The title of the first podcast is This American Life. It was produced by Chicago Public Media and hosted by Ira Glass, though it featured other speakers as well. The title of the episode is Random Acts of History, it is number 644, and it came out on April 27, 2018. The genre is various news worthy short stories with various topics. This podcast has one main host, but he was not alone, as he was joined by one of the producers Brian Reed, and other episodes feature different staff members and people too. The target audience is probably young Americans who like being informed. The podcast features short stories told by different people, with sections narrated by the host between these. The length of the episode that I listened to was 57 minutes and 15 seconds. The podcast started with an intro section prologue with Ira Glass talking to producer Brian Reed about a speech from a Native American chief, and how baffling his indifference and acceptance of how they were treated by whites was. Next it transitioned to a story, this one not featuring the host, about a group of high school students who behaved disrespectfully during an airing of Schindler’s List, and all of the anger and hatred that was directed at them from the Jewish community as a result. There were many interviews from many people involved here, including members of the class, and the manager of the theater. Recorded dialogue from speeches given at the school were used too, even audio from Steven Spielberg. There is then a brief transition scene from Ira Glass, and then it leads into a story about a man who lost his sister in 9/11, and how he reacts to the 9/11 memorial museum. After this, there is a brief outro by Ira Glass, with the ending featuring music.

I was able to easily follow this podcast, it is separated into multiple stories, and each story has a transitionary segment clearly letting you know when one ends, and another begins. I think that this is a very good way to organize it. A lot of this podcast was unscripted, as it featured many interviews, but a lot of it was scripted as well, such as the entire 9/11 story. I think that the fact that they went with whatever style fits best for the story is a good system. The host way pretty engaging, he was not in a lot of the podcast since majority of the podcast focused on stories that he wasn’t in.

Music was used across the entire podcast, although it wasn’t playing the whole time. The music appeared in key parts in the middle of the stories, as transitions, and at the end of the podcast. It would always fade in and out. The transitions between stories featured Glass briefly introducing the story. I found it to be a very engaging podcast, and I never found it hard to pay attention to what happened as they did a good job of getting interesting stories.

The second podcast that I listened to was called Welcome to Night Vale. This podcast was created by Joseph Fink and Jeffrey Cranor. Published by Night Vale Presents and is hosted/stars/ is narrated by Cecil Baldwin. The episode that I listened to was episode 15 – Street Cleaning Day. This episode first released on January 15, 2013. The best way to describe this podcasts genre is that it is a Surreal, Comedy-drama, paranormal, horror, news satire that takes place in the fictional town of Night Vale. The format is a single host, who acts as the news anchor for the fictional town. The target audience are fans of wacky random humor, and news satire. In this podcast Baldwin plays the role of the news reporter who is reporting about all of the wacky magical nonsense that happens in Night Vale with comical indifference, as if all of the strange circumstances were normal. The episode that I listened to was 23 minutes and 3 seconds long. The episode starts with an intro that then plays transition music that fades in and then fades out as it leads to its first segment. The first segment is a warning about how it is street cleaning day, and how the residents of Night Vale have little time to barricade themselves inside their houses, so they can avoid getting killed by the street cleaners. It then transitions to multiple different stories about Night Vale such as a tale about a farmer who found a door to another dimension, and how the mayor banned all Wheat and wheat by-products, and how illegal wheat speakeasies opened around the town selling bread as a result. The podcast jumps around its multiple plot points throughout the episode. There is tense dramatic music that plays any time the host mentions the street cleaners. The end of the podcast mentions the relief of Night Vale having survived another cleaning day.

While this podcast is incredibly random, it can be followed easily if you understand and appreciate the fact that the randomness is all part of the humor. The entire thing Is scripted, but it works out well that way. The host’s voice is very engaging, and he does a great job of switching emotion on the fly. Music was used very well in this podcast, with it being used as the intro, outro, transitions, a section featuring a song, and was used to set the mood during the spooky parts. Transitions were sometimes accompanied by music, and sometimes not. I was very entertained and found it funny, I will listen to this podcast again.

While these were two very different podcasts, I learned a lot from each of them. Podcasts come in all shapes and sizes, and while that applies her, they both do have things in common. They both handled transitions well, knew when to use music, and where both clearly made by talented people. I would recommend both of these podcasts to people.