Escape Artists

Cast of Wonders => About Cast of Wonders => Topic started by: Unblinking on December 08, 2016, 01:38:23 PM

Title: Renumbering and pre-dating episode posts
Post by: Unblinking on December 08, 2016, 01:38:23 PM
I know that Cast of Wonders has had some issues with the RSS feed that have interfered with regular episode posting this year.

As the episodes have been released this year there have been some anomalies in episode numbering, skipping a couple dozen episode numbers at one point to get to the Banned Book Weeks ones in a timely fashion.  Now those episodes have been renumbered to be sequential.  At least, it appears so, because I have the original files on my iPod and those episodes are sequentially later than Dinovember in the album sorting.

I usually sync my iPod once a week or so, and so another strange thing is that I synched it last week and there were a couple episodes that were dated weeks before.  Presumably a similar thing where the posting is caught up.


Just wanted to submit that this renumbering of episodes and making posts with previous dates instead of the date-of-posting makes it much more difficult for me to have any idea what episodes I have actually listened to.  I think it would be better to post them with sequential numbers to begin with (the occasional one out of sequence because of a delayed contract for a big round number episode is one thing, but skipping a couple dozen is another, I think), and renumbering them does not make it better.  And I would rather the post date actually reflect the date of posting, otherwise, it would be very easy to check the date, see that there was nothing new since the last day that I synched, and to just skip the episode completely by accident.

Title: Re: Renumbering and pre-dating episode posts
Post by: danooli on December 12, 2016, 06:11:12 PM
2016 was a trying year with the RSS feed issue and some hectic schedules. We apologize for the inconveniences we may have caused and 2017 will be a lot better.
Title: Re: Renumbering and pre-dating episode posts
Post by: Unblinking on January 01, 2017, 04:16:48 PM
Can you PLEASE stop backdating episode posts?  Makes it much harder to tell what I have listened to.  I manually download files, not with a podcatcher.  Normally I chrck once a week, and so all I have to do is check for any new posts dated within the last week.  I check today and there ar several that are alll backdated for the last month and I almost missed the banned books rachael k jones story because it seemed to be inserted in mid list.

Is there any benefit to forging the post date?  From my point of view, there is a major detriment and the marginal benefit is that we can try to pretend the publication delays didnt happen this year, but anyone who is paying attention knows it did and it is easy to miss episodes entirely.

Can you PLEASE stop doing that from now on?
Title: Re: Renumbering and pre-dating episode posts
Post by: danooli on January 02, 2017, 03:20:18 PM
I totally get that frustration. Trust me, we would LOVE to not have these scheduling issues. I am truly sorry. With the RSS feed issues we experienced and the editorial change happening over the summer in the midst of con season and a house move, we fell way short of some of our goals in 2016.

The only solution to your dilemma that is feasible (if we have to do this again, which I sincerely hope won't happen) is to perhaps use the forums as a guide?  If you see a new thread posted, that means there is a new episode. That is far from ideal, I am acutely aware.
Title: Re: Renumbering and pre-dating episode posts
Post by: Unblinking on January 03, 2017, 12:49:48 AM
I totally get that frustration. Trust me, we would LOVE to not have these scheduling issues. I am truly sorry. With the RSS feed issues we experienced and the editorial change happening over the summer in the midst of con season and a house move, we fell way short of some of our goals in 2016.

The only solution to your dilemma that is feasible (if we have to do this again, which I sincerely hope won't happen) is to perhaps use the forums as a guide?  If you see a new thread posted, that means there is a new episode. That is far from ideal, I am acutely aware.

I understand technical issues.  They will happen, and sometimes for longer than anyone would expect.  I am not really worked up about the RSS issues.

It is specifically the pre dating in particular.  Pre dating doesnt solve the RSS issue on any level.  I guess it allows us to pretend to newcomers that they never existed, but I am not sure there is any real value in that pretense.

But... predating does have a huge detrimental effect on some of us, probably anyone who downloads episodes manually like I do.  I want to catch up on episodes before making my yearly list and I have NO IDEA which episodes i need to download or how far back I have to look to find.  It was alread on my to do list and that item has now become an undefined duration (which probably bugs me extra, being a software engineer by trade).  ThE only reason I even found the RKJ episode that seemed to have slipped in several episodes out of order is because I never forget RKJ stories, because she is a friend and also one of my favorite writers.  If it hadnt been so clearly an anomaly for that reason I would have no idea and wouldve missed it entirely (are the downloads for that episode lower than average?  I guess it might not be noticeable if everyone else uses podcatchers)

I am honestly considering just dropping the feed and writing off Cast of Wonders 2016 episodes as a total loss, skipping whatever I havent heard because I am not sure I have the time to go combing through the feed to figure what I have heard and what I havent.  You know I wouldnt consider something like that lightly, I have kept up with the cast for years.  I expect whats done is done this time around in any case, but I would really appreciate if the staff could consider not renumbering and predating again in the future.