Richard Farrar's Blog

Photo by davideferrari

In today’s  society our senses are being continually bombarded with an overwhelming and virtually limitless stream of information. How do we cope with it all? Podcasts are yet another potential drain on our valuable time resources. So, if you choose to satisfy your information cravings with this modern medium, when do you say enough is enough?

If you listen to podcasts, what is the ideal length of a podcast to fit in with your busy schedule? When do they become too long, and when are they too short to be worth bothering with?

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Life is not always as it seems, and this is particularly true in the world of film and television. Whilst we’re all used to the computerised visual effects used in modern films, we are probably not as aware of the level of special effects used in the film’s soundtrack.

Any modern blockbuster film will invariably be liberally splattered with awesome special visual effects (CGI). We’ve come to expect it. However, while our eyes are being bombarded with spectacular visual sequences our ears are also being attacked with a host of auditory stimuli to trick us into believing what we see is real.

The audio production of a film never attracts the same kudos as the visual effects. Yet, get it wrong and the visual sequence just won’t have the same impact. Get it right however and you’re transported into a different world completely. It’s all smoke and mirrors!

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The Internet Monthly is a monthly podcast featuring 20 or so short Internet related articles, tips and tricks and a regular search engine of the month feature.

This month we hear about comparison shopping by barcode, pay-as-you-drive car insurance, a film certificate style rating system for websites, how to delve deeper than Google for up to date search results and  the talking search engine that works in your car.

There’s information about getting the BBC iPlayer working on your TV and how to stream and share live video online from your mobile phone, plus where to get all your social media activities in one place and places to go when you want to get out of the city.

This podcast is derived from a monthly newsletter published by Zen Internet and recorded and produced by Silicon Bay. The podcast is reproduced by kind permission of Zen Internet.

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