In Which I Solo on the Air

Just before last week's episode of Spellbreakers, Patrick sprung the idea of my doing the show on my own at times when he was unable to do it. In fact he'd canceled two of the three previous episodes, including the one right before the aforementioned Badlands conference as he was traveling. Instead we had showed unconscious to fail to do the show. I was determined that even though I was a newbie at streaming at age 58, and had brought no previously existing fanbase to Badlands as had most of the other show hosts, I could outlast any of the youngsters if I wanted. 

Yesterday before this week's show, Patrick followed through on this idea, sending me text messages telling me he wanted to teach me how to run the platform that we use for multicasting streaming, called Streamyard. As I had learned, using Streamyard allowed one to broadcast to multiple platforms at once, such as Youtube, Rumble, Facebook, etc. Of course we cannot broadcast to Youtube, as Badlands has been banned there because of the topics we cover.  Instead we have become of the biggest channels on Rumble, just as Rumble has taken off as a home for dissident refugees like us.

I'd been using Streamyard for the show since starting in January, but I didn't know much of the details of how it worked, as Patrick had set up each week's broadcast. Now I got a tour behind the scenes by his adding me as an admin to his premium account. It was like seeing the cockpit controls of airplane. He whizzed through the tutorial with me furiously trying to absorb the details and taking scrawling notes. In just ten minutes I was to be on the air by myself. He would listen into the broadcast this week just in case it went south.

My main goal of being on the air by myself, with over a thousand people listening to me live at once, and more thousands to follow from the recording, was to get through it without technical issues. In fact I shared my seven goals with the audience at one point in a Keynote slide:

1. Get through the show without audio and video issues that compromise the broadcast.

2. Fulfill my duty in promoting the sponsors (I love this part).

3. Make Badlands look good.

4. Discuss current events and other content pertinent to the topic of the broadcast and theme of our show.

5. Be entertaining to the audience.

6. Interact with the listeners in the live chat at some point (this is perhaps the toughest part).

7. Make Patrick look like a genius for trusting me to do this.

I mentioned that #5 is the golden rule. If one is entertaining--even in a disaster--then all else is forgiven.

Here then is my solo effort, if you care to listen to it. And make sure to hit the Like button, even if you hate it!