THE BEST SHOW ON WFMU WORLD DOMINATION SCHEME, PHASE ONE. YOUR IDEAS HERE!

[yesno]

I think that Jon from Maplewood's idea is pretty good.  But there doesn't need to be a whole second podcast per week. 

A lot of the clips that are already on friendsoftom.com and other places... Martin would be helpful... could be put out as a podcast.  They could be kept around, so that new people can download the archives (the way you can with Jesse Thorn's podcasts), instead of expiring in a few weeks the way the current podcast's archives do. 

This intro, baby steps podcast, in addition to having the funny phone calls, could also have Tom rants, interviews, GOMPs, etc-- the whole flavor of the show.  A couple of clips would be added to it per week, but the purpose would not be to be a normal podcast, but just to get people hooked, like special powder on funnel cake.  Also, this is something that the FOTs could put together, although I don't know what bandwidth might cost.

I think it would be a pretty good way to increase people's awareness of the Best Show and move it a few steps closer to its inevitable ascendence to the top of the mountain (in popularity... in quality it got there long ago).  As it stands the Best show is sort of like the Ulysses of radio comedy, and a lot of people are scared off by the depth of the thing, or they listen to a random episode, don't get it, and move on, not really understanding what it's supposed to be.  (I'm not sure I would have been able to get into the show before the advent of the People's Theme, which at least gave me an idea that the show was really deep, had a weird community and a lot of stuff it would take me a while to get my head around.  Luckily I was exposed to the show at a time in my life when I was willing to do just that.)

[Jimmy]

I think this sounds great.  I am sure a lot of people are willing to help, but aren't sure in which way to help.  I think we need someone knowledgeable in computer/internet things to oversee everything.

[JonFromMaplewood]

Before Tom heave ho'd me (or is it heaved ho?), I was going to offer to help.  I have Soundforge, love the show, and would completely help in this type of project.  As the fourth Ghostbuster said, "We have the tools, we have the talent!"

But the reason I thought Tom would reject the idea outright - more so than the effort - was that perhaps he wouldn't like the idea of putting the show into "children's chewable" form.  If they can't handle 2.5 hours of Best Show, then screw 'em.  If he doesn't feel that way, then I am more than willing to help.

[Bryan]

I also think this is a good idea. It takes a particular kind of listener to jump right in to the deep end of the swimming pool.

Tom's "Heave Ho" had my wife giggling for about fifteen minutes.

[perry]

I think this is a great idea.  I wanted to call in to console tom; he shouldn't be upset that he's not up there in the list of podcasts because i think most people who love the show love to listen live.  and if they miss the show, theyll listen on the podcast maybe, but the problem with the current best show podcast setup is that they only go back to last year.  people probably figure, "why get the podcast on itunes if i can just go to the archives and listen to any show i want?". 

i think yesno has a great idea of adding clips and stuff to the podcast to get people hooked on the show.  the biggest thing keeping people from the show (in my opinion) is when people hear that it's three hours of talk radio, they think there's no chance of it not getting boring.  what got me into the show, of course, were the wurster calls, and once people get that, then it's a lot easier for them to listen to the show.  when i first started listening to the whole show live, i was always waiting for wurster to call in, and that made me listen, but then the whole feel of the show takes you over and you start to love EVERYTHING about it.  the problem is getting people into it, because once you're into it, you can't stop.  at this point, i probably know more about newbridge's history than my own city's.

so over all, i think it's a great idea to try to get ALL of the episodes in podcast form, or at least put up clips of stuff that will help people learn more about the "in-jokes" and the history of the show, since it IS a little hard to just turn on any given best show and know what's going on.

[iAmBaronVonTito]

From my understanding, the best way to get the word out publicly is to oversaturate.  something that can be very easily done, and very cheaply done, would be flyers, stickers, etc. and post them all over town with the BS or FOT website on them. 

[Bryan]

From my understanding, the best way to get the word out publicly is to oversaturate.  something that can be very easily done, and very cheaply done, would be flyers, stickers, etc. and post them all over town with the BS or FOT website on them. 

Sure, but people still need a way in. Something easily digestible that will give them an idea of the way the show works.

[perry]

i'm fairly new to the show, i've been listening religiously for about a year and a half now, and i've been through most of the archives and am now sufficiently schooled in everything best show, but towards the beginning i found it very intimidating looking at how long the archive page was, and i was so excited to find out about fotpedia, but then i got there, and it looks like it hasn't been updated or anything in a long time.  i'm sure it gets a bit tedious putting every detail in there, however, i have to say...it would be a CRUCIAL element in getting people into the show, because they could be listening to a show and then look up anything they're not sure about.

i mean, if people were going to go to the trouble of flyer-ing and putting up stickers, we might as well put our energy into making fotpedia really awesome and organized.  i really think it could be a huge help to pull in new listeners.

[erechoveraker]

From my understanding, the best way to get the word out publicly is to oversaturate.  something that can be very easily done, and very cheaply done, would be flyers, stickers, etc. and post them all over town with the BS or FOT website on them. 

Site banners and the little image thingies people put in their signatures on message boards would be nice and easy way to get word out too.

[iAmBaronVonTito]

From my understanding, the best way to get the word out publicly is to oversaturate.  something that can be very easily done, and very cheaply done, would be flyers, stickers, etc. and post them all over town with the BS or FOT website on them. 

Site banners and the little image thingies people put in their signatures on message boards would be nice and easy way to get word out too.

yeah, im not saying it's the only way.  but it would be a nice way to get people to the site, which will inevitably feature a link to this new site that is being cooked up. 

[erechoveraker]

yeah, im not saying it's the only way.  but it would be a nice way to get people to the site, which will inevitably feature a link to this new site that being cooked up. 

Oh I was absolutely agreeing with you. I only mentioned the web stuff because A. I would use those images on sites/message boards if they existed and B. I'm too lazy to make one for myself so hopefully some enterprising young FOT'll do it for us

[AllisonLeGnome]

The iTunes rankings are definitely not a great gauge of legitimate popularity- most of the top things are corporate crap that really doesn't count, and I would imagine that The Best Show has a lot more listeners who listen via methods other than iTunes Podcasts (live, WFMU archives, other podcatchers, etc.) than most shows that are podcast-only.

[Jimmy]

The iTunes rankings are definitely not a great gauge of legitimate popularity- most of the top things are corporate crap that really doesn't count

A lot of the popular podcasts are advertisements of popular things (the Comedy Central stuff, anything Disney).  I wish they had a better way showing what is decent, but I guess it is impossible when you have a million kid subscribers not realizing that the Miley Cyrus podcast they listen to is crap.

[Tom Scharpling]

This is the official home of The Best Show On WFMU World Domination Scheme Phase One brainstorming. Please put all idears for the WDS in this thread.

I am not yet sure how this will be configured, but I am starting to warm up to the notion of a shorter non-weekly podcast that would be for beginners. Someone called it 'Baby Steps', and that is pretty good.

I also love the Podcast Alley thing. Thank you for that.

Let's keep the idears coming. And thank you! It's very flattering and much appreciated.

Tom.

[KickTheBobo]

yeah, im not saying it's the only way.  but it would be a nice way to get people to the site, which will inevitably feature a link to this new site that being cooked up. 

Oh I was absolutely agreeing with you. I only mentioned the web stuff because A. I would use those images on sites/message boards if they existed and B. I'm too lazy to make one for myself so hopefully some enterprising young FOT'll do it for us

Here are some old Best Show-related animated gifs that I made that I guess could be put into forum signatures and whatnot. Feel free to download and use if anyone wants.








there's also a banner over at The Million Zimbabwean Dollar Homepage that I think ended costing me $1.38.


One idear I had awhile back was to maybe put together a flickr stream where people post photos of TBSOWFMU/ FOT stickers that they put up/ come across in the wild. Like "here's one above the toilet tank at Enid's - who woulda thunk it?".