Battlestar Wiki talk:Think Tank/Audio Project

Comments and Discussion

Great idea! It might be of great benefit if we can identify one or more actual users who could take advantage of this, so that it can be implemented in a way that is useful to them (and not how we THINK it would be useful to them). There is likely a template to eventually be developed that could link to the audio of a page (or otherwise navigate to the audio), indicate that the page does have an audio version, and possibly indicate versioning/etc. so that the audio people would be able to identify clips that are out of date so that they can be updated. (This audio was created from Version XYZ.) To such an end, it might be useful if the recording were done in sections where appropriate, so that a particular section could be updated instead of having to redo the whole article. I'm not sure about the usability implications of that, though.

Any ideas on where we could id some audience members? Would this (if approved) merit a Skiffy broadcast seeking interested parties (if we don't get banned for "advertising").

Also the Podcast project volunteers to transcribe all the audio clips. And... *waits a beat* we're done. Whew. That was tough. --Steelviper 12:00, 21 August 2006 (CDT)

That's a good idea. We can do it like the podcasts. If we are to use the podcast method, we would have an mp3 for each section, then there's an overall mp3 that combines them all. I rather like that. -- Joe Beaudoin ^{So say we all - Donate} 12:24, 21 August 2006 (CDT)

Not a bad idea. However I do see a problem. I being doing templates for a while, and I would think this would be a problem. Inside the "header" we would have to place the template. This could potenially make the TOC very cumberson. We could do both. Overall and Sectioned audio files. I can make the templates refer back to the "diffid" that they were spoken of so people can go back and compare versions so they can see how out of date it is. However, I would like to see the project and orginized over at the "media" wiki since it's an "upload". We should for sure though add a *beep* after each section. (Darn. I wish I had a good enough mic). Anyone suggest a "test" article once we get this off the ground? I suggest Elosha. One more thing... we should not read the "infoboxs" or "captions". Just the stright text. Forget external links sections. Offical statements. etc. Stuff that is not from us. Questions? No. They change to much.

How would we do episodes because they are not in prose format. They are items. --Shane ^{(T - C - E)} 03:12, 22 August 2006 (CDT)

mp3 v. ogg

• mp3 - Very large; Can play almost anywhere even iPods
• ogg - Smaller File Compacted; Need custom codecs to listen.

--Shane ^{(T - C - E)} 03:12, 22 August 2006 (CDT)

I would prefer mp3 because its more versitile, but i can see why the ogg format has many pro's. I however have an iPod so cannot listen to ogg files apart from on my pc. --Mercifull ^{(Talk/Contribs)} 03:25, 22 August 2006 (CDT)

Wikipedia uses ogg for philosophical reasons that I don't hold particularly dear. From a practical standpoint, mp3 is the obvious choice. --Peter Farago 12:57, 22 August 2006 (CDT)

MP3 requires the (generally) $$$ codec in order to encode into mp3, but once it is in that format it is pretty much the accepted format for audio interchange. As long as our "readers" have a means of producing that format, then I'd favor mp3. --Steelviper 13:08, 22 August 2006 (CDT)

There are free mp3 encoders. The problem I don't know of any recorders that go directly into mp3 format. it might have to be a WAV to mp3. Maybe we should ask RDM how he does it. :) --Shane ^{(T - C - E)} 13:11, 22 August 2006 (CDT)

Well, he does have a digital voice recorder. it already encodes in mp3, as most of them do, so I don't think he really does anything other than send the files off to Sci-Fi's webmaster. Oh, and as for mp3 vs. ogg, mp3 is obviously the more logical choice as ogg is more of a hassle than mp3. (Do also keep in mind that we don't have to record the voice in high quality, as the human voice doesn't really have too much in the way of range, particularly when reading text out loud.) -- Joe Beaudoin ^{So say we all - Donate} 14:29, 22 August 2006 (CDT)

Podcast Hosting

Can't we technicily also store the podcasts already on the wiki if we wanted to?. there open source. We can convert them to the ogg format. --Shane ^{(T - C - E)} 14:51, 21 August 2006 (CDT)

I don't know if the podcasts are open source (our transcriptions are "fair use", and they're publically available, but I believe they're copyrighted material). Besides, if scifi is willing to host them, I'm not sure what value we'd add by hosting our own copies... --Steelviper 15:00, 21 August 2006 (CDT)

Reduncency in-case they disappear. Two, Three years after a show they might get rid of them. --Shane ^{(T - C - E)} 15:12, 21 August 2006 (CDT)

The podcasts are copyrighted, unless otherwise noted. I would imagine that if we obtain permission to host them then we'll be ok. But let's get back on subject here, shall we? -- Joe Beaudoin ^{So say we all - Donate} 15:15, 21 August 2006 (CDT)

Would it not be a good idea for somebody to save all the podcasts on their HDD just incase? --Mercifull ^{(Talk/Contribs)} 03:24, 22 August 2006 (CDT)

Obviously, a personal archive would be a good idea. The issue here isn't so much archiving to your hard drive, CD or whatever storage medium, but rather distributing the podcasts through the wiki itself. -- Joe Beaudoin ^{So say we all - Donate} 14:30, 22 August 2006 (CDT)