The Podcast Asylum

This condition most often afflicts those who have just purchased a DVD full of sound effects and can’t wait to use them all at once, whether they serve any useful purpose or not. The zings, bangs, crashes, trumpet fanfares, and rounds of applause every few seconds can obliterate the intelligibility—and certainly the listenability—of the podcast.

Podcastus Overproductus in its most severe form causes show hosts to compound the damage done by the sound clips with a fake DJ voice and a hokey script, resulting in a nightmare cross between a morning zoo radio show and a children’s television program.

One painful example of this syndrome can be found at BASF’s Chemical Reporter podcast. The idea is brilliant: explain the chemistry at work in daily life by answering questions like “Why does salt melt ice?” After only a few episodes, the listener becomes possessed by the desire to bash the podcast host over the head with a blunt object.