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Today’s Guests:
David Hornik, Partner, August Capital
Roger Chang, Senior Producer, Revision3
Andrew Eisner, Community Manager, Retrevo
The Topics:
Apple Takes Over
Google’s Pac-Man Costs Millions
AOL Celebrates 25 Years
Google TV
Tony Blair, Venture Capitalist
Download this Episode:
iPod/iPhone/PSP: 111MB
Quicktime H.264: 137MB
Windows Media Player: 133MB
Mobile 3GP: 38MB
MP3 (Audio Only): 14MB
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in related news…
Foxconn to raise salaries 20% after suicides. (ft.com)
You need to check the audio quality of the show, especially the theme music — it is skipping horribly.
What vdiv said!!!!
Also, it doesn’t seem like CG without the CoCrank Sabastion.
hey I noticed this last week… What happened to Sebastian Rupley? Did he leave the show after all these years?
As for the audio, there’s a thump/click that seems to happen on low tones (like the bass drum on the theme song) never thought it could clip on the low end like that.
The audio issue is on both versions so SJ can’t blame Flash for this one!
I miss Sebastian too. John should bring him in on Skype. I think they are using a Tricaster so it can be done.
FRAGaLOT: He moved out of state I think. They talked it about previously. He was good. A sobering influence, if you will haha.
Sebastian Rupley was the George Fenneman of Cranky Geeks. Maybe he got a gig with Lipton Tea. I miss him too.
I’m glad some other folks are pointing out the crappy sound quality of this show. It has been going on for weeks. It is so freaking obvious, but no one bothers to fix it.
And the skipping problem is on the pre-recorded commercials as well. Why don’t the advertisers bitch to Dvorak?
I guess no one does any sort of quality control checks once it is posted.
I wouldn’t be too hard on them. I haven’t heard one this bad before so I don’t see a pattern of this particular issue and it was still watchable. And it is free so it’s hard to bitch too much. I appreciate the show because I like the content. (I already miss John’s serial mispronunciations of GigaOm!) I like watching John talk about whatever he wants to talk about because he’s witty, really smart and charmingly grouchy so I’ll deal with the occasional technical glitch.
I do shows and have had some that we discovered had a quality issue after it was in the can. Hard to re-assemble everyone and duplicate an exact show and make it as fresh as it was the first time.
There are some shows like Leo Laporte’s where the host is running the tech side and others like Cranky Geeks where there is a producer or team and the host comes in and does his thing and rolls out.
So give John a pass on the audio. I’m sure they’re aware and will work on it. Web video and the codec issues involved in it are still in their tweens. It isn’t rock solid technology like a POTS line or something.
“I haven’t heard one this bad before so I don’t see a pattern of this particular issue and it was still watchable. And it is free so it’s hard to bitch too much.”
I was not referring to a watchable video, just the ITunes podcast subscription(audio only). The annoying twitch every couple of seconds has been happening for several weeks and makes the podcast difficult to enjoy.
On the other hand, Dvorak’s daily 5 minute Tech podcast does not have this hiccup, so he has the capability of getting it right.
My bet is that he’s not even aware of the problem. If he was, he would have offered some sort of explanation.
BBC News on my overpriced cable is unwatchable because of audio hiccups like those referenced above.
JCD’s quality control guy is asleep or watching porn or something.
Whereas my ol’ fave Leo Laporte is unwatchable because he has an oversized BFD microphone sticking out of his chin. And he’s obsessed with keeping it RIGHT THERE no matter wut.
“On the other hand, Dvorak’s daily 5 minute Tech podcast does not have this hiccup, so he has the capability of getting it right.”
John can correct me if I’m wrong but I think it is key to note that Tech 5 is something John does on his personal computer and encodes/renders himself and Cranky Geeks is a show produced by Ziff Davis where John comes in and hosts and they actually put it out. That said, there is obviously an audio issue that needs to be addressed.
“Whereas my ol’ fave Leo Laporte is unwatchable because he has an oversized BFD microphone sticking out of his chin. And he’s obsessed with keeping it RIGHT THERE no matter wut.”
That’s funny. Leo is awesome. He does love his Heil PR-40. He’ll happily tell you that. It is really interesting comparing TWIT and Cranky Geeks. Leo’s show is an audio podcast that added a video component. Like Imus. CG is a web TV show that has an audio podcast available. TWIT has radio mics and looks like a radio station and CG has lavaliers and looks like Charlie Rose.
It would be interesting to compare viewer/listener ratio numbers for each show and see how their differing approaches appeal to each type of audience.
I may do a story on that.
I’m primarily in the newspaper business but I used to do a daily talk show on the radio and I do web TV stuff now and I can tell you that while a mic in the face is visually obtrusive it does result in way better audio quality than something clipped to your lapel. The quality gap narrows if you have a good sounding room. And as many people–including Sebastian on one of his last CG appearances–have noted, audio quality is a crucial and often neglected part of good web video.
SOMETHINGS WRONG WITH THE SOUND
Add another one saying that the sound is messed up. MP3 stream has been poor for weeks (with the ads actually the most effected), and it was not always this way.
Latest news headline:
Obama’s Patience Wears Thin as ZD Struggles to Contain Audio Hiccup.
As the hiccup in the Crank Geek podcast continues to gush after Ziff Davis's multiple attempts to ignore it have failed, President Obama is losing patience.
At a recent White House meeting on the hiccup problem, the president reportedly snapped, "just fix the damn hiccup.
Ooops!
And Dvorak’s response?
Fix the damn HTML!
Leo’s show Security Now with Steve Gibson should win a Pulitzer prize for the quality of its content. Unfortunately, Steve has an oversized BFD boom mike permanently fused into his right cheek. The audio is fascinating—the video, not happening.
Minuscule Sennheiser microphones on a tripod on a resonance-absorbing mat placed in front of a person are ideal. Boom mikes are fine for radio but not necessary. If you’re doing video & it’s blocking a portion of your face, you’re doing it wrong. These emperors have no clothes—& it shows.
Anyone else having a problem with the audio not syncing with the video on the .WMV, windows media player format? Seems like the longer the show goes, the worse the sync gets. Maybe it’s the media player or stupid vista, I don’t know. Other downloaded files seem to play and sync just fine on this VAIO.
And, oh yes, the audio sucks on the downloaded quicktime file played on the VAIO or an iTouch. Geez!
The audio skipping is driving me nuts! >_< I'm going to stop downloading and watching the show.. it's unbearable 🙁