• It’s Thursday, which means that fans of Serial are getting their weekly dose of podcast crack. The This American Life spinoff, which digs into the details of a 1999 Baltimore murder case, has spawned a bevy of equally obsessive commentary, including a podcast about the podcast from Slate. But the vortex of meta-analysis doesn’t end there — an English professor has started a weekly video chat with Rabia Chaudry, the lawyer who brought the murder case to the attention of Serial‘s Sarah Koenig (and who is also blogging about Serial). “I am interested in exploring how new media engagement affects narrative and knowledge, and Serial presented an fertile ground in which to ask those questions,” writes Pete Rorabaugh.
There’s also the Serial subreddit, which as a listener I am studiously avoiding lest I fall into a wormhole from which I cannot return. Plus, I haven’t listened to today’s episode yet.
Oh my God, people. The @serial podcast. It is, all at once, my favorite new TV show, movie & book. LISTEN YOU'RE WELCOME.
— Patton Oswalt (@pattonoswalt) October 11, 2014
• The NPR subreddit, however, is more manageable, and this thread features a few folks from public radio stations talking about the NPR One app. “[A]s an employee of an NPR member station, these apps scare the crap out of me and a lot of other member station employees,” writes one.
• In the second in a series of posts for Radio Survivor, Ann Alquist argues that community radio stations should produce short videos to expand their footprints beyond traditional broadcasting. She points to a series of live performance videos from St. Louis’s KDHX that has attracted more than 2 million views. But persuading station staffers to adopt video can be a challenge, she writes. “At the heart of adapting digital disruption is managing change at community radio stations,” Alquist says.
• Attendees at next year’s South by Southwest conference will witness the official launch of “Music X,” the music video platform created by noncommercial Triple A stations. The SXSW panel will feature musician Michael Franti. KUTX in Austin, Texas, home to SXSW, is one of the stations involved in launching the channel, which has yet to be given a permanent name.