EP284/EP634: On a Clear Day You Can See All the Way to Conspiracy

[Tesseract]

The ending, however, creates a bit of a problem. Yes the "sound" may erase memory but what about electronic memory? In this modern age of computers and terabyte hard drives, most radio shows are taped in case the station has to defend themselves from the FCC; for their fans as well so that they can listen on their MP3 players. All it'll take is someone plugging in to their RSS feed one morning and suddenly the secret's out.

Some others already anticipated my answer to this, which is: any recording would also have the memory-erasing sound.  I honestly believe that anyone listening to this for the first time couldn't resist listening to the entire thing and thereby hearing the sound; and, thanks to that sound, every time one listens to it is the first time...

So, the sound engineer who has to check how the show sounds before it goes out on podcast is going to be in for a long night then?

[langly]

The ending, however, creates a bit of a problem. Yes the "sound" may erase memory but what about electronic memory? In this modern age of computers and terabyte hard drives, most radio shows are taped in case the station has to defend themselves from the FCC; for their fans as well so that they can listen on their MP3 players. All it'll take is someone plugging in to their RSS feed one morning and suddenly the secret's out.

Some others already anticipated my answer to this, which is: any recording would also have the memory-erasing sound.  I honestly believe that anyone listening to this for the first time couldn't resist listening to the entire thing and thereby hearing the sound; and, thanks to that sound, every time one listens to it is the first time...

So, the sound engineer who has to check how the show sounds before it goes out on podcast is going to be in for a long night then?

More than likely no one would check it as it went out to the podcast. In many stations that's all automated. I thought the show was a good attempt since now we know there was substantial time pressure on the production. One thing that annoyed me was that the host really didn't have the apparent drive or bombast required in the delivery. From the way he described himself at the intro I would have expected a Jim Rome sports guy delivery, that is important. Stingers and liners would have added some verisimilitude as well. Finally some audio processing overall - some compression and limiting would have made it sound more -radio if carefully done and would have evened out the levels. Given the ending to me it sounded pretty light weight to make it onto escape pod but a fair attempt.

-Radio engineer since 1979

[Tesseract]

So, the sound engineer who has to check how the show sounds before it goes out on podcast is going to be in for a long night then?

More than likely no one would check it as it went out to the podcast. In many stations that's all automated...

Frell! There goes the image of someone perpetually editing the same soundclips over and over.

[matweller]

From the way he described himself at the intro I would have expected a Jim Rome sports guy delivery, that is important. Stingers and liners would have added some verisimilitude as well. Finally some audio processing overall - some compression and limiting would have made it sound more -radio if carefully done and would have evened out the levels. Given the ending to me it sounded pretty light weight to make it onto escape pod but a fair attempt.

-Radio engineer since 1979

And now for another round of "Behind the Scenes at Escape Pod"...

There were a lot of things we could have done to make it sound more radio-ish, but EP has a strict policy about over-producing. The goal is to be storytellers, not story-producers. Even adding the filter to the calls was questioned before it was done, but it was rightly decided that it was key to separating the callers from the host.

You're not at all wrong, so don't take this as me knee-jerking back at you. I think this has been mentioned before, but in case that's a personal delusion I just wanted to make sure people knew why we handled it the way we did.

Now back to your regularly scheduled forum. The time will be 8:30 at the tone... {beeeeeep}





NOTE TO SELF: Start collecting info on Langly to exploit for other projects in the future...

[Unblinking]

A sly person could use a recording of this as a weapon.  If they were taking notes as they went, they could have written down clues like "memory erasure sounds?" and then when their memory got wiped the note would remain.  If they then clipped the recording down to that sound then they could wear heavy earphones to block out the noise and play it on speakers to erase anyone's memory--Men in Black style.

[Thunderscreech]

This is basically how I first seduced my wife, except instead of a special sound I used rohypnol instead.

[stePH]

This is basically how I first seduced my wife, except instead of a special sound I used rohypnol instead.

d00d... Tee-em-eye. SRSLY.

[H. Bergeron]

...From the way he described himself at the intro I would have expected a Jim Rome sports guy delivery, that is important. Stingers and liners would have added some verisimilitude as well. Finally some audio processing overall - some compression and limiting would have made it sound more -radio if carefully done and would have evened out the levels. Given the ending to me it sounded pretty light weight to make it onto escape pod but a fair attempt.

I'm happy about the level of production on this episode, personally - there were a few flubs where the callers' voices weren't processed or where the host's voice was, but they weren't too bad. The main issue that I have with this story is the reading. I agree with Langly that it should have been read in more of a Morning Talk-style voice - the kind of guy that you tune in to to hear him being mean and sarcastic on the radio. Although I liked the narrator, I don't feel like his reading gave the radio host the teeth that he should have had. It took me a few sittings to get through this story because of it.

Aside from that, I really enjoyed the story itself - an interesting concept!

[CryptoMe]

I thought this was fun!
And I'm with birdless, I also laughed out loud at the skeletons on the front lawn line...

I giggled out loud at "all my skeletons are tastefully arranged on my front lawn."

[hardware]

This story was clever and fun, but certainly more form than substance. For a SF podcast, the radio format is an obvious match, and it kept the tone close enough to reality, even if it was not pitch perfect. I had Jeff Bridges in the beginning of 'Fisher King' in my head (excuuuuuuuse me). Any way, the story didn't really go anywhere unexpected (aliens are so obvious), and it is a challenge to tell a story by means of pure exposition in an exciting way. The gradual reveal was OK, but didn't exactly have me on the edge of the seat. I think if there had been more than one phenomena or at least some kind of development in the outer world, it would have been more interesting.

[LaShawn]

I work in a community garden, and a bunch of people kept coming over asking if I was okay as I sat there in the dirt, laughing my ass off. The format was *perfect*! This is a story I'm going to recommend to all my conspiracy friends and relatives. And sadly, I have a lot.

[Ichneumon]

Not my favorite. Others have pretty much covered the issues I had.

[CryptoMe]

Interesting to revisit, both the story and the comments (including my own).
I still found the story fun, but seemed to notice more of the problems this time round, specifically how recordings open the possibility for people learning and not being mind-wiped. I also laughed out loud at the skeletons on the front lawn line again (I guess I am consistent).

[dwarzel]

Author here.

I don't know if it's gauche to recommend other podcasts, but The Drabblecast did an excellent rendition of this story as well, and put quite a bit of work into it.  Speaking for myself, I consider it a must listen (the media player is down at the bottom of the page):

https://www.drabblecast.org/2014/10/05/drabblecast-340-clear-day-can-see-way-conspiracy/

As for the most recently (re)voiced objection (recordings), all I can do is reiterate my defense at the time of the original podcast: Any recording would also have the memory-erasing sound.  I honestly believe that anyone listening to this for the first time couldn't resist listening to the entire thing and thereby hearing the sound; and, thanks to that sound, every time one listens to it is the first time...

[divs]

We fully support the The Drabblecast! Thanks for linking to it.

[CryptoMe]

Author here.
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As for the most recently (re)voiced objection (recordings), all I can do is reiterate my defense at the time of the original podcast: Any recording would also have the memory-erasing sound.  I honestly believe that anyone listening to this for the first time couldn't resist listening to the entire thing and thereby hearing the sound; and, thanks to that sound, every time one listens to it is the first time...

Awesome!! I love hearing from the author!!  And while I agree that most people would listen to the end of any recordings, I can't believe there wouldn't be some people who wouldn't get to the end for some reason (late for work, distracted by spouse/dog/children/emergency, etc.). These people would eventually figure out that everybody else who did get to the end of the recording had forgotten all about it. Then those rare people who didn't get to the end would figure out that there was something problematic at the end of the recording and start passing around an edited version.... At least that is what I imagine would happen.

Still a good story, though.