11/25/07 - The Overnightscape Underground is a new project by Frank Edward Nora, creator and host of The Overnightscape. The Overnightscape Underground is an audio podcast where each "episode" is 24 hours long. It's a "virtual broadcast" with a wide variety of content. It has the same basic format as The Overnightscape - Frank as host, talking on various topics - but there is more of a focus on the broader variety of content - music, movies, extended audio field trips, archival material, open source audio, etc. You can think of The Overnightscape Underground as an episode of The Overnightscape where all restrictions have been removed. No time limit, no "episodes" beginning and ending... and since the show is meant to be more "random access", much "deeper" content can be included... such as "Place Sounds", which present sonic landscapes without talking... and if you're not in the mood for something like that, just skip ahead to the next track! The Overnightscape Underground is essentially an ongoing virtual broadcast with no set endpoint. It is released by days - so, for example, the first release is "Day 1" - an entire 24-hour day. After that will come "Day 2". Content is organized by track number (ie, "Day 1, Track 22"), and also "virtual" time ("Day 1, 10:00 AM"). The Overnightscape Underground will be released in several ways. The standard release will have each of the tracks in the day as a separate file. So it will be like downloading a music album - a number of files, all organized and numbered within the same "album". In the case of Day 1, there are 75 tracks. All files are MP3s at 128kbps/44.1kHz/stereo. You can load The Overnightscape Underground onto your iPod or any other MP3 player and listen to it just like you'd listen to an album. And moving around to different tracks, or skipping tracks, is easy, because they are separate tracks. Each day is approximately 1.29 GB in this format. Additionally, the project will be released as a combined 24-hour MP3 file. I tested this out and I was amazed at how easy it was to play and navigate around a file like this in iTunes and on iPod. Right now I am planning on releasing this 24-hour file in a more lo-fi 32kbps/22kHz/mono (which still sounds pretty good), which is about 329 MB. Every track in The Overnightscape Underground is released with a Creative Commons license. A lot of material comes from various open source resources around the web... The whole project is focused on openness and a new way of looking at copyrights... I finished Day 1 yesterday, but I still have a lot of work to do tagging all the files and writing the track notes and descriptions. Plus, I have to work on a new website for the project! But I figured since Day 1 is complete, I would present a preview version for listeners of The Overnightscape... this is the single file, 24-hour version... basically a 24-hour MP3 file. It is the complete Day 1, but since I have not listened to all of it yet I may have to make some changes. Also, please don't distribute this version to anyone else... the final release will be out in a week or two hopefully and I'd rather this version not be in circulation. Here it is... (this file is 329 megabytes...) You should right click and "save target as..." onsug_day01_24hr_preview.mp3 And here is a rough draft of the Table of Contents: onsug_day01_preview_toc.txt I am very interested to hear any comments or ideas you may have - please do not hesitate to email me. ENJOY!! |
© 2007 Frank Edward Nora - frank@theovernightscape.com