[Systers-dev] Hello and invitation to screencasting project

[Jennifer Lindner]

Hi Systers-dev,

My name is Jennifer Lindner and I'm a member of DevChix. With Jennifer  
Redman, we've been beginning a project to increase the visibility of  
women in technology, and DevChix is interested in producing tech  
screencasts for learning purposes as well. I'm going to cross-post a  
message summarizing our current thoughts on it -- it contains  
particular points where our two organizations might work well  
together, but of course there are probably no real limits there. So  
anyone who's interested, welcome!


Begin cross-post:


OK, I've gathered some thoughts on production and tools, content, and  
process. I have to say - daunting though it rather is, it's very  
exciting to envision, too. All feedback is warmly welcomed.


Production and Tools

So let's get into how to do this. I found a few free web-based tools  
for audio and screencasting (and if anyone has heard of or worked with  
any others please let me know). My goal is to make it easy for any of  
us to record audio and screen/audio/visuals, and to record conference  
calls for multi-user discussions, and then export the resulting files  
so that they can be incorporated into our (I hate this word but it  
applies) branded template. There's Audacity for recording audio on  
one's own machine (http://audacity.sourceforge.net/), web-based Audio  
Hijack Pro (http://www.rogueamoeba.com/audiohijackpro/) for recording  
skype calls and web-based Screencast-o-matic (http://www.screencast-o-matic.com/ 
) for capturing audio & visual.

I've used Audacity a bit and briefly tested Screencast-o-matic, seem  
fine at first glance.

I'd like to test Audio Hijack for recording a Skype call this week.  
Who can be on hand some evening this week - Weds? Thurs? - for a test  
conference call?

I'm setting a goal for myself to create and post (on the Systers wiki)  
a few sample pod and screencasts using these tools by end of this week.

Susan P -- would you consider being point person on hosting/publishing  
with Systers/ABI? Sounds like you're the one best in a position to  
handle it.

Content

I'm in agreement with Victoria that podcasts would be the best way to  
handle panel discussions of broad general topics, and gender issue  
topics.

I would love to have some podcasts of advanced technology topics that  
supersede particular languages/systems etc: master slave databases,  
encryption hashes, etc, highlighting how they're used in production or  
real world applications generally.

I'd also love to have some history casts - First There was C++; the  
Rise and Fall of Java; From Perl to Python; Setting up your Linux  
Distro, Then and Now .. these are off the top of my head, but the idea  
is stories of real history in technology, to help new women in tech  
get a sense of this moment, to produce a bit of documentary of our  
own. I'm thinking just two-five minutes for both general discussion  
and history topics.

For the tutorials, I'd love to produce how-tos, quickstarts, current  
topics and intermediate-to-advanced screencasts on particularly thorny  
or fun topics within the technologies we decide to cover.

On the topic of gender issues: besides discussions, I see a real need  
at this point for intros to prominent women in tech, for the purposes  
of increasing the number of women speakers at conferences. I think  
they'd need to be screencasts in order to show the work of these  
women, their sites, links to slidecasts/presentations etc, but mostly  
they could be audio, and would only need to be about two or three  
minutes as well, I'm thinking.

What are people's thoughts on the idea of general topics and history?  
This and the introductions seem like a great point of involvement for  
Systers, what do you think, Jennifer R? (yes, many many Jens/Jennifer  
in tech ;)

And it's time to begin soliciting tech topics: all those who've  
expressed an interest in content (Lori, Eleanor, Victoria, Desi - and  
everyone who's interested), let's begin assembling a list. Let's do it  
on the systers wiki, here:

http://systers.org/systers-dev/doku.php/subject_areas

On the matter of branding.. I like the DevChix tagline Boys Can't Have  
All the Fun. I think it's very important for these to have an element  
of light-heartedness, of highlighting the enjoyment that is a big part  
of this work and our experience. Jennifer R, does Systers have a logo?  
Would Systers want the ABI logo in there with the DevChix logo? Maybe  
this is a matter that deserves its own topic, discussion between our  
two groups?

I'd like the format of our casts to be consistent, something like  
this: welcome music, intro, announcements of current conferences or  
meetups /credit to Systers/ABI & DevChix, topic, links, outro music.

And as for music, I think this is also something we should open up for  
solicitation and discussion. I like the music Nola's friend did, but  
as long as we're doing this I think it's worth polling our collective  
tastes. Here's Nola's friend's mp3, and I can start with a particular  
favorite of mine, too - by all-female band Electrelane. Maybe they'd  
license to us cheap:

http://rubygeek.com/podcast.aif

http://jenlindner.com/take_the_bit.mp3

Process

The thing with this is, it's extremely advisable to publish some sort  
of content weekly, or perhaps bi-weekly with certain things, but  
regularly. And I think it'd be great to time these so that we can  
publish them on Thursday nights, to take advantage of Twitter's Follow  
Fridays.

What I'm thinking is that we produce some general podcasts to have on  
hand for those times we can't produce new content. Perhaps start with  
those, or start them in tandem with the technology-specific casts. I'd  
like us to have a small review committee and volunteers to sanity test  
code. And as a last catch-all, we publish internally and post to  
Systers-dev and DevChix to get all the eyes we can before going live.

And for people who have some but not much time to contribute, maybe we  
could have a research arm to this. She could research a topic or  
person and post the results to the wiki, for whoever decides to do the  
cast to begin working from.

Thoughts? Who wants to be part of review and testing?

Jennifer R, I'm going to write a more introductory version of this  
email for Systers-dev - or maybe just an introduction to the  
discussion, and cross-post.

Allrighty then. best---

Jennifer

photoblog: www.jenlindner.com
jen(at)jenlindner.com
twitter: jenlindner