podficmeta | Meta posted by an author

I have to say that I loved lavvyan's response. I loved both parts of it, but I especially, especially loved this one.

Imo, what she has a perspective on is not podfic. It's something else that doesn't exist yet and that she wishes to exist. Which, more power to her. But I don't recognize podfic as it exists either as a practice or as a community in her post.

Me neither. I'm too sick to be polite so I'm keeping out of it, but she does seem to have a rather skewed perspective

*hugs* I hope you get better soon!

thank you! I'm eating lots of soup :-)

While I'm fortunately not sick (get better soon! *hugs*), I also don't feel that I could stay polite. And yes, her perspective seems very skewed - which is no wonder if she only took a glance at podficcing and the community.

Thank you! I've lost my voice which as you can imagine for me is not great ;-)

Her post does seem to be a product of a quick glance at a community, with no interaction with said community.

This. It really looks to me like she's thinking that there should be some service wherein authors who want their work available as spoken word, for accessibility purposes, should be able to find readers and oversee their own productions of that work, with the reader essentially there as a hired worker.

And hey, look! The podfic community is a bunch of people who are reading fanfic out loud! It's exactly the same thing, right?

Only wait! The podficcers have their own ideas about how to record and edit podfic! They have their own ideas about how and where podfic should be hosted! They even have their own interpretations of the stories in question, and one or two people have said they wish they didn't have to ask permission, even though they do anyway, which is clearly a sign that the entire community thinks that they shouldn't have to have anything to do with the authors! That is not the OP's vision AT ALL!

A lot of people who aren't very familiar with the podfic community seem to make the mistake of thinking that there is some list you can put yourself on that will magically inspire people to podfic your stuff, that podficcing is a service for the author's benefit and not something being done by readers who love to read because it is its own creative activity. It's that notion -- that podfic is there for the author's benefit -- that brings in the entitlement complex, I think, because an author who believes that podfic is for their own benefit in the first place is going to be very unsettled when they discover that the author's wishes are not key to the creation of podfic at all.

The one thing I do agree with her on is that I intensely dislike the term "podfic". XD I strongly prefer "audiofic", because "podfic" makes it sound like the only people who could possibly be interested in it are people who, specifically, have iPods in particular, which a lot of people don't. It is like hearing "Kleenex" instead of "tissue" or "band-aid" instead of "bandage" or "Droid" instead of "Android-based smartphone", and okay, I can live with those first two, but open formats being renamed after trademarks makes me a sad, sad, Creative Commoner.

/enough-about-my-own-weird-tics-this-is-not-about-me

I understand the objection to podfic (I have the same objection to other words like that, and even though I rather irrationally like this one, sometimes I will make myself use audiofic instead), and it makes me sad that as the discussion on their post progressed, this person has concluded that perhaps what they mean should be called audiofic to precisely differentiate it from podfic as it exists now. *headdesks*

I KNOOOOOOOW I AM SUCH A SAD PANDA ABOUT THAT. /facepalms

I strongly prefer "audiofic", because "podfic" makes it sound like the only people who could possibly be interested in it are people who, specifically, have iPods in particular, which a lot of people don't.

I actually didn't realize that the "pod" in podfic was the same as the "pod" in "iPod". *headdesk* I thought it was inspired by "podcast", and didn't actually think about where that "pod" came from. And I agree with you in principle, but I think the word has taken on its own life now.

/Luz, who does not have an iPod

And I agree with you in principle, but I think the word has taken on its own life now.

I'm afraid so! And I mean, I use 'podfic' too, so it's not like I Demand My Own Vocabulary!. Who knows -- in sixty years, maybe people will just be calling all mp3 players iPods. I'm sure Apple would love that. ;)

It really looks to me like she's thinking that there should be some service wherein authors who want their work available as spoken word, for accessibility purposes, should be able to find readers and oversee their own productions of that work, with the reader essentially there as a hired worker.

Thing is, IMO it wouldn't even be *that hard* for that to occur. I occasionally record things for friends for presents/fun/because I have spare time when they express a desire for a podfic of X story. If those friends were to say, "I wrote this story, I really wish I had a podfic of it, and I want it so much that I'd be happy to do all the editing work if someone else did the recording!" I would happily provide the raw recording track. In order for that to happen, though, one needs to (1) make friends, or at least casual DW/LJ acquaintances, with podficcers; (2) not alienate audioficcers by making blanket statements about how they ought to do things; and the OP doesn't seem to be doing either.

Just over a year ago, I looked into making a podfic newsletter and started some rather involved RSS readers. I actually found communities where author's can ask for their fic to be podficced. All the ones I saw were pretty dead though, or, rather, I saw a decent amount of asking but very little filling (if any? I don't recall ever seeing a request filled).

Podfic is just such a labour of love. Yeah, maybe if there was an offer to help on the level you suggested... but even then, I'm probably too much of a control freak and wouldn't be ok with someone else editing my stuff.

When I first found the post above I started responding as I read. Before I got to her "vision" of what podfic should be I wrote out some advice to her on how she could get her stories podficced, which was:
The podficcing community is pretty small (although it gets bigger and bigger all the time). There’s a limited number of podficcers and, what seems like, unlimited amounts of fic to podfic. Podficcing is hugely time consuming (4-20 minutes of work for every finished minute of podfic, one hour of finished podfic per 10K of written fic, give or take, depending on the podficcer) and there’s only so many hours in a day. Since there’s so many fic options for podficcers to choose from, it makes each podfic a rec for the fic and our way of showing we love it. So asking others to podfic your works, it’s kind of like asking someone to rec your fic.

There are ways to encourage people to podfic your works. You can give blanket permission for others to record your fic and, in general, encourage podfic. Get involved in the community, make connections and friends, then you'll find podficcers more likely to podfic your work. But the only way to guarantee that your fic gets podficced, really, is to take up podficcing yourself.

I haven't posted over there yet because the second half of her post totally threw me for a loop and I have to regroup.

Edited (html!fail) 2011-02-17 01:42 (UTC)

Yeah, maybe if there was an offer to help on the level you suggested...

Yeah, I don't think that's likely to occur, either, but it was the model that the OP was proposing (someone else records, zie edits--which suggests to me that zie has no idea exactly how much fun it isn't to spend 5 minutes editing an audacity file and the realize that whoopee! I've edited a whole *1 minute* of fic!), so if the OP ends up creating/collaborating in the way zie wants, there might be some takers for doing just the recording part of the work.

it’s kind of like asking someone to rec your fic.

I think of audiofic as being similar to fanart (drawn as a gift for a fic), and so the part where bjewelled talks about having editorial control over the process (auditioning, casting, editing) boggles me. If she wants a very specific kind of collaboration project and outlines that from the start, that would be fine, but what she's describing right now sounds to me like this kind of interaction:

writer: posts fic
drawer: reads fic, gets art bunny, creates fanart (without even asking permission from the author! quelle horreur! /snark), posts it, and sends a link to the writer
writer: sends response saying, "that's not how I envisioned that scene, and I don't like your use of pastels instead of watercolors. Please change this line, this shading, make Hermione's smile bigger, and make Harry's hair messier."
(drawer: "WTF")

Fanart created for a fic is a gift and I think of podfic as being a gift in the same vein. Writers don't look fanart gifts in the mouth (or if they do, they complain about it behind lock or in private chat, I guess), and I wish that same kind of politeness applied to audiofic.

Another thought popped into my head regarding the fanart analogy--podfic as it currently exists is like when fanartists read a fic, are inspired by it to create artwork, and post the fanart. What bjewelled is envisioning is more like if a writer were to choose fanartists and ask them to illustrate their story, while giving the writer draft sketches to critique and suggest edits on. It's an entirely different kind of project.

The one thing I do agree with her on is that I intensely dislike the term "podfic". XD I strongly prefer "audiofic", because "podfic" makes it sound
I'm not really crazy about the ipod connection either, although it doesn't bother me enough to really rock the boat about it. However there seems to be quite a few of us it might be worth changing our own vocabulary and see if it takes off....

re: terminology; before I discovered podfic/audiofic, I had heard about and investigated podiobooks, serialized original fiction presented as podcasts. While it does use the trademark, I kind of like the wordmash. :) Their community culture is somewhat different than the podfic community's, but I found some helpful technical tips on their forums.

What's interesting is, there are lists where you can give permission to podfic. No, it doesn't mean it'll automatically happen, but I have certainly flipped through them.

Also, what's to stop her approaching a podficcer that she likes and asking whether they would be interested in recording her works? I'd be flattered if someone liked my podfic enough to ask and certainly take a look in case it's something I'm interested in recording.

It's something I wanted to comment on her post, but she's stopped comments now. But she is assuming that podficcers don't want to interact with authors, but it certainly doesn't appear that she has asked a podficcer.

Maybe you're all psychic?

...am I the only one bothered by her change of the generally accepted terms used in the podfic community? Podfic > audiofic, reader > vocalist, listener > reader??

As a digital fanartist, I would be disconcerted if someone started calling my work "image retouches" or "digital collages" (even though some of it could fit those definitions), instead of the accepted generic "fanart" or "photomanip(ulation)s".

Yeah, that kind of set off my "control freak" alarm bells from the word go. >_> It was a clear case of "I want it done my way, so I will redefine everything in order to get control over the topic before we even get started."

Yes, that's exactly it.

I should also say that I too thought "podfic" was inspired by "podcast" so it was a term I mostly used, but that I don't have a preference either way. But are iPods really what gave the name to podfics?

Oh, I have always figured "podfic" was inherited from "podcast", but then I always associated "podcast" with iPods, too. Apparently opinions vary on whether or not the "pod" in "podcast" was originally meant to refer to the iPod, but the first "podcatcher" software was something designed specifically for the iPod (its name was "iPodderX"), and Apple has repeatedly sued people using the term "pod" in their software because it dilutes the iPod trademark, or some such. While internet radio programs were around before the iPod, I don't think they really caught on until the iPod, and particularly Apple's native support on the iPod for podcasts (and they sure aren't arguing with the name "podcast" itself; I imagine there are a lot of people who think you can't listen to a podcast without an iPod, and there are likely people in fandom who don't know that you can listen to podfic without an iPod, too).

But audiofic and podfic are both generally accepted terms, so I end up using both, depending on context!

I think I don't associate them with iPods because they're rare in my part of the world - there are knockoffs, and players by other manufacturers, and they're all called by the generic term "mp3 player". Probably the only people who call them by their name are those who can afford to buy them in the first place. :)

All of that is very interesting stuff which makes me want to look it up further (which I probably should have done in the first place, so thank you for taking the time to type it all up!)

While I don't totally love the term "podfic" I was rather annoyed by it. So much of her post came off as "you're doing it wrong" and her ignoring our vocabulary and making her own just cemented that feeling.

I thought that was rude as fuck, myself.

It's a pity that her post evolved into such a podfic-bashing session, because she touches on some other issues in there that I'd have been interested in seeing expanded upon. The accessibility stuff, yes, but also the overlap (or lack thereof) with amateur voice acting and radio plays. I've poked around amateur VA sites occasionally and would have loved a rational compare/contrast of that performing/listening experience vs. podfic from someone more familiar with that "side" of the fannish recording-'verse.

I've tried a couple of times to type up a response, but I keep getting sidetracked by a couple of points that I'm not even sure she's really saying.

For one thing, I'm ticked off at the (apparent) assumption that she's the only person ever to think about accessibility when making podfics. It might not always be the primary motivation behind someone creating a podfic, but I know that accessibility is one of the main reasons I started recording my own stories, and that you can't be part of the podfic community for very long without interacting with fans who have accessibility needs.

Which brings me to the other thing, that she keeps going on about making more elaborate productions. This is a great goal, but if she's so concerned about accessibility, I can't help but feel annoyed because my bare-bones recordings are pretty much all I can manage, in terms of money and time. I have Audible, a microphone, and a hand-knitted cover for said microphone. That's my budget. Either my stories are audio-accessible as a single-reader recording, or they're not audio-accessible at all. Which does she want?

So, yeah, kind of annoyed and not in a good emotional place anyway to be a) reading her post and not Take It Personally or b) respond reasonably. Besides, most of you have already done a stellar job of responding for me. :)

I've tried a couple of times to type up a response
I'm on my 5th draft or so. I totally get what you mean. Mostly my involvement has been the occasional response to other's comments because I just don't know how to get out all that I feel (especially with the character limits on LJ comments, succinct I am not :S)

For one thing, I'm ticked off at the (apparent) assumption that she's the only person ever to think about accessibility when making podfics... Which brings me to the other thing, that she keeps going on about making more elaborate productions.
The point I'm editing up now (on draft #5, god) is about how I find her post kind of jarring because making podfic a more elaborate production actually reduces accessibility for many. I know that radio play-style podfics are pretty much useless to me because I have too much trouble following them, since I multitask. For fen with aural impairments it can render the recording completely useless.

I'm coming rather late to the party here, but I found it a little jarring? amusing? interesting... right at the beginning, with this sentence: I've seen a few mentions of podfic that say that people listen to them because their eyes skim over large chunks of text, they like to listen to them in the car, or whilst working or cooking or something like that, but I have only ever seen one thread that mentions accessibility.

Because, um, what are all those reasons, if not about accessibility? Those listeners are saying "I have trouble reading/I don't have hands free to hold the book/I can't see the computer from where I'm standing, so I want to listen to it instead..." It doesn't take a certificate of disability to want to access a story in a different way!

For the record then, let me add a disabled person's perspective (just in case we need it *rolls eyes*): one of (the many) reasons I listen to podfic is because there are times when I'm too sensitive to light to be able to look at my computer screen (even with heavily tinted glasses), too brain-foggy to read, and too achy to sit up for long. I love listening to someone else reading me a story when I'm too ill to read it for myself. Thankfully, this does not happen very often. Mostly I listen to podfic because I enjoy listening to it in the bath, whilst travelling, whilst working on crafts - and whilst temporarily insomniac due to annoying colds! I love being able to take stories to places that aren't always convenient for reading, and I love the intimacy and companionship of sharing a favourite story with someone else in fandom.

As a reader of podfic (though only for six months or so), I found it very frustrating that they didn't seem to appreciate the amount of work that goes into editing. I recorded for an hour the other day, spent two hours starting the first editing pass - and found I'd only got fifteen minutes into the file... Even when someone tried to point out that the editing process is both more time-consuming and more complicated than they'd been imagining, they brushed it off with a one-upping comment! I'd love to be able to dump all the editing hassle on a beta listener, but since the editing is the lion's share of the workload, it wouldn't be fair! Even if someone proposed a collaborative multi-voice project, I'd expect the participants to do at least one editing run-through of their own, to get the major mispronounciations, mistakes and repetitions out (and then you'd hand it over to a designated editor to put it all together and tweak the separate files into synch with each other...).

She's basically turned off comments now unless you're her friend, but as a newbie to podfic and podficcing, I find her post way off-base.

What I've seen that contradicts her: (1) Every podfic community I've seen points out the need for author permission (and dang is it nerve-racking to ask). (2) I've been listening for less than a month and I've already seen people recruiting for multi-voice podfics and other group projects, which may not be what she is after, but sure goes against what she is saying. (3) There's almost no feed back to podficcers (something that shocked me when I found podfic), so they aren't doing it to take over an author's work for their own gain or anything like that. It's really a labour of love and if someone podficced my work now, I'd be totally flattered.

Honestly I found the whole post odd and I was amazed at how the very polite, coherent and to the point all the responses are. Bravo podficcers for being such nice people. Any other part of fandom would have had flames by now.

You all rock! That's all I wanted to say.

She's basically turned off comments now unless you're her friend
Ahhh. Thanks for pointing that out! I was wondering why there hadn't been any new discussion, especially after it was

metafandomed. Looks like I was the last one to get a comment in before it was shut down.

I've been listening for less than a month and I've already seen people recruiting for multi-voice podfics and other group projects, which may not be what she is after, but sure goes against what she is saying.
I think this is a relatively new thing (and, so ratio-wise I can understand why she thought that, especially since it seems she only did about 10 minutes of research).

It really seems to me like the past year (and a bit) podfic fandom has been pushing itself do try new and different things with itself.

There was just something about the first podbang competition that seemed to open the floodgates. This comm was created shortly after, giving us a chance talk about we do/want. There was the critical feedback exchange. Amplirecathon encouraged people to talk about what podfic listeners like, what works for them and what they want more of. Places like

ladiesbigbang started, accepting podfic.

I've been watching podfic fandom for the past 5 years and I don't think we've seen a creative jump like this since

amplificathon first started. It's awesome :)

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