Cocktail Confessions

Part of me feels like I sold out to the Media Man.  I’m not exactly sure why, but I’ve been fairly proud to have gone thus far so long without jumping on the Twitter bandwagon.  There’s a couple of reasons why I never felt the need to jump on this trend, and I suppose on the technological front it was because I never had a smart phone prior to my Droid and there was no way in hell I was going to use my regular phone (sans QWERTY keyboard) to attempt and fumble through pecking out a tweet.  It didn’t help either that Verizon charges like $.10 for every text message as well if you don’t have a data plan.

The second reason was more of a social ego thing for me which of course goes both ways.  On my side of the coin, I’m not sure what I would ‘tweet’ or why I would in the first place.  I’m not of the generation where this technology is second hand nature to kids have my age.  It seems that ‘tweeting’ was the next step in evolution for teens who were already maturing beyond Myspace, and now had a mobile way to keep friends updated.  I’m pretty sure that if I were 16 again, I’d really be into Twitter.  On the flip-side of things, it seemed Twitter became all that when celebrity douche’s like Ashton Kutcher, Kim Kardashian, Paris Hilton and John Mayer got on-board and felt the need to tweet about everything they came into contact with.  Soon, ‘entertainment’ news shows such as Access Hollywood and Extra started to report the often mundane and sometimes insane musings of so called celebrities and hung on every word as if the ability to tweet now turned them into wise old sages that we as a culture needed to hang onto every word.  It was no longer about what we could do or experience for ourselves, but we were more interested, (for whatever reason) in “What would Ashton do?” or “What does Brittany think?”, as if somehow we were actually no closer to them, understood them, and now could tell others we were friends.

So why did I succumb if I am so against it?  Well, like all things, even my opinions change over time.  I still think Ashton and John Mayer are douches, but I cam to realize that there are other people out there that actually do write about things that interest me.  There are people I am interested in following as it comes to discovering new technologies, new restaurants, new clubs and venues, and even news that affects my world.

So who the hell am I following then?    Funny you should ask.  For the first time, it seems I have the ability to ‘interview’ who I want to follow on a trial basis.  Some may come, some may go.  For example, I don’t think I could follow a John Mayer even if I like him because my phone would be chirping upwards of ten times a day on just him.  Now suppose I began to follow 10 people, or maybe 20, or even 30.  If they even just tweeted once a day, I’d be inundated with chirps that would drive me up the wall.

The current list I have is relatively small (10), and there wasn’t all that much thought put into it.  Some of them I added like Neil Patrick Harris, because he actually has something to say and it has content, not like Kim Kardashian who peppers here with just links and nonsensical crap like advertisements.  I looked at a few dozen random celebrities in different fields and here’s my list thus far:  Nikkie Jackson (fitness model), Catalina Cruz (Internet entrepreneur), Niel Patrick Harris (actor), Bobby Flay (celebrity chef), Denise Richards (actress, model, animal lover), Kevin Smith (director, comic buff, actor), Blair Herter (TV personality, comic geek, video games), Adam Sessler (TV personality, video gamer), Aziz Ansari (comedian, actor), Guy Fieri (celebrity chef, tv personality).

I also realize it’s a great self marketing tool.  I’d love to get more people to listen to my podcast and if I can even attract one person via Twitter over to CocktailConfessions, then by measurement, it worked.  I doubt I will be personally be ‘tweeting’ much, I mean what possibly do I have to say to the masses who don’t even know I exist?  If I’m lucky, maybe I’ll get a few followers, although I suspect they will be friends and I can share with them some new eats I’ve discovered, or inform them of a new podcast, or perhaps an occasional mobile picture….but isn’t that what we have Facebook for?

On my Droid phone I installed ‘Tweetcaster lite’, a freebie version of Tweetcaster Pro.  It seemed to get a lot of positive ratings 4.5/5 and seems failry intuitive to use.  Not sure if it is the best one out there as it seems a few people said it doesn’t have the ability to upload video’s to Twitter….but do I care about that?  Maybe it will come with an upcoming patch or release upgrade?

Anyway, now I’m looking for an appropriate and easy Twitter plug-in for WordPress.  I’ve already seen a few, but I need to decide which one will suit my needs here.  Don’t be surprised if you see one or two come and go over the weeks as I decide which one is for me.  However, in the meantime, if you so choose you can follow me on Twitter at ‘@alonedisciple’.

Finally, if you were to become a follower of me, what would you want me to tweet about?  Recipes?  Grilling?  Cocktails?  Funny crap?

The following enhancements and/or general changes were made over the last few days to the site as I continue to learn and make minor adjustments.

• Link added: Chris Richardson is the developer of the Map Press plugin and was very kind to help me out directly and very quickly when I sent him an email regarding some technical issues I was having in getting maps to display when ‘published’.  Added a link to his plug-in site in the Blogroll section entitled Map Press.  Go check him out if you have WordPress.
• Plugin update: Map Press v1.5.8.8 was updated 7/23/09.
• Plugin update: Sociable v3.4.3 was updated 7/23/09.
• Plugin update: Askimet v2.2.6 anti-spam was updated 7/21/09.
• Plugin update: Power Press v0.9.2 was updated 7/23/09.  However, I noticed when I did the upgrade some (not all) of my settings were lost.  I need to go back and ‘re-validate’ two of the feed settings so when I eventually try and post these to Zune or iTunes, these services will recognize new podcasts when posted.  Speaking of Zune and iTunes, I’m going to try and get at least one of these (probably Zune first) submitted over the weekend.  Crossing my fingers.
• Zoom H2 portable mic: Was supposed to be delivered today, however, most recent tracking update has now extended the window upwards of 7/29, which sucks, because its apparently at the FedEx facility in Aliso Viejo as of 6:30am this morning which is 10 miles from my house.
• Plugin deleted: Deleted visitor IP mapper running in background (my eyes only).  It didn’t seem to be capturing ‘all’ the data and therefor not doing it’s job correctly or accurately and thus just taking up space at this point.  No big loss.
• Plugin added: Added Next Gen gallery plugin that allows for slideshows and picture gallery enhancments.

First of all, I’d like to thank all of my friends who have so far visited my page and took the time to download or listen to my first trial episode and provide either words of encouragment and some helpful feedback.  Personally, I’ve been both excited and frustrated with this experience. 

The positive part is the feeling that I am indeed learning something new, and get to enjoy messing around with the technology and flexing a little bit more of my creativity.  For those that think I have ADHD, well maybe I do, and this is just another outlet for my sometimes idle mind.  I do have a lot of great friends and stories and I only get more excited when I think of future episodes when one of you is sitting across from me on the mic, sharing a beer, and just shooting the breeze.

The frustrating parts is the amount of work leading up to this and the continual tweak and modifications.  I really didn’t realize how much goes into a podcast, let alone oen that garners others people interest and word of mouth.  If you think about it, there are many components in the production of a blog: style, hosting services, various software applications, plug-ins, editing, feeds, post production, transfer and exportings of files, ID tagging, audio conversions, etc.  It can be really difficult when you discover than ‘current’ manuals are hard to find, and many things that appear to be compatible actually aren’t. 

You have a vision of how things are supposed to look and work on paper or in your head, but in actuality it doesn’t always pan out.  I’ve run across obsolete plug-ins, technical hurdles, vague or non-exsitant instructions, false data capturing and statistics, and more passwords and logins than I can shake a stick at.  To illustrate, despite how ‘easy’ various white papers say how easy it is to podcast, here are the various components I work with just to get this far:  GoDaddy as my hosting site, WordPress as my main blogging software, Audacity as my audio capture and editing device, FeedBurner along with Google accounts to provide an enhanced RSS feed, BluBrry as an embedded flash player and download tool.  That doesn’t even incorporate the various plug-ins: wordpress statististics for data capture, Social to share posts on social networking sites, and a few others.  Each time you install one, you need to make sure that it not only looks right on teh main page, but that it is compatible and actually works as described.  Easier said than done.  There were plenty of installs, just to rip it back out and look for a comparable alternative and I’m sure there will be more of that in the future as well. 

But for now, it looks as if I have the main gist of everything working properly.  The last two major hurdles, which so far appear to be the most daunting to date is the ability to learn MP3 ID tagging, not just for Windows (that’s easy), but the scripting/coding for iTunes.  Once that is done, then it will be submitting the appropriate feed to both Microsoft Zune and iTunes to have them be approved and available for everyone to subscribe from there.  The good news is I did a prelim test last night with iTunes, and it did indeed detect my feed and registered my episode (sans artwork and proper tags, but it is there in its raw format).

So on to the other stuff:  I added the first episode to the ‘Podcast‘ page.  This is where all epsiodes will reside via a download link without all the show notes, links, pictures, etc.  Think of it as the one-stop-shop for past episodes.  I also added another page, ‘Patrons‘  in which over time will be populated with a few lines of guest biographies and headshot pictures….just so you can put a face/name to the voices you may hear.

Whew, that was a mouthful.  Now hopefully from here on out, I’ll get to the fun stuff and leave the majority of this techo crap and geek speak behind. 

Now, let’s look forward to the next episode, so stock the fridge with some cold ones.

Feedburner logo

I have just spent the last hour or so signing up and tinkering with Feedburner.  You should see the appropriate RSS chicklet banner now at the top of the sidebar to the right.  It should rotate the latest 5 posts for those that are just taking a gander.

Feedburner itself just relocated over to Google, and thus you need a Google account to activate Feedburner and everything that goes with it.  While it is currently active now on this site, I still need to make some additional configuration changes, such as adding personal artwork so when my podcasts eventually show up on iTunes, or other pod catching services that support pictures, my podcasts will have a little flair.  I already know the picture I’m gonna use, but it’s stowed on another PC right now, and I’ll have to upload it to my WP server anyway for it to show up.

Since I just activated it less than an hour ago, so it may take a few extra hours before I start catching statistics and data collection for analyzing.  This may sound a little boring to you, and in all honesty, it may end up being a bit boring for me in the long run as well, so I’ll definitely have a drink when I occasionally glance how many of you aren’t that interested in anything I have to say or write about.

So far, everything I have done on this site I have taught myself from reading various forums, wiki’s, and other Internet articles, solely by trial and error.  I feel like I’m pretty close to actually starting the real podcasting I had previously intended to do from the get go.  It’s been a bit slow on the creativity end as I am using more of my techie side (not the happy fun, go-lucky side) to get this up and running.

I also added some option to help share posts to Digg, Facebook, Vinenews, Technorati, Stumble It, and a few others too.  So we’ll see if those kick in or not.

I may even do a dry run ‘break the ice’ podcast tonight.  You know, get the opening down, introduce a drink, tell a story or two and discuss the future format of the show.  I’d like to shoot for about 20-30 minutes for my initial cast, and of course there is the editing again back in Audacity.  So while I may indeed record tonight, it may be a day or two before I actually post.

I want to post a picture of my ad-hoc studio as well (i.e. my spare bedroom where my PC and podcasting kit is located), and also do a quick write up on my Behringer mixing board, microphone, and packaged software as well.