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(By Troy Price) Back when I was a kid – young, like 8 or 9 - I thought the coolest thing was to sit in my dad’s work truck and play on the CB radio. I remember turning to Channel 19, because that is the channel all the truckers talked on. And even after turning to that channel I had to adjust the dial labeled ‘Squelch’ to hear exactly what I wanted to. After that, I could sit on that woven bench seat cover and hear all the swear words a kid would want to hear.
An interesting thing would always happen when I pushed the button on the microphone handset and ask questions about what I heard. They would all tell each other how there were ‘virgin ears on the air’ and the truckers would either scatter to other channels or seriously clean up their language. They self regulated well.
With the ever-growing interest in podcasts and podcasting, I encourage us, the podcasting community, to self regulate as our forefathers of the Citizen’s Band did before us. A shining example of this is the podcast Risk!.
I am a big fan of ‘Risk!’ (found at www.risk-show.com). The show’s tag line is, “True Stories People Never Thought They Would Dare To Share.” Oftentimes the beautiful stories the people share are of such a personal nature that the impactful details of the story would be lost if not for their expletive language. I am thankful for the storyteller’s sharing and the show’s producers self regulation. Here is what I think we all can learn from them…
First, in Risk!’s show description they lay out the details of their show. The show uses descriptors like ‘surprisingly uncensored’ and ‘jaw-droppingly true’. This helps the reader quickly understand the nature of the show.
Second, sometimes their stories are especially explicit. In times like this the host, Kevin Allison, shares a ‘trigger warning’ or offers a brief summary of the upcoming story to let the listener choose if they would like to continue listening. This is handled in a very mature manner and never in a titillating, “Wait until after the break and hear a shocking story from a furry that you’ll remember forever…” kind of way.
Last, every episode of Risk! is tagged with an ‘Explicit’ label. This label is visible in the directories when anyone comes across the Risk! show warning the listener each time that this is explicit content. This label does one more thing that is important. Most podcast players have settings that restrict the playback of shows labeled as explicit. This allows parents and guardians a way to limit minor’s access to explicit materials that is built into the system.
Apple thinks the explicit label is very important. Be aware that there is documentation from Apple that says they have the authority to ban non-labeled explicit podcasts from the Apple Podcasts directory forever – no do-overs. L
Here is why. Minors, just like I did, will find out which channel or website has explicit material. They are smart enough to adjust the squelch or use VPNs to access what they want. We, as podcasters, need to self regulate and assume the responsibility for limiting access of the explicit shows we produce to minors who may not possess the maturity or be cognitively ready to hear our content.
Having a podcast is great. Having an explicit podcast can be great, too. Just first seriously consider how you set up your explicit podcast.
Article Epilogue: This article was tough to write! That ending was more of a whimper that a bang because I became distracted by how many times I deleted what I just wrote. Below is some of the pure gold that I deleted in previous drafts of this article, included here strictly for comedic value…
Self-regulate your nastiness. tm (t-shirts with that statement are available in my cafepress shop.
Notice I did not say I was not angry with the truckers for leaving me behind. On the contrary, I was super mad! However looking back, the truckers handled it the right way…
You can be explicit without using any profanity, for instance… I stopped typing at for instance because I didn’t want this article to be labeled explicit.
One other thing, where does the word explicit even come from? It seems that we could have a label that describes the intended audience of the show and not just the content. (I like that sentence, so don’t be surprised if you see that particular nugget in a future article.)
Imagine telling your mom that you got banned from Apple Podcasts forever because… when I reread that I decided that it was time to bring the article to a close. If you ever have to use the ‘imagine telling your mom’ trope to be persuasive, you have probably already lost the argument.
There you go, edited fragments from writing an article about explicit podcasts… Enjoy!
Troy Price is the co-founder of Front Porch Studios in Berea, Kentucky. He has been involved with podcasting for over a decade. Do you listen or produce a show that you think should be on the list? Comment below or email Troy@frontporchstudios.com to be included!