Seasons, good or bad?

[Crash]

After reading thru a thread in the Decoder ring section between Gregg and Paul Campbell. I had to open it up, to it's own post.

In doing audio drama , do you prefer an episodic show to be run in seasons with a small break, or just continually.

I would think most listeners are already pretty familiar with a season standard since it has been done in original radio drama and then on TV. It would seem to also allow a show to grow more naturally since you can focus a season on a plotline or a series of plotlines and grow a bit more in the character development.

But then again this is the internet home of the flashy items and ten second attention span.

Personally, I like a season layout since it gives me a container of shows rather then just a blanket history. While I love going back and starting from the first episode, if you have 100+ shows it might be daunting for a new listener.

Of course then you run into the Hiatus drop, but it depends on how you handle it.

[Paul Campbell]

	Quote:	Crash
	Of course then you run into the Hiatus drop, but it depends on how you handle it.

The first idea I had to try and deal with a Hiatus was to consider providing some other form of story content during the Hiatus. Perhaps some short stories set in the same universe as the main shows.

Chris Lester of The Metamor City Podcast has done something of an inversion of this. His podcast has started with short stories and is going into a full-cast audio novel.

[UltraRob]

I think Paul has the right idea. Probably the best approach is simply to have more than one show in your feed, so when one "season" ends, something else begins, or at least comes out for a while until the next "season" of something starts.

Last year, I had a pretty solid audience during the first part of the year when I was releasing shows bi-weekly for a few months. Then real life got in the way and I went on hiatus for 3 months to get married (silly me) and rearrange my life accordingly. When I came back after nothing for 3 months, my audience was a fraction of it's former size, and it's taken me almost 6 months to build it back up again to former levels.

Moral of the story- never let your feed sit dormant for any real length of time without putting something into it. Now I always have at least one release every month, regardless of other output.

As for seasons themselves as a concept, I think it's probably not a bad idea. If you work ahead and get most of them done first then you can rapid-fire the shows out on a bi-weekly or even weekly basis- hooking your audience and keeping them hooked for a couple months. That serves the modern attention span pretty well, I think.

Rob

[laura]

	Quote:
	As for seasons themselves as a concept, I think it's probably not a bad idea. If you work ahead and get most of them done first then you can rapid-fire the shows out on a bi-weekly or even weekly basis- hooking your audience and keeping them hooked for a couple months. That serves the modern attention span pretty well, I think.

As a listener I definitely like the idea of saving up episodes and releasing them more regularly, particularly for ongoing storylines. I normally try to save up the episodes myself, but if it's a good story I want to listen to the next episode and then find myself wondering what's going on and who all the characters are! It might help to keep the audience, though if they end up disappearing over a hiatus that's a problem.

I suppose there's also the issue that everyone involved wants to hear the finished product of all their hard work and get it out as soon as possible, so maybe we should be very happy with all the wonderful stuff we get!

[Jack J Ward]

For me its always about consistency.
If you do a monthly podcast... then please keep up every month. I get used to it.
If you do a weekly podcast where you say your season is over in May. Do it.
Of course if you want a summer season that's a different schedule.. fine.. but stick that schedule if you can too.
I go by birds when it comes to anomalies. One. Two. Many. That's how birds count, and pretty much the same for me. Once error in a long while is okay. Two is understandable, three and things get pretty funky!
J

[Gregg]

Yeah, our "seasons" have almost become artifical designations, as we now record year-round... but every year in the fall I start calling it "Season Three", or what have you. It's really more for myself than the listeners I think, as we usually don't take more than an extra week or so off from running new episodes.

But keeping new content coming while avoiding burn-out was a big part of the reason for bringing in outside scripts for our Summer Showcase last year, and that ended up doing really well for us.

[Shannon]

Gregg is actually a robot. It's the only thing that makes sense.

I suppose that with the addition of the Sonic in the Summertime, we're now a year-round show as well. Which I'm glad for. Otherwise, I'd be at a loss of what to do with my time. *laughs*

[Gregg]

If I was actually a robot, I'd be finishing a script right now instead of lurking in the forums. Honestly, there are dinosaurs and a crazed Nazi scientist... you'd think that would keep anyone working...

[AtomicClockwork]

You guys are awesome. I have no idea how you guys do it.

[UltraRob]

	Quote:	Gregg
	If I was actually a robot, I'd be finishing a script right now instead of lurking in the forums. Honestly, there are dinosaurs and a crazed Nazi scientist... you'd think that would keep anyone working...

Gregg, you're a sadist you know? You tell us there are Nazi mad scientists and dinosaurs coming (in the same episode no less), with all of us knowing that because of your schedule we'll have to wait over a year before we hear it! Evil! Evil I say!

Rob