Good morning and welcome.
How’s the healthy eating going? At Fresh Air Towers, there’s a variety of different self-improvement themed Januarys going on, with everyone making some sort of effort. For instance, Richard – Director of Pressing Send on the Email – has increased his running, and subsequently increased his cookie intake to balance things out.
In previous years, Michaela – Director of Content and Head of Loud Nose Blows – has gone all-out with a regime that involves no alcohol, no sugar and strictly no food that could be categorised as ‘nice’. This year, she decided that she wasn’t ready to be that miserable and so has reverted to ‘Squeaky January’, which means she is being ‘squeaky clean’ but is at liberty to decide exactly what that means on any given day. She’s not drinking ‘much’ booze, so while it doesn’t qualify as ‘dry’, neither is it ‘wet’. Strictly speaking, Michaela’s January is somewhere between ‘damp’ and ‘m****’
As for me, I’ve got the Nutribullet out of the cupboard and so my breakfasts and lunches are a combination of fruit and vegetables which, on their own look quite different, but which, after being clumped together and chopped into tiny watery pieces, all turn green and taste of banana. Yesterday’s breakfast included a whole cucumber, for flip’s sake.
On Wednesday afternoon, we had an all-afternoon strategy session in Fresh Air Towers, and reception called to say they’d got a parcel for us that had been waiting at the front desk since December. Well, that parcel turned out to be a Christmas hamper from Spotify containing mince pies, popcorn, spicy potato snacks, sweets, Christmas pudding flavoured chocolate and much more. It was as if the Gods knew we were going to be sitting on a sofa together all afternoon and felt we needed some delicious calories. Thanks go to them – The Gods – as well as our lovely friends at Spotify for their very generous gifts.
**** This word is on Michaela’s ‘words that are banned from the newsletter’ list.
Grumpy Robots
I’ve written a fair amount on this newsletter about Google’s Notebook AI which allows you to generate a bespoke podcast on any topic by feeding in a document and getting two robots to talk about it. This could be a complex article you want summarising, your geography homework, or the phrase ‘poopoo peepee’ repeating multiple times (see previous edition).
In December, Google introduced the ability for you to interrupt the robots to ask questions like a radio phone in, but the problem was that this annoyed our artificial hosts and they sounded grumpy about it. No casual listener wants an AI slave to go all James O’Brien on them, so, Notebook LM invented some ‘friendliness tuning’ and now they’re all lovely again. They really don’t mind you chipping in as long as you’ve got something useful to say, and may even give you a happy ‘woah’.
Got someone you can think of who could do with a bit of ‘friendliness tuning’? The staff in Pret A Manger perhaps? My former neighbour Vera? I’m sure you have your own suggestions.
AI and Audio
Sticking to the topic of AI, because no-one is writing about this enough right now, Fresh Air’s good friends at Forever Audio have been chewing it over and Seb Juviler has posted a thought piece to explore the implications for security and IP. His conclusion that ‘Perhaps it’s less about ‘unleashing AI’ and more about, ‘diligently applying AI with the full understanding of the risks’ shows why he’s the type of guy who is listened to on these topics, whereas I use it to make snarky digs about my neighbour Vera.
Who listens to Business Podcasts?
Well, for starters, loads of people, but it’s good to know more about these folk and what we can derive from their listening habits. So thank you to Sounds Profitable for having done that work so we don’t have to, and now they’re doing a webcast about it which you can sign up to here. As a teaser, they’re almost twice as likely to listen to self-improvement and health and fitness podcasts as the average podcast consumer. This is something that brands don’t think about enough – promoting shows and content to parallel audiences who overlap rather than just to the same audience in the same genre. When promoting a new health & wellness show, it’s easy to say we should put ads in Happy Place or other health shows when perhaps the best audience is a business listener who’s also likely to care about their body. It’s bloomin’ obvious really.
Martin Poyntz-Roberts watches the birds…
I’ve recommended episodes from Wisconsin Public Radio before and I have no shame in doing so again. This episode, released on December 21st last year, is a journey through tranquillity, and it kicks off in the UK, despite being produced in the USA. We’re immersed into the longest night of the year, and we join Sam Lee as he goes in search of nightingales. No torches, no artificial light at all. What we get is a soundscape created by the birds calling through the dark, and then, adding to the incredible sounds of the night, we hear Sam and his fellow musicians playing music to encourage and coerce the nightingales to sing, in accompaniment with the tunes they’re playing. And it’s simple. Forget the over production, this is pure and simple storytelling and beautiful soundscapes. Everyone needs a bit of tranquillity at this time of year, most of all me, so just plug this in, close your eyes and drift away.
Nik Gandhi listens to strangers…
I stumbled upon this podcast while browsing on Apple’s homepage, and the format of it immediately appealed to me. Tom Rosenthal (not the one from Friday Night Dinner…) approaches people who are sat on park benches, and finds out about their lives. Simple as that. The stories which come from it are heartwarming and filled with intimate details. Despite knowing they’re being recorded for a podcast, people open up to Tom with little reservation. Perhaps the simple act of asking interesting questions is enough. If you’re a fan of ‘Where Are You Going?’ you will definitely like this!
What we’ve been listening to this week
Soil.
Oliver Bolton posted this extraordinary video on Linkedin with the sight and sound of cornflower seed germinating. I’ll be honest, the first bit makes me feel very icky indeed but when someone’s using ecoacoustic technology you can get over the sliminess of the whole thing. I’m willing to bet you’ve never heard the sound of cytoplasmic streaming before.
So that was one thing, but then I followed the recording credit to discover a project called ‘Soil Sound’ which aims to ‘give the soil a voice’, which is something we can all get behind, I’m sure. Have you ever wanted to know what the soil sounds like in different parts of Switzerland? Of course you have, and Soil Sound have provided the answer. There’s a podcast in soil, I know it. But what would it be called?
‘The Sodcast’.
Thank you. [takes a bow]. Sometimes I amaze myself.
What we’ve been doing this week
On Wednesday night, we had some drinks to bid a fond farewell to Oli – Head of Looking Too Young to be Served in an Off-Licence. He’s left Fresh Air to take up a very exciting opportunity with a very lovely podcast company who we can’t even be angry with because they’re lovely.
Oli was Fresh Air’s first Assistant Producer and, over his four years with us as AP and Producer, was the driver behind some of our biggest shows, as well as a cherished member of the Fresh Air gang. Stopping to Notice – the podcast that he dreamt up and made happen – will continue as his own project, and Darren & Steve – the weird sinister Santa figurines that Oli accidentally smuggled out of the restaurant during our 2022 Christmas do – will stay perched on our office windowsill as his permanent legacy. A reliably cheery, endlessly hard-working, smart, imaginative, creative and hilarious teammate and friend, we already miss him very much and I hereby predict that Oli will one day employ all of us.
