DPHU1001 Chap.4 Pitching and Producing a Round-Table Podcast
Pitching and Producing a Round-Table Podcast
This chapter follows a podcast from idea to submission. Podcast 1, worth 35%, is set up on Moodle as a four-step submission: you add your name to a group spreadsheet, join your group through self-selection, and write an individual pitch in Week 4. The Moodle page warns that a student who does not join a group receives a zero mark. The written pitch is an 800-word task with an hour and a half to complete it.
It needs a working title, a description of the issue, three or four professional journalistic items and an explanation of what makes their coverage interesting through the course lenses.
Production skills come next. The individual written intro is capped at 100 words and judged on expression, engagement and how well it introduces the issues.
Editing is mostly cutting: the Brisbane model episode kept about 30% of its recording, and your final edit must run 5 to 7 minutes. Descript produces transcripts with speaker labels and timecodes.
Podcast 2 adds a cover and intro from each individual, plus the group's original and edited recordings and both transcripts.
Production is also where marks are lost for reasons unrelated to analysis: a missed group step, an intro over the word limit, or a missing transcript. Treat the submission list as part of the task, and check it with your group before the final week rather than on the due date.
What this chapter covers
- 01
Pitch: an individual case for a topic, with a working title and three or four items
- 02
Item: a news report, feature, opinion piece, documentary or panel from a professional outlet
- 03
Written intro: up to 100 words that preview the coverage and the issues it raises
- 04
Edit: the 5 to 7 minute episode cut from a much longer group recording
- 05
Transcript: a speaker-labelled, timecoded text of the original and the edited audio
- 06
Cover: individual artwork showing the podcast name, the hosts and the media-analysis angle
Worked example · free
Checking a pitch against the task
- +1Sharpen the working title so a casual reader knows the coverage question: "Renters or rioters? How three outlets framed a housing protest".
- +1Raise the items to three or four, drawn from at least two other professional outlets.
- +1Explain what is interesting in each item: whose voices it quotes and how it frames the protesters.
- +1Link the analysis to course lenses, here representativeness and balance, and say why listeners will care.
Key terms
- Working title
- A provisional episode title that states what the podcast will analyse.
- Piece to camera
- A recorded segment in which the speaker addresses the camera directly, used for the Podcast 2 pitch.
- Descript
- Audio editing software used in the course to transcribe recordings and edit them as text.
- Audacity
- Free audio editing software used in early workshops to trim group recordings.
- Timecode
- A time marker in a transcript showing where each passage occurs in the audio.
- Sub-editing
- Revising copy for clarity, accuracy and length before publication.
- Lead-in music
- A short music bed that opens an episode before the hosts speak.
- Raw recording
- The full, unedited group discussion from which the final episode is cut.
Pitching and Producing a Round-Table Podcast FAQ
What has to be in the Podcast 1 pitch?
A working title, a description of the issue, trend or event, three or four items from professional journalistic outlets with links in a separate blog post, and an explanation of what makes their coverage interesting in terms of the course lenses, such as accuracy, balance or privacy.
How long should the final podcast be?
The edited episode should run 5 to 7 minutes. Record much more than that, because the model episodes kept only about a quarter to a third of their original recordings once repetition and agreement were cut.
What do I submit for Podcast 2?
Individually, a cover and a written intro. As a group, the original recording, the edited recording of 5 to 7 minutes, the original transcript and the edited transcript, as listed in the Week 12 workshop.
Can I use items in a language other than English?
Yes. The Week 8 pitch brief allows items published or broadcast in other languages, provided you supply your own translations of the extracts you discuss if your team takes up that topic.
What happens if I do not join a podcast group?
The Podcast 1 group self-selection page states that a student who does not join a group there will receive a zero mark, so complete the group steps early in the term.
How long is the Podcast 1 pitch and how much time do I get?
The pitch task description sets an individual written pitch of 800 words, with one and a half hours to complete it, and the Step 3 pitch opens on Moodle in Week 4 with a time limit of 1 hour 30 minutes and one attempt.
Assessment move
Treat production as a series of drafts. Start a shared folder with your group in Week 3 holding item links, a running list of findings and the transcript of every recording. Write three versions of your intro and test each against the three workshop criteria, then cut the weakest phrases.
When editing, listen once for structure and once for clutter: the first pass decides which segments survive, the second removes false starts and repetition. Check the submission list a week before the due date, not on the day.
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