Another Show Update

Hey folks, hope this finds everyone well, and I hope that at least so far everybody is having a great 2012!

As anyone who has been a regular to the show, as well as a reader to this blog knows that I recently made a move to Monday nights. I have to say that unfortunately the viewers just haven't been there on Mondays.

Since the intent of the show is to promote independent musicians, that is not going to cut it, these folks deserve better. So, today I sat down and started exploring other websites for broadcasting the show.

The first one I tried was a neat little website called TalkShoe, which is similar to our old broadcasting home blogtalkradio. Ok, let me backtrack a bit, I checked out blogtalkradio to see what the improvements were, and from what I saw, unless you become a paid subscriber ($39.99 a month) you are limited to a 30 minute show per day, and can not broadcast in "prime time" (7 to 11 pm) so I said screw that and did a Google search for sites similar to it and thats how I landed on TalkShoe.

I really and truly wanted to like TalkShoe, I really did, but, it took forever to load, kept timing out, and when I finally managed to get on to do a test show, I kept having problems with the website loading. I stopped and restarted Firefox in safe mode, that let the page load faster, but then I had a couple of issues broadcasting. What my idea was, to broadcast the show in Skype, but I couldn't find a link to call in using Skype. You had to use the dial in number, which would require Skype credit, which I currently do not have. So then I tried using their proprietary call in feature "TalkShoe Pro" and when I played it back, it didn't sound good at all. In fact I had a user show up in the chat and tell me that my best bet was to use Skype as he had a similar experience on his show. While I thought it was beyond awesome that all I was doing a test show, still had a listener show up and offer advice, the site just didn't work the way that I think it needs to for the show to regain it's past glory. I really wanted this to work, it just didn't. If I, as a host, had issues even loading the site, people looking for the show would have the same, most would give up, so as much as I wish it would, it's just not going to work. I will check back at a later date to see if there are improvements, however at this time, as much as I wish it was, TalkShoe just isn't a viable alternative.

So, I then turned my attention to the account that I had recently created on Justin.tv. After tweaking and playing around for a few hours, I have to say that this one went better, but there are some issues to me taking the show over there. The first issue is that because all the shows archive, and every broadcast on the site itself is licensed under Creative Commons, all the music I play would have to be as well. While the majority of the music I play is indeed licensed under Creative Commons (CC) there are several musicians whose music I currently give airplay to, are not, nor would I ask them to. While I do have the permission of the song writers and the musicians that do not license under CC that I am currently giving airplay to (and honestly consider these guys friends as well), I myself am not comfortable giving them airplay on a site that by default licenses everything broadcast on it under CC. These musicians have not offered their music under CC, so it is not my place to play it on a site that is a CC site, whereby offering their music under CC, it's not my place to do so, it's just that simple.

The other thing I notice is that Justin.tv doesn't have a co-feature like blogtv does, not that I've used it much at all in the last year, but it is handy. The bonus with Justin.tv is that the entire show would archive for 7 days after broadcast so even if people weren't able to catch the live show, they can listen to the archive at a later date if they wanted to. I also found that I can use the Flash Media Encoder that I currently use on blogtv for the better sound and video also works over there, and the better quality archives as well.

So, here is what I'm thinking in regards to the future of Indie Spotlight Live. I am starting to think (nothing written in stone of course) that I might be moving the regular broadcast to my channel on Justin.tv. In addition, because several of the musicians that do not license their music under CC have been with me since day one, obviously also deserve airplay, I am thinking that I might also continue a semi-regular broadcast on blogtv. The other idea is to move the blogtv show back to Sunday nights, and do a shorter version of it featuring all the musicians I currently play, with a full sized show featuring the CC music on Justin.tv on another night (maybe not Monday, but another night where I can do a full sized broadcast) and seeing if I can attract a whole new following on there.

At this point, all ideas are on the table, at this point in time, at least this week, I am doing the Monday night show on blogtv. If I don't see the stats at least start to improve, I really need to start thinking about how, and where I am going to go next with the show. I know from past experience that doing 2 shows a week is draining, and is hard to keep up with, especially if you are doing them on 2 different websites, I've tried this before and it was a bit much. But to give the majority of the musicians that I currently play on the show airtime as well as taking care of the guys that have been loyal to me their due as well, to me it's worth it. I can even use the playlist that I would put together for the justin.tv show and insert these guys for the blogtv show. There are many ways I can go with this.

Bottom line is, I can't currently go back to doing the full show on Sundays, the viewer/listener stats aren't there on Mondays, so I need a plan B.

I'll let you folks know what I decide. Have a great evening!