Fifty podcasts is not a lot for most podcasts. But from the beginning we decided to use podcasts from outside CITIZENShift and outside the walls of the NFB. This means I can’t just pick up the flash recorder every week and record whatever I want, because we’re looking for podcasts by people who perhaps normally wouldn’t be podcasting - people who are engaged in their communities and have something they want to say about a particular issue that’s affecting them.
It’s pretty astonishing really - the breadth of issues on the podcast over the last year and a half. Here are some personal favourites:
What’s next? A lot more video, for one thing. Everyone’s buzzing about video these days. And seeing as it’s what we do best here at the Film Board, we’re happy to oblige. So we’re aiming for over 50 per cent video content this year.
Which raises a question - should we split the RSS feed into a video stream and audio stream - or keep it all together?
We’re also a proud partner in the Rabble Podcasting Network - so check out all the great podcasts they’ve got cooking over there.
Finally, we’re always very excited about collaborating with media-makers - so if you have socially engaged audio or video content that you’d like to see on CITIZENShift, email me at m DOT forsythe AT nfb DOT ca. Hope to hear from you soon…
A Promise is a Promise is a moving film about Sheremet and Musa, two boys from war-torn Kosovo who, with the help of one Canadian soldier, made their way to Canada.
A Promise is a Promise won the CITIZENShift Award (Best Social Issues documentary) at the Toronto Student Film Festival. In this week’s podcast, Denise Hastings interviews the director of the film, Jaime Gianopolous, about the making of the film.
This week, Darren Ell interviews American physician and heart specialist, Dr John Carrol about the health conditions in Haiti with a focus on conditions in the impoverished neighborhood of Cité Soleil.
Cité Soleil is often the focus of intense scrutiny because of its terrible poverty and its unwavering support for Jean-Bertrand Aristide, the democratically-elected President overthrown in the 2004 coup d’état .
People just don’t have enough to eat, so in the very poor areas in Port-au-Prince, such as Cité Soleil, they have something they make called teh, which means, earth. And what it is, is mud - from the ground - mixed with salt and butter. They mix it by hand and turn it into five-inch-diameter patties that harden up in the sun… and people eat these.
- John Carrol
John has been working as a physician in Haiti for twenty-five years. In the interview, Carrol describes the state of Haiti’s infrastructure and its devastating impact on the health of the country’s citizens.
Cut-line: the soil in Cité Soleil is riddled with garbage and toxic water that washes down from Port-au-Prince to the seaside slum during the rain.
The soil in Cité Soleil is riddled with garbage and toxic water that washes down from Port-au-Prince to the seaside slum during the rain. (Photo: Darren Ell)
It’s a very straight-forward resource, written in plain language that lays out all the copyright issues podcasters should be aware of: when you can use music; what is fair dealing? how to license your material appropriately; things to beware of when using video and images; and more.
