Help With ~ Podcasts - Former Guide

Image by Thomas Hawk

Draw From Your Own Experience

What are you passionate about?   What makes you angry, or curious, or confused?   Think about your home town, your friends and family, your hobbies and pursuits, causes you care about and are committed to, or new ideas you have encountered in your course work or personal reading, blogging, and media monitoring.

Get the Facts

As you research your topic, how can you tell if information is credible and reliable?

• Help With ~ Evaluating Sources
• Find Scholarly Sources by Subject

Include Opposing Viewpoints

The best podcasts address all sides of an issue, and use data to support arguments.

• Opposing Viewpoints
• How Do I Find ~ Statistics & Data

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     Image by okaysamurai 

Consider

• Which podcast format will best suit your content?

• What do you want your audience to get out of listening to your podcast?

Examine

• 6 Popular Podcast Formats: Which One is Right for You?                                                                                                                -- Charli Prangley, Tradecraft, Issue #9.  (11 minute read)

      Image by Beppie K

Outline and Script Writing

• Having a strong script and preparing with it will make the following stages much easier.

• In developing a podcast script, think of using tools such as Google Docs, in which you can color, italicize, bold, and underline text to give visual cues that will help with narration, especially when there are multiple voices included in your podcast.

• Use your script to practice reciting the podcast dialogue, which can ensure that the podcast falls within your desired time frame.  

• Identify where and when extra sound effects and any other audio (music, sound effects, speeches, etc.) will go into your podcast.

• Here is an additional guide for outlining and writing a podcast script:

  • Planning Your Podcast – Free Podcast Scripts and Formats.  Niki Clark, Voices.com, February 25, 2019

Gather Audio Source Materials

• To enhance your audience's experience of listening to the podcast, consider using found audio.  This can include sound effects, background music, and/or other snippets of audio from interviews, speeches, etc.
• Especially if your podcast will appear on a public-facing platform, there are very important considerations in relation to copyright, fair use, and permissions. 

  • Music & Audio:  Portion Limits for Educational Use

    • Up to 10%, but in no event more than 30 seconds, of the music and lyrics from an individual musical work (or in the aggregate of extracts from an individual work), whether the musical work is embodied in copies, or audio or audiovisual works.  Any alterations to a musical work shall not change the basic melody or the fundamental character of the work.

• Copyright-free and licensed audio sources are your best bet.

  • Licensed content for Hamilton students & faculty:

    • Extreme Music Library, Part 1 & Part 2
      Instrumental music, chiefly synthesized, for use in not-for-profit, educational audio, video and film productions.
    • Great Speeches of the 20th Century
      Sixty-one historically important speeches by prominent 20th century Americans.
    • Historic Presidential Speeches
      The voices of seventeen American presidents from 1908-1993.
    • Period Backgrounds: Sound Effects
      A wide variety of period atmosphere sound effects for stage production and TV, radio, and multimedia programs.
  • Sound Effects
    • BBC Sound Effects
    • Freesound
    • SoundBible.com

  • Free Music Resources:

    • Creative Commons
      Find CC-licensed work (audio, video, music) for a creative project.
    • Internet Archive
      Includes texts, audio, moving images, and software as well as archived web pages.
    • Library of Congress Digital Collections
      A growing treasury of digitized photographs, manuscripts, maps, sound recordings, motion pictures, and books.
    • Free Music Archive
    • CCmixter
    • Bensound
    • Partners in Rhyme
    • Youtube Audio Library

      Audio Library is the safest YouTube channel dedicated to promote no copyright music, royalty-free music and creative commons music for content creators.

Attribution and Permissions

• Attribution can occur during the podcast, in documentation accompanying a podcast, or on whatever platform the podcast is published when distributed.  Depending on the subject area, you may follow existing guidelines for citation styles, to give credit to your guest speakers and audio sources.  Even with copyright-free materials, giving credit is important.
  • Help With ~ Citing Sources

• Permissions: It is important to be clear and transparent when it comes to informing participants in the podcast how their voices will be used and potentially showcased.  Here are some important documents and notes that can help facilitate this important aspect of podcasting.
  1. Recording Permission Form on Docusign 
  2. Individual Recording Release Form
  3. Participants may also give oral consent during interviews. 
• Podcasting Legal Guide
  Designed to provide a general roadmap to some of the legal issues specific to podcasting. [pdf version].