers like Halley Suitt
(http://halleyscomment.blogspot.com),
Dave Winer
(http://www.scripting.com),
and Adam Curry (http://live.curry.com) have
taken
this idea and run with it, mixing frequent audio posts with their
text
content. In the highest-profile audio
blog post to date, Winer
even
announced the cancellation of a blog hosting service - affecting
hundreds
of users - in a ten minute audio file (you can hear it at
http://cyber.law.harvard.edu/blogs/gems/crimson1/aboutWeblogsComHosting.mp3).
But
before you jump on the audioblogging bandwagon, remember this - the
power of
the Web is the power to choose. You make
your own trails, and
your own
links. You read what you like and skip
the boring bits. And
audioblogging
takes that power of choice away. Your
listeners become a
passive
audience - they have no power to skim, they can't skip the
boring
parts, they can't link or excerpt your post effectively. Your
post
becomes invisible to Google and other search engines. And anyone
who has a
hearing problem, or a dialup account, or doesn't speak your
language
too well, anyone who is trying to surf your site from the office,
or from
an Internet cafe - well, they're just plain out of luck.
Consider
also this - the average person speaks at one hundred, perhaps
one
hundred fifty words per minute.
Meanwhile, an accomplished reader
can read
ten times faster - up to a thousand words a minute, and that's
straight-up
reading, not even skimming. You're
forcing people to listen
to you at
a speed that's barely faster than the speed at which they can
type. Why are you wasting their time? Is your voice really that
beautiful?
From the
invention of the alphabet, to movable metal type, to the advent of
cheap
paper, universal mandatory public education, universal literacy,
the
Internet - the modern world has built on the back of text! This is
not by
accident! This is not a mistake!
Ask
yourself - is the key to making your site more interesting really to
add rich
media? Or is it possible that if you
took more care in your
writing,
said something passionate, grammatical, interesting, and pleasant to
read, it
would actually make more of a difference?
Henry
David Thoreau said "Our inventions are wont to be pretty toys, which
distract
our attention from serious things. They are but improved means
to an
unimproved end... We are in great haste to construct a magnetic
telegraph
from Maine to Texas; but Maine and Texas, it may be, have
nothing
important to communicate"
So what
do you have to communicate?
Thoreau
may not have been a big fan of technology, but we can still read
him one
and a half centuries later and be pulled in by his beautiful
prose
style. Is your audio post going to stand
the test of time?
Brothers
and sisters, we deserve better than this, and those whom we write for
deserve
better. This is not what we built the
web for! For the first
time in
human history, you can have anything you write read by millions
of
people, whether within days or within hours, and all it takes is
talent,
imagination and the discipline to put up something worth
reading. There are no obstacles anymore - so why must
we create new
ones? Just because you're going to be able to do a
real-time three
dimensional
high-definition interactive virtual reality fly-through of
the
inside of your cat - does that mean you should?
Does that mean it
belongs
on your website? This is not the legacy we want to leave!
So stop
the ridiculous self indulgence, and shut up and write.
And if
you want a copy of this without having to listen through it, by God
you can
find one at http://www.idlewords.com/audio-manifesto.txt.
August
31, 2004