350 – Interviews – Author Steven C. Phillips Presents – Altered Audio!

Hi, this is Kevin Conroy, and you're listening

to the Geekcast Radio Network. Hello and welcome

to the 350th episode of Geekcast Radio. I am

TF2 and Mike, and today in this special interview

episode, I welcome the co -creator of the Geekcast

Radio Network, a 20 -year podcast veteran, a

voice actor, and now writer, plus my best friend

in the world, it's Stephen C. Phillips! Yeah!

who now has his first book published, entitled

Altered Audio, Podcasting Demystified, a guide

for any and all podcasters with clear advice,

real tools, and zero gatekeeping. Because as

you know, folks, the goal has always been to

unleash the podcasting geek in us all. Hi, Steve.

How are you? Good. How are you? I'm good. See,

the goal there was to basically fake not knowing

you. And congrats on the release of the book.

Any initial thoughts before we jump into the

questions? No, just waiting to be peppered with

questions at this point. Yes, I'm going to assault

you now. Would you like to be a pepper, too?

That's right. I'm a pepper. Don't you want to

be a pepper, too? That's right. It's an old Dr.

Pepper joke. All right, so we got three sections

here, folks. We're going to talk to Steve about

his voice acting, his podcasting, and his writing.

But got about 18 or so questions, maybe a couple

more in the random section. You never know. Starting

out with the voice acting, you say in the book

that the original dream was to be a voice actor.

All these years later, you have gotten to live

that dream in several projects. What was your

favorite part about the voice acting process

that you went through? So when I first got started,

it was on the Transformers Headmasters fan dub.

And I had a piece of crap lab tech. desktop mouse

or not mouse microphone. And it was one of those

$9 microphones, you know, those, those ones that

plug into the, the microphone port. Yep. And

they just sound like crap. And then if you had

like a phone call, they would have like the weird

backfeed. And then if you hit anything and had

a weird backfeed or buzz or yeah, it just, it,

it sounded distant, not very clear, just sounded

like trash. I learned how to do that. And I learned,

uh, cause I was like, I have no idea what to

record these in. And, uh, I was using like windows

sound recorder, uh, cause that was my exposure

to it at that point in time. And, uh, the other

guys in the stuff, they're like, we use gold

wave. And I'm like, what's that? Uh, I'm like,

is that sound wave just different? And they're

like, no, it's gold wave. And, uh, It's essentially

like I don't even know if it still exists, but

it's it's like I at the time. Oh, it does still

exist. They they do a lot of like audio editing.

There's I mean, they have a video editor as well

now, but they have they have multitrack. They

have like 20 bucks to buy. So it's not it's not

bad. And it works on all devices. Like, you can

get it on iOS, Windows, Mac, Linux, and Android

now. I remember using it. It looks nothing like

it looks now. It was very different. And I had

no idea what I was doing in the software. Like,

I just, I didn't. And it was so confusing. There

were so many different settings, so many different

things you could do. And I didn't know anything.

I was recording for the voice of Scourge because

I could do the voice of Scourge. And I was doing

a voice match just like everybody else in the

program and joined in on episode three. And then

every now and again, I actually still to this

day still get we've we've. rebooted with a different

set of people running it at one point and i think

they made it to episode 10 or 11 or something

and then it just kind of fizzled out but it takes

we i get usually like one a year that gets recorded

and so even to this day i still get to do some

random characters in it like i've done dive bomb

i've done superion i've done you know some different

voices but uh That was that's still like the

pinnacle of like awesome because I still have

the original video clips on a hard drive. And

I'm like, I got giddy when I saw my voice on

the animation for the first time. Nice. When

you craft your voices, how do you go about doing

it? What is your method? And I'm not talking

about the impressions. I'm talking about your

unique voices that you create. Uh, so I, I, this

kind of bleeds into both. Uh, so when I, when

I do the voices, I, one, obviously watched a

lot of television and animation as a kid. So

I flipped channels. I watched the, you know,

the one Saturday morning, I watched the Sunday

stuff I watched. I literally flipped. Between

the five or six channels that had cartoons on

Saturdays and then the three that had them on

Sundays. And then I watched weekday mornings

and then weekday evenings. And I watched entirely

too much. So I would play like when I played

with like my action figures and my Lego figures

that I created to mimic the ones that I couldn't

afford to buy because I had a bazillion Lego.

Which, by the way, look nothing like the stuff

that comes out nowadays that's pre articulated

and transforms properly. Oh, definitely imagination.

But. I, I would try and replicate the voice,

and sadly, a lot of them didn't come to fruition

until I hit puberty with my voice deepened and

I was able to actually hit the voice. Uh, but

a lot of the, the, the screen care forces were

a lot easier to do, uh, because obviously voices

are different and they change over the years.

And, uh, so I started out doing like meat wad

and, you know, trying my, my hand at sound waves,

star screen, Megatron beast, Megatron waspinator,

uh, Gollum. Those were a lot of my and Kermit

the Frog. Those were a lot of my foundational

ones. And then I kind of learned how I could

merge other voices to create different voices.

And so I have some original voices like when

I when I have congestion, I can do Morgan Freeman

pretty well, which, yeah, it's an impression,

but it's still like a vocal intonation that I

have to figure out. Even the impressions, I typically

have to learn their speech patterns. Like, I

have to listen to them enough. I have to learn

the speech pattern. I have to replicate it. I

have to hit the right cadence at the right moment

with the right speech pattern. I did that in

my acting class. I played Casey Kasem. And then

I did the Joker. Yeah. So, I mean, there's that.

And then a lot of it, I just pick stuff up. When

we interviewed the guys that did the Ninja Turtle

podcast years ago, and then I come off mute and

I'm like, oh, I can do Krang all of a sudden.

Just practice it five seconds off air, microphone

muted, all of a sudden belt on, and then, you

know, Saki, this is Krang. The devil is my new

body. So, I mean, a lot of those voices just

come out of just hearing them for years and learning

what they say. But when I produced an audio drama

for three and a half years, I couldn't always

do an impression. Right. You had to create your

own. I did. Yeah. So one of the characters was

kind of a play on Beast Megatron, but it wasn't

100 percent Beast Megatron. It was more lighthearted,

more like goofy version of it. And so, like,

I I pitched the the deep and dark and, you know,

and made him more, you know, conversational,

you know, and well, well, well. I hit some of

the same tones, but it was a lot lighter and

a lot different. Then I had to do a talking parakeet,

which I can't do right now just because my throat's

a little raspy on it and dry. I did a talking

parakeet because they had a written -in role

for a talking parakeet. The director just looks

at me and the writer and goes, I don't know how

I'm going to do this. And I said, well, lucky

for you, I had an aunt who's still alive, but

she had a bird when we went to visit in Florida.

And she had a bird named Myron, and it would

talk. it wasn't a parrot it was like it was some

other kind of bird but it could talk like a i

don't know if it was a love bird or something

but yeah he would he would go you know and you

know and so like i i started doing that impression

and they were like there we go It was supposed

to be like a parakeet and I'm like, well, parakeet

don't really talk. They really don't. Yeah. And,

but they wanted it to talk. They wanted to say

just short things like, you know, never going

to stop, never going to stop, you know, and,

and things like that. So I just started speeding

it up and doing it like higher pitched. And then

there was a scene where I had to, uh, get vacuumed.

Like the bird got vacuumed up by accident. Cause

the kid's supposed to be cleaning the cage. And,

They're like, OK, I really don't know what to

do. So I. I said, well, I have this idea. And

the director's like, let's see how it goes. Of

course, you know, Mary is recording for it, too,

because she played my wife in the program because

I cast her that way. And there's this this scene

where our. imaginary son in the program like

the uh that's another kid's another kid not our

own but yeah plays our kid and he goes you know

vacuums him up and the bird's going you know

and and something to that degree and you know

a lot more squeaking and squeech squealing and

and things like that and i i did a quick you

know number of that and director is like it's

great i need it longer and so i'm like i'm like

oh and so i i immediately like just chug some

water gurgled it for a second you know and then

went at it and recorded a couple different takes

of it and and uh he's like throat hurt yet and

i was like yep and uh so i did that and there

was an instance where i had to play a scottish

character which i was trying to do scotty but

i was like he's not off like my impression of

him and james doohan's voice and uh star trek

are not authentic scottish accents like they're

they're just not uh because mine was an impression

of james doohan doing scotty you know a scottish

accent in star trek and i I was just this person

that wrote it was like, I want to see you do

the voice, Steve. And yeah, good luck. And I

was like, gee, thanks. And we didn't have access

to a Scottish actor. And they joked around like

they were going to hire somebody off fiber for

a hot minute there. And then which came to shove

that day. And they're like, I got to get it done

today. I don't have time to wait. What do you

got? Me being the overly critical one, I watched

a butt ton of YouTube videos to get the vocal

pattern and the cadence and the speech pattern

down. And I rewrote all of the dialogue for the

Scottish character so that I could say it exactly

how it needed to be said, like how they trim

the words, how they, you know, the cadence of

it, you know, and. it looked like a mess like

i couldn't even barely read it uh and when i

got down to it i'm like i have no idea what this

is saying at this point like because i translated

it in a sense and so i got in the booth and i

just started you know well how do we got you

know and just kind of added some of those lilts

in there and things and i i'd watched a ton of

them from voice dialect coaches on youtube and

and other people that are Scottish that were

watching, you know, like James Doohan and then

watching, um, I forget the other guy's name,

uh, that did Scotty and the reboot films. Uh,

you know who I'm talking about anyways. Uh, yeah,

my, my brain is having a hard time remembering

actors names anymore, but I, yeah, you know who

I'm talking about. And so anyways, they were

like, his was not too bad. His was a different

dialect, but it works. They were like, James

Doohan is not Scottish. And then they were talking

about Chris Pine doing a Scottish accent. Simon

Pegg, yeah. And so they talked about Chris Pine

doing a spot -on Scottish accent in a film on

Netflix. And, man, I can't remember. It was The

Outlaw King. And it was about Robert the Bruce.

I think I was supposed to be playing the same

character in this script. And I watched this

film four times and mimicked every time they

said something so that I could get the cadence

down and the voice down. Went in, recorded it.

I could probably replicate it if I tried, but

yeah, it's... Uh, it's very difficult. And then

I, I created another character like, uh, uh,

Ranger Bob, which was a take on Patrick Warburton

doing, uh, his role from Emperor's New Groove.

Oh, nice. Uh, crunk. Uh, yeah, the Kuzco that

Kuzco watched, you know, and squirrel squeaky,

squeaky, squeaky, squeaky, squeaky, squeaky,

squeak, you know? And so. I did this weird thing

with my throat the day of. We were doing a live

-action version of whatever this was, and the

character had never been seen before, never been

heard before, never been in anything. And they're

like, so here's the catch. You have to be the

Ranger character, but you have to do a voice

or something, and it's for 12 hours. Yeah, that's

a lot. I got the voice figured out when I was

driving to work at 730 in the morning. Same person

that wrote the Scottish thing wrote this. I knew

I was screwed. So they had the best intentions,

but still. So anyways, I went in and I was like,

this is what I got. And they were like, ooh,

like, you know, like that moment where you hear

David Kaye talk about, you know, the voice at

the control room, you know, all of them looking

around like. Yep. You know, dinosaurs looking

at each other like, Ooh, that's good. You know,

or Camille, uh, yeah, whatever. And, and so anyways,

I did the voice and I was, I later figured out

a better way of doing it without having to cause

the throat strain that I was doing, uh, before,

but I don't even joke. I got this voice figured

out. I could not get out of the voice. for 12

hours because I tried at one point during lunch

to talk normal and I lost the voice and I still

had like six hours left to shoot and I was like

alright I gotta go outside for a few minutes

I gotta go get this thing back and I listened

to my recording that I sent earlier in the morning

and I'm like how did I do this again and so now

this is the voice of Ranger Bob So he kind of

talks like this when he's talking and, you know,

the squirrelies and yeah. So I kind of evolved

it from Patrick Warburton to more my own thing.

And, you know, he's like, oh, affirmative, you

know, kind of like he's like some weird, goofy

military guy, but he's actually a park ranger.

And then there's literally like a scene in the

show that he. talks like a squirrel or doesn't

talk like a squirrel but he's like i gotta go

find my nature friends and see what the squirrels

are doing you know or something like that and

there was a whole mini series with him doing

like nature nuggets for kids or whatever and

like i came up with the premise and then i was

like okay now i gotta do the voice through all

of them yep absolutely all right switching over

to podcasting this this One is more of a diatribe

than anything else. But in the book, you chronicle

your podcasting journey, so we want readers to

be able to read it for themselves. But 20 years

later, did you ever think you'd have a network

with 20 or more podcast shows that equal over

4 ,000 episodes covering many different geeky

topics, of which the numbers are futsy with me

on this, but 85 % you're a voice on. Sounds about

right. No, I didn't think I would still be doing

this, to be honest. Not to mention the fact that

I, one, starting off with TFWire and doing 15

War Story episodes, doing an episode of PlayOn,

doing an episode of TFWire proper, and then doing

all things Transformers. brainstorming all these

other shows getting to collaborate with like

twig and tf anonymous and uh so many other different

you know what's on your mind and all these other

programs that i'm sure i'm forgetting quite a

few at this point um but no i didn't i didn't

see myself doing as many, like I I've probably

done more podcasts than what I can remember at

this point, including like, you know, the, the,

the kids podcasts that I produced, like I did

a number of those and I wrote a number of those

and those are dramatizations. And so those are

different. I did some for my kids, uh, school

spirit day for years. And, um, now weirdly enough,

I've been going around and I don't know if this

cuts into another question because I have no

frame of reference here. You devil. I weirdly

enough have been getting asked more and more

to speak and present on podcasting more locally

than anything else. But I do have another like

I actually have a like almost a webinar live

stream type thing awesome coming at the end of

september uh actually for uh a bigger organization

so uh then then just a local thing which don't

get me wrong i love doing the local thing and

i love talking to the kids as long as they're

receptive um but that's i'm super geeked for

that plus uh i like the community and the community

doesn't cost me anything to be in I'm actually,

I'm writing an article right now about podcast

associations. So that's, that's going to be a

fun one. I'm sure I'm going to burn some bridges

by accident, but I, I have some strong words

to say on that. But anyways, yeah, I, it's, it's

definitely been interesting and I've always dreamed

of writing a book. So this is something cool,

like getting to design it, getting to see it

in print form. I have multiple copies of my own

book sitting around. I have one in my display

cabinet now. Nice. I have one, which that's the

Barnes & Noble one, which I'm like, okay, that

one's my other proof copy that's in pristine

condition. My Amazon versions is not for resale.

um mike both my boys have read through or ian's

still reading through it um he loves the anecdotes

like he's i think he got bored he got bored when

the anecdotes ran out um because like he's he

he got stalled on chapter three and then he's

just kind of like i'll get back to it soon um

um he's like, cause he was asking me all kinds

of questions when he was going through like the

intro and the pro, you know, the, the prologue

and the, you know, chapter one, chapter two.

And so it was, it was, it was interesting going

through that, but yeah, I would have never seen

doing as many podcasts as I've done and writing

a book or getting to teach about it, which. oddly

enough, I enjoy, even though I'm not like this

award winning podcaster or, uh, you know, somebody

that's getting asked to these big events or,

or, or paying for these, these big, uh, uh, podcast

associations or, uh, you know, just because I

haven't done those particular things doesn't

mean I don't know what to do. Yeah. It's more

so. I don't have the time or the funds to do

what some of these people are, you know, getting

on the road running with. Uh, and it's because,

and again, that's why clear advice, real tools

and zero gatekeeping. That's, I'm not trying

to like, I'm not trying to lie to people in the

book and go, Oh, if you buy my book, you'll make

money. You'll be a big time podcaster. It's like,

no, it's like it's work. these are the tools

that I've seen. These are the evolutions of things.

These are the places to find what you need without

having to do like a bazillion Google searches

and try and find what actually works. And so

that was kind of my premise for this was like,

I want to help people figure out like, this is

easy street, like skim through, find what you're

looking for and not, not deal with like, cause

honestly you don't need the gear. it doesn't

matter. Like, I mean, you can record on your

phone nowadays. Like I've done it. I've recorded,

you know, conversing with you and Kai on discord

and not even had a microphone hooked up and it

sounded just fine. Yeah. So it's technology has

evolved. Things have gotten better. Like it's

no longer the, you know, the cracker Jack box,

uh, microphones of the, the lab tech days, which

is why they're gone. The lodge attacks, Mike's

sucked until they bought Yeti. And now they've

kind of, bastardize those too but i mean yeah

i mean that's that's kind of that that's why

i'm i'm a huge proponent for indie podcaster

not corporate podcaster yep absolutely all right

so after the recording of an episode of say all

things transformers or altered geek what is your

editing process like do you edit it immediately

do you edit it the next Whenever you have the

time to, how much time are you putting in these

days on the editing versus the old days? So the

old days, I will definitely say I put a lot more

time. But it was also different. So back in the

old days, we either recorded through Skype. Originally,

we both recorded on Audacity. And then we had

to sync up the files. audacity didn't play well

no with the stream and so we would have to chop

and cut and and audacity did not have multi -track

back then no so it was not fun uh you could easily

screw something up which is why i like the one

beverly hills cop episode with uh or die hard

with with dodd or mike birdman um that's why

that particular episode was like like whatever

was wrong with it like super slow or non -existent

audio um and then granted i listening back to

that because i list relisten to m wire 200 just

because i'm planning the revival yeah and i was

listening to it and i was like you know listening

back to this i know what happened I literally

know what happened, but I didn't know what I

didn't know back then. And so it was it one.

It was how it imported. But two, it was a setting

and audacity that neutered the file more or less.

And so but I mean, like and then looking back

at like, you know, our first interview with David

Kaye where we had the buzzing. Yeah, I could

run that through an AI filter now and clean it

up completely. Yeah. Like easily. easily but

i also learned how almost like eight years later

how to use the spectrographic cleanup and cleaned

the majority of it up anyway so i mean there's

with each you know amount of time that goes by

things evolve and get better and um I forgot

where I was going with the question, but... Things

evolve in time, and things get better over time,

and new tools. Yeah, I mean, I've just seen a

lot of stuff change. My editing, though, getting

back to the original question, back then it was

a lot more tedious, a lot more time -consuming.

I had the intro, I had the outro, which the outros

were fun and goofy for the time. You've just

listened to a podcast on the Geekcast radio network.

You can follow us in the following ways. On Facebook,

blah, blah, blah. Until next time, unleash the

geek in you. It doesn't work nowadays, but it

was funny back then. Kind of a staple of that

old era. and the gamer clans and that kind of

stuff. But I spent a lot more time doing it then,

and then when we started using Adobe Sound Booth,

I believe. That sounds about right. It was Sound

Booth before Audition. It had its own issues

with things. And I can't remember. There were

some goofiness things with that, too. I can't

quite remember all of it. I also had a version

that could run off of a flash drive at one point.

Damn. Well, it was like a mobile version that

I stumbled across. And I put it on because it

didn't need to install. You could just run it

right from the flash drive. Right. Yeah. And

so I used that for years because it was easier

when I was on the go or like when I was out somewhere

or like when I worked at the dealership, I had

I had a computer that I used in between, you

know, work and things that I had going on. Like

my lunches, I would I would literally edit on

lunch or I would edit college classes. And I

learned how to do all this stuff through that.

And then. uh, eventually got audition when they

phased out sound booth and audition was better

and had a lot more features and was just capable

of a lot more audio formats. Uh, whereas sound

booth wasn't like, I think it couldn't even run

a C files or something. Like it was just wave

and MP3 and M4A or something. And that was it.

Uh, and so when I got audition, like I started

building out, like now I have, I have prebuilt

templates for like all things Transformers and

the Cyber Dragon Ball and Altered Geek. And I

leave like the spot for the voice promo. I have

the spot for the intro. I have the spot for the

outro. And I, of course, like the outro, I drag

it depending on the length of the episode. But

I have them all on individual tracks. I have

them all with certain presets in Audition so

that I don't have to. finagle with it and then

uh and then i literally import from our our discord

recordings yeah the the multi -track so like

i get your audio my audio and then i put them

on different tracks and then just make sure like

i drag them to the beginning of the the time

frame making sure that they line up 100 and then

and then i move them further down past the intro

or like where the transition starts happening

yeah and uh So then I, then I kind of, I skim

it because generally if we're recording an episode,

I can tell if it's going to need editing. Yep.

I don't always take timestamps. Sometimes I should,

but if, if I notice something going AWOL on it,

I will look at the discord recording, see where

the timestamp is, make a mental note of it, you

know, on a notepad. And, uh, seek it out once

i've imported it into the multitrack but um for

the most part i listen to hear like i i have

the presets for audition in there where it'll

it'll level it it'll put a loudness filter it'll

it'll tweak certain other things and kind of

automate it um it's not ai it's just presets

podcast presets so it'll boost things they need

to be boosted and lower other things and uh i

have i have like 12 different presets depending

on what it is so i have music one i have like

podcast ones i have three different of those

and then i have other ones that i've used for

audio drama stuff that are variations and i've

tweaked different parts of it and then i i kind

of scrub through and if I know that there's a

bunch of ums or like sneezes or, uh, me clicking

the mouse. Cause oftentimes I'm multitasking

while I'm recording, uh, which I know that the

click, click, click, click, click, click, click,

uh, is super annoying to people. Cause I've,

I've gone back and actually listened to them

and I can tell where I'm paying attention and

where I'm not. Uh, and Amware 200. Oh no. I,

well, I was listening to them where 200 and I'm

like, okay i think i totally well i didn't edit

it you did so i wasn't actively paying attention

to what was going on like i mean i was paying

attention to the conversation but i think i was

playing star trek online oh i'm sure you were

because i was laid off and i was like it was

my i think my first layoff and i was like yeah

whatever yeah no no uh or maybe it was my second

layoff i don't know but it was it was funny regardless

and i i was listening to it i'm like okay i am

annoying uh no you're not no i meant the clicking

the click yeah i understand and and i'm gonna

say something here folks and he knows better

than this because i'm not trying to insult him

but oh my god i want five dollars for every um

i have to cut for me yes per episode And most

people will say, oh, but you can leave that in.

And I'm sitting here thinking, no, you can't.

There's a perfectly good way to sit here and

have a conversation and talk to someone. So they

do have software now. It's called Descript, and

it will scan and create a transcript of the entire

episode. And you can have it. find the verbal

crutches and remove them and it tightens up the

audio automatically how much does it cost and

is it i have no idea but it's it is a i know

they have a free version but i know that it uses

part of the cloud to uh filter it and to clean

it up but it does it does do that like it will

show you the transcript you can go through and

find all the ums or the uhs or the the other

double double word yeah verbal crutches and it'll

go through and it'll remove them all nice and

so they do have software out there uh i'm trying

out a new one from uh daniel j lewis right now

that i'm on the beta test for and i can't say

what the name of it is granted i don't remember

what the name of it is but it's fine it it helps

build chapters and it helps build like time for

like more of like a an outline of the episode

itself yeah so basically like when i said okay

this is the voice acting section this is the

podcasting section and then up next will be the

writing section yeah so i mean it'll it'll agree

yeah it'll do that and the id3 tags and the it'll

do all of that and it uses a little bit of ai

but a lot of the features are just like manual

yeah you you put you dump your file in there

it automates and it it does a lot of this stuff

I'm actually working and, and he's like, Oh,

I can't, I put it together in three weeks and

I'm like, okay, I know you used AI. So I, which

everybody's doing that. I've, I'm guilty of it.

I've, I've created a couple of, uh, I've created

a couple of the plugins for geekcastradio .com

using AI because one, I'm too cheap to pay somebody.

To, you know, more or less, it's if it's a subscription.

Yeah. And I need a simple feature and I need

it to work like it's not it's not something that's

like, oh, I'm going to have it generate me an

SEO app or I'm going to have it generate a podcasting

plug in or newsletter plug in or, you know, pass

keys or, you know, something something to that

degree. I'm not having it mess with because there

are better features out there. There's better

things that are more maintained, paid more attention

to. I don't pay attention to how WordPress functions

like it's just not in my wheelhouse. So this

particular one that I created, I ran it through

AI and I because we used to use like a featured

image plug in and it would. It was like, I forget

what it was called, but it was, it was for featured

images and it would allow you to quickly change

them based on category, or you could click on

it in the episode or the, the post list. And

I won the one that was available was getting

bigger and more bloated because we've been using

it. I don't know, 2012. Yep. like way back when

oh yeah because i you know we've changed websites

and i've i wanted something with like quick editing

and it got to be super bloated and there were

just more features and it got ad heavy and i

was like you know every time they add all these

ads it's slowing down the website but it's also

a security risk yep and so well yes i do have

Certain things, you know, Jetpack on their newsletters,

podcast importers from like Second Line, things

for the theme. I don't like I was going to have

it generate our own comments plug in. And I was

I was going through AI working it out with it.

And it literally told me out of the features

you're looking to have. this particular one is

the one you want. It's like, unless you want

to sit here and develop a brand new one, which

will take weeks to a month, you know, months.

Yeah. This is what you want. And I was like,

touche. I was like, you save me time. You save

me effort. If a better mousetrap works, you know,

is there, right. I'll, I'll go with it. Uh, anyways,

I created the, the, you know, a featured image

plugin, which is the only one that I have actively

running right now. I have some others. I'm, playing

around with and tweaking and messing with. But

this one, I got all the features I wanted. There's

no crazy dashboard, no crazy settings thing.

It's just literally, it works. And again, you're

using the artificial intelligence as a tool.

I'm using it as a tool to write the code. I'm

telling it what I want. And then I'm troubleshooting

it. I'm testing it. I'm seeing if it works. It

does what I want. And then I'm working on the

UI with it. Uh, but, and I'm developing a couple

other ones. I'm actually working on a, an actual

standalone program that I'm, because we're talking

about editing. It reminded me where I wanted

to automate all of these things, but where you

can drop in the raw files, it will slap on the

intro outro. It will, you know, things like that.

Like, but I don't, I want it as a standalone

program. where one you could plug it in with

an api through ai if you so chose yeah like transcripts

or things like that my main goal with it is 90

of these different things people want easy and

then also 90 of the things out there are subscription

an indie podcaster does not have the money no

I don't have the money. Like, I mean, I could

pay for it. Yes. But if I paid for every service

that had a subscription, it'd be like paying

for cable television. Pretty much. Yeah. So I'm,

I'm very, and as I've mentioned, I'm very indie

podcaster. I'm not for the corporate people.

I'm not for these people that are trying to sell

a product. Like, yes, I'm trying to sell a product.

My thing would be a one time. Oh yeah. I don't,

I don't, I want it to work. You know, it's like

level later. Yep. That thing doesn't exist anymore.

I mean, unless you have it. And it essentially

would also have that type of thing built into

it. But I'm not taking anybody's code. I'm not

doing it. I mean, I don't know where the AI,

you know, designs it. And I will say 60 % of

the time, the code don't work. Because I've had

that issue with even my WordPress plugin. And

it's very much a trial and error thing. And,

you know, when I get something that works, I

let it know. And then it tweaks it, troubleshoots

it. And, you know, we kind of build it collaboratively.

And so my goal is to create this thing where

it's like a one -time purchase and it's not like

stupid expensive. Yeah, I mean, there'll be a

kickback towards me on it. But, I mean, it's

not. It's nothing that's going to break the bank.

It's well under the price of a video game. Oh,

yeah. But again, just because it's a kickback

towards you, you're obviously going to then put

that back into the website or back into the production

cost. 100%. I mean, we're not out here making

money, folks. Like we said earlier, we've never,

never been doing this to make. buku bank of money

or anything like that or whatever i mean if we

ever made money great like if we ever got paid

collectively like you know yeah but i mean i

i'm also not under the flag of being like oh

we got bought by amazon we're wondering we're

also not gonna have jobs like yeah exactly yeah

so i mean it's that that kind of thing like i'm

trying to i i don't i don't love modern like

where modern podcasting is going because you're

getting all these like people trying to sell

a product all these fire these hothead corporate

people for these big corporations trying to sell

their product and trying to rip people off and

it's like dude just i mean that's that's again

that's why the book like i just yeah it's not

an expensive book it's not it gives you the keys

to stuff it's not a dummy's book where it's like

eight times the size of my book and and costs

you know 30 bucks or whatever like yeah i mean

mine's a fraction of the cost but it's this literally

will fit you know this is this is like a production

handbook that you can carry with you and it's

lightweight and yeah so absolutely all right

back to back questions here what is your favorite

type of podcast episode to listen to news storytelling

or review show It depends what it is. Okay, well,

storytelling specifically to give you something

like podcast approach or origins or something

like that where a story is being told. So they

all kind of boil down to am I interested in the

topic and am I going to learn something? Okay.

Because if I don't... if I don't find value in

the topic nature or, I mean, the guests matters

to some degree. Like I, I will fully admit there

are some origins people. I don't listen to their

episodes because I don't know who they are and

doesn't resonate. So there's one that there's

also the familiarity and like, do I know who

this is? Do I know what this is for? Like, you

know, I'll listen to, a review show a lot more

often but i also do listen to some new shows

like i there's some video shows on on youtube

that you know i'll listen to that i don't know

if they have a podcast component but i do listen

to some of them but i'll also go back and listen

to some of our old stuff because i'm i can't

honestly remember what we said It's like, you

know, the M wire 200. I didn't remember any of

that. Like, yeah, but I also recorded it forever

ago. And so it's, it's very much just one. I'm

getting older. My memory is not as great as it

once was. Plus I don't, I'm dealing with different

stress stuff in my life now that I didn't have

then. And granted, it's not as bad as back then,

but still. Uh, there's just more things occupying

it, but like I was relistening to, cause I was

sharing it with somebody on discord. I was relistening

to the 4 ,000th episode of all things, the overall

4 ,000th episode of the network. And in that

episode, I said, generally, if you tell me an

episode number of any of our podcasts that I've

been on, I can tell you what topic it is. Like

if you tell me tune cast episode, one well that's

the nintendo tunes if you tell me tooncast episode

10 that's he -man and shira like i can do that

kind of stuff but i couldn't tell you what in

the hell was said on that episode i would have

to actually go back and listen to it kind of

thing and uh and yeah but yeah i don't know i

think for me when it comes anyway uh so here

we go what is your the the opposite end of this

this question. What is your favorite type of

podcast episode to produce? Same thing. News,

storytelling, review show. I think they all kind

of tie into one at certain times. Kind of. Sometimes

they do. I like the news shows just to kind of

keep up on stuff. And then I also like the review

shows because, again, I can also do that. But

yeah, I, I don't know. I, I, I am, I'm a fan

of all of them to some degree. It just depends

on the topic nature. Yeah, absolutely. All right.

Two more questions in this category. Then we

get to the writing. What did you see as your

biggest challenge in podcasting 20 years ago?

And what do you see as your biggest challenges

today in 2025? 20 years ago. Hand coding the

website? That's right. I absolutely hated that.

And I tell people, do you remember the day when

you used to have to hand code your RSS feed?

Well, I do. I remember doing the art. I remember

doing the website. I remember having to manually

update the website because it wasn't automate.

I remember having to manually do the RSS feeds.

I remember having to. Yeah. And edit and then

somehow find time to be like, oh, I'm going to

produce more episodes. And somehow we recorded

like four to five to six episodes a week, sometimes

three a night. Yep. So that's how we recorded

four to five episodes a week. We would do three

a night. That's how we got. I honestly don't,

I don't know how I had the time for that. I mean,

granted different, different place in life, but

yeah, but yeah, I mean, it, it, it definitely

was a different, a different beast back then.

Nowadays, nowadays it's, It's mostly just finding

time to record. Yeah. I, I have all these ideas.

I have all these shows I want to do. Like I want

to do, I would love to get back to, to weekly

alter geeks or, and you know, all things transformers

and have more regular cadence with the cyber

dragon ball. Cause like I have the scripts written

for the next like two episodes of that. I'd like

to get time to do altered track or even edit

the episode that I have. And, uh, and, and I've,

I've even toyed around with, I was going to bring

back the internet pathfinder, but I was like,

you know, that shows so far dead and removed.

I'm better off doing a brand new show for altered

audio. Yep. And kind of going from there. Uh,

I also want to do the video show of M wire and

see if I can actually pull off a video show.

Yeah. Very cool. And so, like, I have all these

ideas and all these, like, projects I want to

do and not enough time to do them. Yes. Well,

when we get to the point of Altered Trek, we

definitely have to record a preamble intro for

that original episode we recorded because that

thing is sold at this point. And we're not rerecording

that episode. We just need to slap an intro on

it. Which I will. Yeah. Yeah. And one of these

days I'll actually get that episode done. It's

just, I, again, time I'm hoping my goal is to

get it done in the next couple of weeks because

I finally have the, the L cars, uh, segment.

So I have the, I have the next episodes, all

cars done too. I, I intentionally did the, well,

those, well, those I, I recorded with, I used

AI for those, but it was mostly because I was

looking for like, not the, not the text, but

like the vocals, because I was trying to get

like the computer, you know, the library computer,

uh, speech and yeah. Or as close to it as I can

get. Yeah. Yeah. So absolutely. All right. Final

question in this section for podcasting. What

is one piece of podcasting advice you want to

give the listeners that is not in the book? It's

like asking me if I remember what I put in the

book at this point, but mostly just if something's

exciting to you and something you, you feel like

isn't being covered by somebody else, there is

place for you. Like there's not, the podcasting

is not like, well, there's already 50 ,000 other

shows doing the same thing. Well, how many of

those are actually active, you know? And so it's,

it's, you know, do your research with it, but

there's, there's room for everybody. There really

is like, and everybody has a different opinion.

Everybody has a different perspective. Everybody

has a different interest or level of interest

of something, you know? there there's literally

millions of avenues and in, in directions and

perspectives that you could take it from. And

I, I'm, I'm in this, this group with our, our

podcast hosts, rss .com and the RSS space. And

I'm literally seeing different things that I

was like, Oh, I didn't, I didn't even think of

that angle. I didn't, that's a great idea. I

didn't think about that, you know? Cause it's

like, I, I literally, it just didn't occur to

me because we've always kind of done our status

quo and how we've done things. And, uh, I mean,

we've taken different angles and evolved them,

but, but it's still different because we didn't

think of it like these people did. Yeah. There

are some things we were groundbreaking and doing

before other people took it on like the beast

wars podcast or, you know, a lot of the review

content. Yeah. Uh, that's why we were big until

like, close to 2016 when it kind of, the bubble

burst and everybody got in and then it got big

again during COVID. Yeah. And then that bubble

burst again because a lot of people that got

involved with it jumped off after. Yeah. Yeah.

Cause everybody was at home and everybody didn't

have anything to do. And there, everybody found

podcasting. It was like, Oh my God, we can just

sit at home and talk to each other. Oh shit.

Sherlock. But yeah. Yeah. All right, time to

get into the writing. So just to give a little

preamble here, folks, we know this interview

is all about the Steve, but background here on

me, I've been writing for 31 years. I was 14

years old when I first started writing back in

1994. Many different things. I considered myself

a writer before a podcaster, and now I'm obviously

a podcaster and a writer. And I'm saying all

this in order to ask you, Steve, have you ever

had you ever had the writing bug? Were you a

voracious reader as a kid? Because that's what

got me into wanting to be a writer. I read a

lot of books as a kid in the 80s. So what got

you into the whole writing thing? So in the 90s.

I used to read a crap load of books. I burned

through books like no other. My mom took me to

use bookstores. Uh, I had, I had a couple of

shelves. I, she had like, I mean, we had kids

books galore, like in, in our, our bedroom with

a bookcase my dad built and it was pretty hefty.

I mean, it was probably about four foot. It's

probably like four foot wide by like five foot

tall, full of books that we had. They were all,

you know, you know, your your classics or your

Disney or your, you know, various stuff that

you get from the Scholastic or the book fair

or things like that. And my mom has some of that

stuff still. And my brother has the rest of it.

And I got some of the books. And so I had, you

know, Power Rangers, G .I. Joe. I had. buttload

of comic books that were coming I loved Star

Trek back then and read all of the pretty much

any book that had to do with Kirk or the books

written by William Shatner for Star Trek I had

and I read the I read them all and they were

you know like three three hundred and four hundred

page books and I would take them to school. I'd

read them. So I had a huge vocabulary, at least

while writing. Vocally, I don't speak as intelligently

as I write. And there's oftentimes I write a

word down. I have no idea what it means, but

I know it fits in the sentence. And I know that's

the right word. I just, you know, I can't define

it or know what it is. But it's somewhere in

my brain where it's like, no, this is right.

I'm telling you. And I'll look it up and I'm

usually like 99 % of the time it's it fits. But

no, I used to I used to read a ton of those books.

I used to go to the bookstore. I used to get

comics. I used to watch, like I said, a crap

ton of animation and film and television series

and all these different storylines floating around

in my brain. I'd play with. uh the action figures

and the lego and i'd build my own scenarios my

own storylines then i started writing my own

and recording them on uh video which i the the

timing of this is so ironic i i was digging through

my desk looking for something the other day i

can't remember what and i found these old home

videos that my brother had transferred from vhs

to dvd nice and like we have like we we have

like our like our christmas one from like 89

to 96 and then we have like a general one which

was like i don't even know what's on it from

but from 89 to 91 just random stuff with like

one of those old sylvania yep camcorders that

are yep huge and then there's another one that

says steve's home videos which is from 94 to

97 which butts right up against time of star

trek generations coming out and my parents getting

a divorce since we had the basement converted

into a makeshift enterprise bridge oh wow so

we put masking tape on the floor for the transporter

we had you know a pool we had a air hockey table

we had a tv which And then we had a computer

system which I had the red alert sound recorded

from the TV. And then I had created my own graphics

for the red alert on the screen. And we had a

computer chair that looked like the Enterprise

A's computer, you know, the captain's chair.

Of course, my brother's got the crappy chairs

and I got the nice one. just nature of the beast

and, you know, dressed in the stuff and had all

these weird storylines going on. And then there's

other ones where I know I'm recording in front

of a, uh, like stories that I wrote on paper

or a typewriter or word processor, uh, that I

would read in front of the camera. And yeah,

it'll be interesting to go back through that.

Cause I've, like I said, I have no idea what's

on it, but. It'll be fun. Very cool. Very cool.

How would you define your writing style for altered

audio and beyond this first book? Uh, very conversational,

very kind of anecdote, very, I used a lot of

plain English and, you know, in some regards,

some metaphors and, uh, spelling it out for people.

More or less, I'm being very frank with people,

very open. It's like, you've got a voice. Use

it. Here comes the part most creators dread,

where most of the magic happens post -production.

That's right. It isn't just about cleanup. it's,

it's, you know, a lot of mindset stuff. It's

a lot of like reframing how you're, you're thinking

about things and, you know, it's kind of showing

that, you know, I, a lot of the, the content

is fly by the seat of your pants. See what works.

Pivot. Yep. Cause I mean, I even named drop,

you know, ATTF, ultra geek, M wire. you know

even the you know i even touch on like burnout

yep absolutely it's like and why you came back

you know you know the the podcast feed quieted

you know life got loud mike sat still until listeners

spoke up you know miss your voice is all three

all things transformers coming back your show

helped me through a rough patch you know I was

like, I didn't relaunch for the metrics. I did

it for the connection, for the conversation.

We've never done this for the metrics. No, I

mean, I don't give a rip. If people love it and

listen to it, the metrics show that it's resonating,

great. I'm still going to record an episode.

Exactly. It doesn't mean that you can't evolve

or get better with your craft. It's just... making

sure that what you're putting out there is better

or resonating or giving somebody something entertaining

to listen to and, you know, educational, giving

them a piece that makes them a part of the conversation.

That's, and that's why I started podcasting.

It's because I enjoy the conversation. I enjoy

geeking out with other people. It's why I kind

of wanted to do this in the first place. Plus,

I've always wanted to be on radio. Now that I've

worked in marketing, I realize I don't want to

work in radio. Podcasting has always been the

new radio for me. It is. That's what I mean.

I'll do podcasting because I can't get fired

from that. Because we run the show. Exactly.

That's kind of where I'm going with that. Exactly.

How did AA begin? What was the initial outlook

at it? The idea for it? Yeah. It started because,

honestly, it was in the RSS space for our podcast

hosting company. And I was getting asked some

of the same questions over and over. And then

I had people in real life asking me that. Okay.

A lot of stuff. And then I've been going to a

lot of stuff speaking publicly. And I'm like,

you know... I've been writing a lot of articles.

I've been making a lot of posts. I've been dropping

a lot of little nuggets of information. I should

probably put this in one place. Yep. There you

go. And so I was like, I need to put this all

together. And when I started writing it, a lot

of it was... I had a lot of redundancies in places

like I had chapters going and there were some

redundancies between chapters. And I was like,

I was like, cause like I did use some AI, but

it was mostly layout. Yeah. And I was like, where

am I repeating this? Where can I, you know, where

can I make it more concise or like. can I merge

this with this and have it still make sense?

Cause like, I was trying to wrap my head around.

I'm like, both are great information. However,

don't need to re say the same thing in two chapters.

Yep. And so I was able to, like, it was like

telling me how I could reframe it. And I was

like, okay, so I can put it here and I can do

this with it. And I can, you know, so it was

able to make it cohesive. on on my own and it

was great uh being able to to throw a lot of

that in there and like i i a lot of it was just

kind of making sure i had a place to put it because

like i've i've probably i've i've forgotten more

than i'll remember on podcasting and like i was

taking like articles i wrote from years ago and

uh, on podcasting and on audio editing in general.

Uh, because I've, I've done both sides of it.

Like I, I, I have a media degree and then I have

a slideshow that I was using for my, for my,

my speaking engagements. And a lot of that's

in here. Like, and then, uh, a lot of the resources.

A lot of the different types of stuff. Like I

was, I was just honestly trying to put it all

in one spot because again, I don't, I don't remember

stuff very well. Yeah. Well, you kind of answered

sort of the next two questions, but I'll say

them anyway. After you had the kernel of the

idea, how did you refine and polish it? And then

what was the formatting process like? Formatting

was interesting because each platform has a different

one. Amazon, Kindle Press, or KDP Press, it has

one style. And then Barnes & Noble Press has

a different. IngramSpark has a slightly different

one. And then the Kindle, like the e -book, you

had to convert in a certain way. And every time

I tried to do it one way, it kept throwing off

the formatting. Funny enough, I was able to because

I built all this in a Word document. I started

off in a Google doc and it was just coming out

weird. And so I was like, I need to do this in

Word proper. And so I was just I was formatting

it, making sure it's spaced right, doing the

page breaks. And then I had to learn that you

because I have the specialized font for the logo

for altered audio and, you know, the cover page

on the inside. It. I figured out how you embed

fonts into the file. Which I didn't know how

to do before, and I had to Google it and then

building the table of contents was was interesting

because, I mean, it's got an automated thing

and it goes by like the headlines and. the or

the headers like h1 h2 h3 that kind of stuff

and then the cover that was a colossal pain oh

no well i designed the one i i asked ai to create

me a cover logo this is not ai created right

um but i did it because i was trying to narrow

down what i was going for right and so i was

describing it and i was kind of doing it And

as you know, with AI, every time you ask it something

or every time you refine one little piece somewhere

and tell it to leave everything else the same,

it does not. So I would have it tweak something

and then it would screw something else up. And

then I'd have it tweak something else and it

would screw something else up. And at first I

was going to cheat and just let AI just make

the artwork. And then I started getting irritated.

And I'm like, this is not what I want. This is

not what I want. and it showed me one good copy

at one point with the overall like shape and

design, but a lot of the colors were wrong or

the fonts were wrong or the, but it gave me like

the structure of how it should look. Right. And

so I, I was able to put it all together. I actually

think the waveform that's on it is the only thing

that's AI generated. Wow. The, the, the neon

microphone that's from the geek cast radio logo

that I created for that altered audio is just

a different variation of the font of altered

geek. Originally I was going to use the altered

geek font, but I was like, eh, it doesn't quite

fit. It just looks weird. Yeah. And then podcasting

demystified like it, I was going for the same,

you know, font. Then I wanted a clean font, which

I think it's future for the rest of it. And then

I put the GCR and logo and then the binder, the

binding part of it was, kind of strange like

my name centered podcasting demystified is almost

centered and then the microphone is not centered

on the binding which whatever it's it's a first

edition i'm sure i'll have another one later

yeah but and then i had to figure out how to

put the about the author and you know leave room

for the upc code because in the templates it

doesn't tell you where to put it yeah they just

insert it wherever and i could have you know

But what's funny is between my Barnes & Noble

version and my Amazon version is the Barnes &

Noble one came out better. Binding -wise. Wow.

On the covers. I think I had to do a slight tweak,

but the Amazon one doesn't... The other thing

I was kind of disappointed is Amazon does not

take care of the book when they ship it. Oh.

as well as Barnes & Noble. Barnes & Noble had

this thing in a cardboard box. Yep. Packed in

there tight. It was not going to get bent, no

matter what you did to it. The Amazon one, not

for resale, was in good condition before my son

got a hold of it. Okay. But it seems to get the

scratches and a little bit of the dings a little

bit easier than the other one. I've gotten since

two more from Amazon because I'm going to be

shopping those around locally just to see if

I can get them in the store. But the process

was different. But I had to use a third -party

website to convert the PDF of the thing for an

EPUB file for the Kindle. Because the software

that came with the Kindle was just a nightmare

to deal with. Like, cause you, you have to use

their software if you want to convert it or you

can upload a finished file. And I was like, I'm

not doing this. I sent him a finished file and

it worked. So yeah, I learned different things

through different publishers. Like I get more

of a cut if it's direct from Amazon or Barnes

and Noble .com. If it's the higher priced version

of the same book. on IngramSpark, which, again,

it publishes to both of those places. So, I mean,

I could have just done it through IngramSpark

from the start. But the problem with it is I

don't get much of it cut from the IngramSpark

version, which is funny. That's weird. So, yeah.

That's very weird. Well, you've talked about

the formatting. You've talked about the self

-publishing process and things like that and

how easy or difficult it was. So how did you

approach this knowing everything? Did you approach

it knowing everything you wanted it to be? Or

was it a project that changed over the time as

you created it? It slowly changed. I honestly

wasn't sure how much was going to go into this.

And every time I thought I was getting closer

to being done, I would have a conversation with

somebody in the RSS space. And then I was like,

oh, another nugget. Oh, I would, I would write

out all these, like these different things are,

you know, articulating something. And like, I,

I literally, I crap you not dude. I probably

have another like 10 to 15, maybe even 20 pages

worth of stuff saved in another document for,

to incorporate for a second edition of this book,

which means the next one will probably come out,

you know, next year or something. Like I'm not

going to release them as close together. coming

august 2026 might even be sooner it might be

like may or june but but you know what i mean

but yeah but i'll i'll probably have a second

edition of the book yeah i'll probably tweak

some of the covering i'll probably tweak you

know to more or less differentiate it from v1

to v2 yeah and uh i i definitely have more stuff

to add to it i was like Part of me was like,

do I hold off on releasing and just put these

in there? Or what do I do? What's the best method

here? Do I just continue with my original plan

and just save these for V2? Or do I pump the

brakes on it and put them in there? And I'm like,

well, if I do that, then I'm probably going to

be pushing it out another month. I would just

wait for V2. Yeah, I was like, honestly, there's

gonna be enough stuff that changes. I'm probably

going to have to redo some of what's in this

book now, because even one of the newsletters

that one of the podcast newsletters I dropped

in here by Chris Peterson download. He just sent

out an email today saying that he's done with

his newsletter because he got picked up by another

organization in podcasting. So, so like literally

like that information is outdated. Yeah. But

I mean, I have other things I would put in here,

like, you know, podcast conventions or podcast

associations, audio dramas. Like, I mean, there's,

there's probably another like 20, 30 pages worth

of stuff I get thrown in here now, but it was

stuff I forgot about. Honestly, like I forgot

about podcast conventions. I, I forgot about,

you know, producing audio dramas i forgot about

you know which is funny because i worked in it

for three and a half years and exactly but i

mean but i was i think it was so focused on the

indie aspect and the fact that like these are

your different avenues these are your different

you know playgrounds yep uh like i'm i'm having

a conversation like i'm doing another teaching

engagement with you know fifth and sixth graders

this week and i'm doing one with i'm having a

conversation with a guy this week about you know,

podcasts and like the, the conversations about

like podcast hosts, guests and sponsors and stuff

like that. So I'm having a conversation about

that during my lunch tomorrow. So, yeah, I mean,

it's, it's just lots of different, lots of different

doors have opened one between the book and two

for the fact that I'm just very ingrained in

the podcast sphere right now with helping people.

Just no charge, no nothing. Just your stuff.

Yep. Very cool. Very cool. All right. So final

question. What advice do you have for authors

of this type of book of podcasting or of just

like the, the, the tips and tricks and the, the

way that you formatted your book and just Because

this is not a novel. This is more of a guide.

It's a non -fiction guide. Yeah, so what would

you say to authors of that type of book? Don't

make it difficult. I mean, yeah, you can have

diagrams and different stuff in there. I wasn't

going to go through all that extra to create

a... dummies book. Cause like, I mean, if you

want a dummies book, get a dummies book. Like

I'm not trying to be a dummies book. Yeah. I

also don't like dummies books because it's information

overload. It's a lot of times like over explaining

something. It gives you the information, but

it's honestly like it, I feel like it just kind

of, a lot of these books are too much. Yep. And

so like, to me it's just, Make it simple. Make

it something you want to read. Like, honestly,

that's the easiest explanation I can give you.

Yep, absolutely. All right, folks, you've waited

the whole interview. You've waited the whole

episode for me to ask him this. Where's the audio

version? Yeah, I've had a few people ask me that

one. Oh, we've talked about this off air. and

I've given him a couple of ideas, but after I've

read the book, it's not that he doesn't want

to do, and he'll say this himself, but it's not

that he doesn't want to do the audio version.

It's that it's more so after I've looked at the

book, I see why he says it's not really. The

book itself is not translatable into audio. Basically,

what I think he could do is take all of the anecdotes

and all of the actual written sections of it

where he's talking about his experience, which

is what I think you said you are planning on

doing, is doing some sort of altered audio podcast

version. Right? Isn't that what you said? Yeah,

I mean, I was thinking about just doing a podcast

and kind of covering specific topics. Right.

And my thought to you was, oh, you could basically

do all of you could do that podcast, edit all

of that together. Boom. Audiobook version. More

or less. More or less. So, yeah. So altered audio.

podcasting demystified by Steven C Phillips.

Where can they get the book? How much is it?

And all that good stuff. So they can get it on

amazon .com and barnesandnoble .com. They can

request it at their local bookstore or local

library. They can order it because no, there's,

there's a stigma with amazon .com that bookstores

and libraries do not want to buy it from Amazon.

Don't know why. Just. i i'm not getting into

why or because i honestly don't know but they

do like the fact when it's on barnesandnoble

.com or ingram spark which i have it on both

so you can get it for the ebook for 9 .99 on

amazon you can get the direct print print on

demand which honestly i think is more economical

in today's age it's like why you have a bunch

of books sitting around when they're probably

just going to shelf warm point in case I went

to Barnes and Noble and I've seen 10 different

editions of Microsoft office for dummies that

are dating back to 2016. Oh my God. Like they,

and they're still sitting on the shelf like 2016,

2017, 2018, 2019, 2020. And they're all with

faded yellow color. my son was like how do you

know it's it was in the sun and i says well this

bookshelf must have been over there at some point

he's like how do you know and i said flip the

book over and it was like bleached yellow like

almost white because it was sitting in the sun

so long in colorado sun and the other side was

pure yellow for the dummies book so i was it's

more economical anyway uh you can get it on barnesandnoble

.com for and amazon .com for 15 .99 uh you can

also There is a $17 .99 version, which is the

IngramSpark publication on both platforms. But

again, that one doesn't give me as big of a kickback.

But if you want to pay $2 more, great. But yeah,

it's out on all those platforms. It came out

August 8th. And yeah. Very cool. Very cool. All

right, folks. Before we let you go, remind the

listeners where they can find you online and

all that good stuff to interact with you on the

interwebs. Well, I'm still on the Twitters at

SCP 21. I will never call it X because it's a

stupid name. It's just a letter. It's just a

letter. It's not even a name. It's a letter.

It's lazy. I'm also on. like Instagram and, uh,

blue sky, blue sky threads, like Steve Phillips,

VO, uh, currently trying to redo my website,

uh, to also include, but my, uh, my link tree

at SCP 21 has links to literally everything.

So very cool. All right, folks. We hope you enjoyed

this episode of Geekcast Radio. I wish you'll

join us next time when we will be doing something.

I don't know. I have no idea. So, for now, I

am TF2 and Mike with... Steve Megatron. Thank

you for listening. Until next time. Oh, yeah.

And unleash the geek in you. This is Kevin Conroy.

And I am the goddamn Batman. You've just heard

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