Rising From the Ashes… Hopefully?
by Michael Penney
Hey everyone,
I just wanted to make a quick post to let people know, that just because the regular audio podcast version of the Smackdown has come to an end, it’s not the absolute end of the PC/Mac Smackdown. As Cal has said a few times already, this blog will remain up and running for the regulars to post and for all of you to comment on.
I’m also having discussions with Cal about just where we can go from here. I’m playing with the idea of creating a YouTube channel. We could also set up a Smackdown Forum?
Why don’t you tell us what you think? What do you think we should do? What would you like to see? Do you have any brilliant ideas? Leave them in the comment section below.
The podcast may be finished, but the Smackdown lives on!
I don’t understand, what happened? Do you not have time to record shows? Is there a lack of interest for the show?
It’s not that there was a lack of interest, or that there’s no time. It’s that managing a podcast and splitting the workload didn’t go as smoothly as we thought it would. When Cal was doing all the work, it was all going smoothly. But if you split up all the vital work to multiple people, if someone doesn’t show, or is sick, or has something important come up, it becomes difficult to stay organized and put out a good-quality show.
When Cal was running it, he would always be there doing the post-production work, and so, even though his guests fluctuated, the shows still got out. But suppose all those regular voices now had their own important tasks, but their attendance and availability continue to fluctuate in the same way. Creates a problem, no?
A Smackdown forum might be good actually. Might act as flypaper for those sorts of discussions so certain general purpose computing forums don’t get clogged up with Mac vs PC arguments. Not everyone likes to play these sort of games… bizarrely.
I’m sure ‘Avro’ knows what I mean.
Question though: What level of moderation would be applied? Cos you know how emotive these sorts of discussions can get when you put opinionated geeks together, comforted by anonymity. Do you let ‘em go at it unrestrained, or throw anyone out if they use a rude word? Like Rachel used to.
I don’t have a lot of confidence in the forum, if anyone remembers we actually had a forum back when Beau was still the PC pundit but people hardly ever posted on it so it just died.
That’s true. But you gotta remember, the show, and the audience was a lot different back then. I think if we do it right, it can take off and be useful.
@Wayne
Regarding the moderation, there would probably be anti-inflammatory rules in place, as well as a necessity for a general respect for others. Other than that… it’d be no different than the arguments that used to happen on the show.
@ Wayne I know exactly what you mean. In some forums the only thing protecting the Mac Users are the Game laws!!!
I would be all for a forum as the participants here seem to be fairly reasonable.