Content is the key
Published by butercup on Wednesday, March 01, 2006 at 9:22 pmWhat makes a blog or a book worth reading?
What makes a podcast or a radio program worth listening to?
What makes a TV show or movie worth watching and then buying the DVD so you can watch it again and again?
You guessed it folks, the answer is - "content".
I've recently started listening to an excellent podcast called The Daily Breakfast. It's produced by a fellow called Father Roderick who happens to be a Catholic priest in Amersfoort, a town in The Netherlands.
If you've been a loyal reader of this blog you will recall that I mentioned my philosophy of religious tolerance - why then, you ask, am I listening to a Catholic podcast? Well first off, it's not about Catholicism per se. It just happens to be produced by a Catholic priest. Secondly, my philosophy of tolerance means that I will be happy to listen to podcasts by practitioners of any religion - as long as they satisfy one key requirement - good content.
That's the thing, folks. Content is key. Fr Roderick knows this. He advocated it in one of the podcasts I listened to this morning. (I think from early January). His podcast is informative, easy going, and interesting. Which is just what I need sitting in my car in the Victoria Road car park in the mornings.
Not every story can have a good ending though. This morning my iRiver decided not to work (some blah about running out of battery power..) so I was stuck with listening to CDs or to the ever-so-crappy morning radio programs. It's good, but really there's only so much of Classic FM that one person can handle .. and all the other "breakfast programs" are totally content free!! Take for example, the radio station that is running some insane competition where the prize is $1000 for every medal Australia wins at the Commonwealth Games in Melbourne. (For the record, Australia won 82 gold medals last time) .... aaaaah, but don't get me started on sports.
Aarrrrghh ... I have a whole bunch of stuff to write about. But in the interests of actually posting this - you will have to wait.
So in other news, books you must read this week are:
Philip Pullman's His Dark Materials series (sorry, you can't borrow them from me as D™ is still reading them)
Garth Nix's Old Kingdom books
The Red Queen by Matt Ridley (about the evolution of human nature)
William Gibson's Neuromancer
And anything by Haruki Murakami , but in particular Kafka on the Shore.
If you've read them already, then re-read them.
// content ends
as for presenters and others that seek to use too many words in the hope that they sound intelligent: "it's as if they feel that if their mouths stop moving, their brains will start working".
Maybe I type too fast.
But content sells, no?
D™ reckons I should publicise my blog in every signature to every email I ever send. But frankly I am much happier with random hits!!