Panel: Community in Audio with Jemma Rose Brown, Davy Gardner, and Chioke I’Anson

Chioke I'Anson: I'm really looking out for how conceptually sound a show is. A Field Guide to Gay Animals, just in concept, is the most amazing show that you've ever heard. And then you listen to it and you're like, Oh, and it's also fun. And it also investigates scientific history that reveals the ways in which even science is dependent upon social and political formations. Oh yeah, this show's worth being an official selection.

Jeff Umbro: Welcome to Podcast Perspectives, a show about the podcast industry and the people behind it. I'm your host, Jeff Umbro, founder and CEO of The Podglomerate. Today, the theme of the show is building community in audio. This discussion will cover how audio can be translated into live events, how to create an event that's worth attending, and the benefits of community.

We'll also discuss the world of podcast awards and how the former enhances the awards process. All three of our guests on the show today are experts in their field. We have Jemma Brown, the general manager at Signal Awards and co creator of On Air Fest, Chioke I'Anson, a philosopher, podcaster, and educator, as well as the founder of the Resonate Podcast Festival, and Davy Gardner, who spearheaded and oversees Tribeca Audio, a division of Tribeca Enterprises. All three of these folks have done more than you know to foster community in podcasting, and we're going to dive into why and how. Let's get to the show.

I know we have a big panel here today, so I'm just going to point to each of you one at a time and ask you to introduce yourself the way that you would at a party. So, I will start with you, Jemma.

Jemma Rose Brown: Hey, I'm Jemma, and I am the general manager of the Signal Awards.

Davy Gardner: I'm Davy Gardner, and I am the head of Tribeca Audio at the Tribeca Festival.

Chioke I'Anson: What it do, y'all? I'm Chioke. I am founder of Resonate Podcast Festival. I run the Community Media Center at the ICA in Richmond, Virginia. And I'm an underwriting voice for NPR.

Jeff Umbro: And what a voice.

Chioke I'Anson: All in the microphone.

Jeff Umbro: Do people recognize you from that?

Chioke I'Anson: If people recognize my voice, we are in like a super public radio dance crowd. You know what I'm saying?

Like, like it's a like, oh no, we're, we're at like a Wait, Wait show or you know what I'm saying? Like we are in a real public radio environment.

Jeff Umbro: So all three of you are involved in the audio world in very interesting ways. You are all creators and community leaders in different ways. I'm really fascinated in the idea of building community in the physical space in the audio world, which is why I've gathered you all here today.

So just to start, could you each tell me what interested you in podcasting in the first place? Like, how did you get involved? And Chioke, I'd love to start with you.

Chioke I'Anson: Well, I was. a college radio guy, you know, I was just like on the, on the radio doing slow jams or whatever. And then, uh, I would also listen to like that, remember in the weekends when you turned on the radio before podcasting was a thing, before the first like audible mp3 player, you just like hear stuff on the radio.

And I would listen to This American Life and I would hear like Scott Carrier stories and I'd be like, Whoa, this is so awesome. And a thing that I in particular liked was that, uh, the audio medium. Removed some of the immediate judgments that come from when you can see people, you know what I'm saying? So, like, you couldn't really necessarily, like, see the race of the person in the story.

There's a lot of stuff, there's a lot of information that you didn't get whenever you listened to an audio story. And I found that that helped to increase empathy in the listener because they could imagine themselves in, like, that situation or that environment no matter what. And so I became a, just a big fan of listening to stuff from there on out, really.

Jeff Umbro: I got into it because my mom used to listen to Delilah when I, she would like drive me to like baseball games or something.

Chioke I'Anson: Oh yeah.

Jeff Umbro: And I still like to this day when it comes on, I, I don't know, I have a moment. So Jemma, what about you? What, what got you interested in audio?

Jemma Rose Brown: I love how when you are in your life, you're like, what am I doing?

And it all seems so messy and then when you look back on it, you're like this all makes so much sense, but I was a history major with a focus in oral history and I got a scholarship my senior year of college to do an oral his, big oral history project, and then I interned at StoryCorps right out of college, and I basically thought all the people that were working on the podcast seemed like the cool people at the company, and I. It was truly like jealousy and FOMO, I was like, oh, I wish my internship was on the podcast team.

And I actually think jealousy is like a really interesting emotion and something to pay attention to and follow. And so like, I noticed myself getting jealous. And then I got curious about that jealousy.

Jeff Umbro: Could not agree more. By the way, my jealousy often turns to grudges instead of like career developments. But, yours seems a lot healthier, so.

Jemma Rose Brown: Or I just like, manically was like, how do I get a job in podcasting? And it was 2011 and that didn't exist as an option. But I pursued it with...

Jeff Umbro: Gusto.

Jemma Rose Brown: Gusto.

Jeff Umbro: And Davy, how about you?

Davy Gardner: I got into audio first through theater. I did comedy at the Upright Citizens Brigade Theater and I was writing plays in the city and stuff.

And one of the pieces that I wrote, Adapted Welfare, to audio from the stage and a producer from The Truth podcast saw that and he contacted me. I started writing for that show, became a producer for The Truth as well, uh, associate producer for The Truth and editor, writer, and then just sort of, you know, started working for audio companies from there for Wondery for a while.

I wrote something for Audible and then, you know, arrived at Tribeca.

Jeff Umbro: So all three of you have had different journeys to get to where you are. All of them have been very heavy and like the idea of just what I would call legacy podcasting, which is a crazy thing to say. Now, all three of you in one form or another are involved in physical event spaces or, or related avenues.

So I want to start with you, Jemma. You co founded On Air Fest and helped to launch that, which is one of the first, or I guess an early, podcast event that really takes the idea of a conference and throws it out the window. When thinking about how to bring a podcast or an audio vehicle to a live event, what are the kinds of things that you think about?

Jemma Rose Brown: I love thinking about translating audio to stage. I like to think first and foremost about what is the feeling or purpose, or sometimes I call it like the heartbeat of the show, and then how to bring that idea to life. I actually, I feel like this might best articulate through an example. I recently was working with PRX and a suite of shows that they put out under a special program called the Big Questions Project.

And one of the shows is a show called Second Sundays. It's kind of about queer perspectives on growing up in the church and they wanted to do a live event and came to me with, how do we bring this to life? And they were going to do a kind of panel. And I was like, what if in the course of our conversation, they were all talking about not feeling invited into the churches that they'd grown up in.

And I was like, what if we created a sermon instead, the kind of sermon that you would have felt welcome to? So taking the concept of the show itself and then using that to guide the format of the live event is kind of like how I approach all of my programming.

Jeff Umbro: Do you have an instance of when that didn't work?

Jemma Rose Brown: People get a lot of times worried about lift, quote unquote, like, Oh, this is going to be a big lift for our team. We're up against ABCD deadlines and don't want to do anything complicated. I'd rather just, interviews and panels are popular because they're easy. You just show up and you chat about things that you've already done.

So you can exist kind of in like past tense accolades instead of like present tense creation. Usually if people push back and are uncomfortable, I'll be like, you know, open up the idea of like, but we could explore and express your show in a way that you won't have the opportunity to otherwise. And if they still put their hands up, I'm like, all right, cool. Let's do a panel. Or the conversation just ends there.

Jeff Umbro: Chioke, you are the mastermind behind the Resonate Podcast Festival. The event has been running for three years. Last year it took you four months to sell out. This year it took you six hours. As some may say, the hottest ticket in podcasting.

Chioke I'Anson: Oh dear.

Jeff Umbro: How do you explain the demand?

Chioke I'Anson: What is generally true is that people want to be together, right? I think that if you've gone to Tribeca or gone to On Air Fest, then you see a scene where everybody is up in there. People took trips, people came to play, to be inspired and to see people shine. And I think that I'm different from those festivals in that, Hey, your boy don't have that much space.

Well, it makes a certain kind of intimacy possible that I think people also appreciate. So like, you know, I think we can, we can accept that like, okay, a limitation, our space limitation does help like highlight another thing, which is that intimacy and also the kind of closeness that people can get into very quickly over the course of just these two days.

So that's pretty dope.

Davy Gardner: Just to jump in a little bit, Chioke, the space informing the community at Resonate is really interesting, being located in a school, I feel a sense of open mindedness when I go to Resonate that's really interesting. It allows me to actually listen and take in new information. And the format that you have is a lot of sort of, I don't know what you would call it, presentations in a way.

And I think it just lends itself to what you're doing curatorially.

Chioke I'Anson: Yeah, yeah, you know, Davy, it's true, I don't, like, say it out loud a lot, like, you know, in public, but I'm an educator, I was a professor for a bunch of years, and Resonate is actually covertly class. Like, it's a lot of class sessions. It's class and it's recess, so, like, I got them both, but I'm, I really care about the education potential of each session, and I really care about the way that recess manifests, like being a thing that brings people together. That's my vibe, like for sure. And also, side note, education is better in a group. Maybe you've taken an online class in your life and I can tell you it's worse than a brick and mortar class, you know what I mean?

So people also learn things better together. They can feel the energy of the room whenever epiphanies are contagious. Everything is better whenever you're in with each other in a class. Hey, and that's why y'all listen, y'all are really going to enjoy Davy's talk this October.

Jeff Umbro: I can't wait to hear that.

I've been messaging with Chioke on the side because I actually couldn't get a ticket because they sold out so fast. So you probably got a new sponsor because of that, so.

Chioke I'Anson: Yeah, that's that's what I'm

saying. Look, we got, we still have a handful of sponsored tickets available for anybody that wants to roll out.

Jeff Umbro: Well, not until after I get mine.

So just put me down for that before you sell them all out. But, but in the meantime, like, how do you think about the programming? What, what are the active decisions that you're making or choices that you're making when it comes to what you do want to present and what you don't want to present?

Chioke I'Anson: Yeah. So, um, I definitely want to focus on craft.

It's not, it's not like exclusively so. I do want to have other stuff in there, but I care a lot about giving producers a platform to share their vision for creation and all the technical details of what it takes to do that. So that's, I think the thing that I'm the most excited about.

And starting this year, we're doing themes. So I'm now trying to pick particular ideas that can be like regulative ideals that can guide the whole festival, right? So that that way, ideally, whenever you come to the next Resonate, it's like qualitatively different than the one previous because it's like following a different theme down to its educational potential.

Jeff Umbro: What's an example of a theme that you're thinking about?

Chioke I'Anson: So this year, it's fiction and nonfiction. So I'm thinking about the things that like fiction learns from nonfiction and vice versa. There's not like a ton of places I don't think where you can actually get fiction podcast producers' ideas on creation.

And I want that to be like the moment at Resonate. That's why I've got Davy on the scene. I'm bringing James Kim up in there. The folks from Wolf at the Door, you know what I'm saying? And so that's the vibe. Next year though, I'll give you a little preview of what I'm thinking about next year. I want to bring producers from around the world. I want to break the linguistic silo of podcast inspiration. And get cats who come from languages very far from those that we speak to get their theses on creation.

Jeff Umbro: And last but not least, is there ever any, like, plans to increase the capacity of the festival or will it always be a little bit intimate?

Chioke I'Anson: Like davy said, the space informs the gathering. And so while I do think that we can increase, it's probably not going to be until another building that is comparable to the current building is built. Now, as it happens, two buildings have broken ground on Broad Street. One is for the VCU Arts building and one is for our partner and NPR station, VPM.

They're both building new buildings. And so I think that whenever they open, we can talk about expansion, but until then, I guess that we're all going to have to get our tickets quickly.

Jeff Umbro: Davy, you have the unique opportunity and I guess, challenging opportunity of creating an audio version of a festival that already exists.

You developed the audio storytelling program at Tribeca. How did you go about creating this new version of what already existed?

Davy Gardner: Well, I mean, at first I just jumped in. I just tried to keep my head above water, is how I remember it, to be honest. It was a big job right away. Over time, I think that there's the balance between physical space and community and then the craft of it all.

And we have, in our program, we have the official selections program as well as these live events, and they sort of aid one another in terms of, like Jemma was saying earlier, the, the sort of panel problem. We don't do those. I decided early to just not have panels at Tribeca because I feel like there is something really wonderful about people getting together who love the same podcasts. And it's like that feeling of going to a concert where everybody just loves the same thing. So inherently, you're kind of a little bit friends with other strangers. Being able to, you know, have one of those shared experiences and then everyone goes to a bar is going to be more of a meaningful networking event than if we all have our little like, hello, my name is sticker on and are very like forced to talk. You know what I mean?

So I think that Tribeca has always been a place to support independent producers. It's always been a place to celebrate great storytellers together and talk about storytelling together. And yeah, I think it was just a matter of, for me, the uphill battle was getting people to see podcasters as belonging on the red carpet, getting to have them reach that level of cultural recognition that television and film have had for so long. And that's really been, I think, an important thing that I've been pushing to have laurels on podcast artwork, to have that same level of prestige.

Jeff Umbro: Davy and Jemma, I want to talk about the award aspects of what you do. Can you each give an overview of how the award nominations work? So let's start with you, Jemma.

Jemma Rose Brown: The Signal Awards is in its third year. We're going to be announcing finalists mid next month, mid September, and then throwing a big winner's party in October. And it's an interesting model. Basically, anyone can submit.

There are entry fees, early bird and then final entry deadline fees. We have a really big and preeminent judging panel that both Chioke and Davy sit on, and all of the work is listened to by these exceptional ears in the audio space, and voted on, and basically the work moves through a cycle where it receives multiple listens from multiple judges. And then the finalists are picked based on a kind of points based system quota and then the finalists are then put forward to the public so you can win bronze, silver or gold, but then you could also win an additional listener's choice.

So the finalists in each category released to the public for public voting that will run late September.

Jeff Umbro: Davy, that's very different from how Tribeca provides awards, correct?

Davy Gardner: Yes. Our program is a festival as opposed to an awards show. The awards are sort of an extra factor involved in it, but I make it pretty clear to all of the official selection teams that.

They're going from so many submissions down to these 16, and that's really like, the laurels are really what they're getting from this. So who the winner is, I mean, we have a jury, and that's really a great way to get more ears on each project. It's more exposure for each and all of these teams, but I was just speaking to the official selection creator team, because you know, throughout the year I work with them to help them get deals and stuff like that for their projects.

And they were saying, you know, they were so happy they won, but by the end of it, like, if somebody else's name had been read, they would have also just been so happy. Like, it just becomes a cohort of people that the strength of all of these groups is that they're supporting one another.

And I think that's true overall in audio. I think the best resource anybody has is your peers and other independent producers. So I think a lot of the trick at Tribeca has been bringing in the culture of audio and the sort of like weirdness of audio, the celebration of things that are unconventional of audio into a space that is recognized and not losing that piece of it.

I'm pretty pleased with how that piece of it has played out. And, yeah, I just would say that the awards are certainly not emphasized. Even on the film side, I don't think people really say I won Tribeca. I think they say I was a Tribeca official selection. I'll add like awards have an amazing place in the space, and I think making those awards meaningful and finding ways to recognize accomplishments is vital. But I think Tribeca is more about the discovery part of the process. It's more about launching new work that's never been heard before.

Jeff Umbro: And what makes a show like award worthy?

Davy Gardner: I would say that in terms of what makes a show official selection worthy is, for me, a show that's inventive, a show that's doing something fresh, that's doing something that's not the same formulaic approach that many podcasts have taken.

If a podcast has no financial reason to exist, then that's already a reason that it's worth paying attention to, because somebody made it and it was not driven by profit. So that's interesting from an artistic perspective. So, I would say, yeah, things that are inventive, to me, are worth listening to.

Jemma Rose Brown: I feel like you gave really specific judging rubrics, Davy, and I want to push back.

I think you've thought about this a lot, and we've talked about it a lot. I kind of want to give you a V2 on that answer, because things that you and I have discussed are really around creative ingenuity seems to be like the big marker that you're always listening for.

Davy Gardner: It has to be audio forward and it has to be excellent, but those are sort of baseline.

We have more selections that deserve, or more submissions that deserve to be official selections than spots that are official selections. So when you have to take our one out of five ranking system and you have a hundred fives and you have 16 slots, it comes down to that's a curator's job. What does, what do I think is best for the ecosystem of podcasts for Tribeca to put forward as these are important pieces for people to listen to because they are inventive, original, and how are they different from each other, you know, giving a broad spectrum of, of what makes an official selection.

Jemma Rose Brown: Okay. This is what you said.

You said work that is original and inventive that feels risk averse. Oh, if it feels risk averse and borrowed that if it feels like it's trying to be safe, then it's not for Tribeca.

Davy Gardner: I stand by that. I, can I tell you, Jemma, I wrote that on the train.

Jemma Rose Brown: Uh huh.

Davy Gardner: Like in between events. Well done, former me. I stand by it.

Jemma Rose Brown: I've been thinking about this question a lot because I became the general manager of Signal a little over a month ago and. It is an award, like, that is the business, that is the vision, that is the purpose of this program, is to create awards to recognize the best work being made in audio, and I have a real personal issue, I take issue with the word best because it doesn't feel qualified. And so I've been doing a kind of like, I'm almost calling it like market research, but I've been literally calling everyone who I trust their opinions in this industry over the last month to ask them what they think the word "best" means. And the way that I have heard "best" defined best that stuck with me is around, and this can be a perfect segue into hearing more from Chioke is, does it have emotional resonance? Did the show, did the episode, did it linger? Did it stick with you? Did it create awe? Did it make you laugh? Did it make you feel like you had a companion in this world? Did you want to share it with your friends?

Um, did you write down, did you take notes while you were listening? You go down a Wikipedia wormhole. Did it just make you feel like stupid and giddy because you're like listening to someone and they make you feel stupid and giddy, but like, did it make you feel is now my new definition of best, and I think a really important metric that we forget to think about when we're thinking about audio is like emotional impact, pleasure, challenge. And those are the kinds of things I want to see in the work being submitted to the Signal Awards and winning at the Signal Awards this year.

Jeff Umbro: My fiancee always asks me like why I like the things I like. And I use that response. If it makes you feel that it did something right.

And she is like a CPA in a former life and makes fun of me relentlessly whenever I say that. But, Chioke, you are not in charge of any of these awards, but you are a judge in, at the Signal Awards and at Tribeca. How do you think about judging, because like, the way that you experience something can change based on your experiences, how you're feeling that day, your relationship to the show itself.

Like, how do you think about it?

Chioke I'Anson: It is true that my emotional response to a thing might be different on the day, as is true for most of us. But I'm I'm really looking out for how conceptually sound a show is. If I sit and think, or I hear the show, or I see the description, and the very idea of the show is just so amazing, and maybe important, or whatever it is, then that, for me, already works.

So, like, A Field Guide to Gay Animals is the most important, amazing show, just in concept, a priori, as the philosophers like to say, it's just in concept, it's the most amazing show that you've ever heard. And then you listen to it and you're like, Oh, and it's also fun. And it's also very smart people talking about stuff.

And it also investigates a scientific history that reveals the ways in which even science is dependent upon social and political formations. Oh yeah, this show's worth being an official selection. It's not even a ques... you see what I'm saying? That's where I come from, you know, generally speaking. I will say a rapper once said that, yeah, you can be important and you can, you know, have a message and all that, but sometimes all you got to be is fresh.

And so it's also the case that there are some shows out there that are, they're just dope. Like they don't need, they don't need like a description. They don't need a philosopher to write about them. They're just dope as hell. And there's also a lot of shows like that out in the world.

Jeff Umbro: I love everything that you all just said.

And you've all clearly put a lot more thought into that than I have personally, because I'm sitting here, I'm like, Oh, everybody has these inherent biases when it comes to judging things. And, but like, you guys are really pulling it out and like making a science of it in a lot of ways.

Chioke I'Anson: And it's also like anything that is, that's picked to get an award to be an official selection, hell, even to be like a pitch party finalist at Resonate. We're making an argument for these shows. In being picked, we're arguing that the show is important and the, the award is a recognition, but it's also an argument. It's also us saying, no, you should listen to this.

Like, this is a direction that sound can go in, you know?

Davy Gardner: I completely agree. And I think that Tribeca's emphasis on premiering podcasts, which is actually pretty unusual, comes from that same sort of thought. We're very proud when something original happens at Tribeca first, and when we can see something, when it's a place for the discovery of something new.

So yeah, being fresh is kind of, if there's any hint in a podcast that sounds like another podcast, or you can hear a sort of an insecurity or an unsureness from the creator, then that really means that it's not coming from that. Full, like, deep sort of soul place throughout the whole piece. There's like a piece of it that they weren't positive about.

And, you know, we have works in progress, so it's interesting to see works in progress going to that place. A Field Guide for Gay Animals was a work in progress submission. We just knew though, that everything that they were sending, even if it wasn't polished when they first sent the first piece, it all had that, it's like coming from their gut feeling.

This is coming from an important place that needs to get out. So I think that if you can have that throughout the whole length of the piece, that's probably going to be art worth listening to.

Jemma Rose Brown: What you're getting at, Jeff, and why this question feels so ripe is that we're touching on terrain that is largely undefined.

It's medium that has barometers for excellence. But they haven't been codified over time the way that you see in other mediums. Right? So like, I remember talking to Nick Quah like eight years ago and he was like, how do you, you know, kind of like, how do you write podcast criticism when there isn't a rubric for criticism?

And I think Chioke and Davy and I are kind of like, in effect, trauma bonded slash have become good pals because we're faced with this similar question of what is artistry? What is worth? What do you bring to the surface in a medium that is very divergent, very expansive, how do you compare apples to oranges? These are like the questions that we think about and talk about constantly.

So you're, you're touching like the raw nerve slash the most, I think, arguably, at least for me, like interesting part of my work.

Jeff Umbro: So now you have to make sure that Podcast Perspectives wins like a criticism award at one of your events. So outside of bragging rights, what do these awards give you? How can the creators use them in their day to day lives?

Jemma Rose Brown: I think there is so much value to winning an award. I think on the kind of intangible side, just to have a team's work recognized because there is so much that goes into making these shows. So just having that pure validation I think is huge. Your work being literally listened to by these judges and what that can lead to is a big thing.

And then even just this idea of like award winning, I've heard from so many different people past Signal winners that changed how they were able to talk about their work, how they were able to sell it to potential sponsors, how they were able to sell it to audiences, right? So those are all the kind of like more nebulous, but very real effects.

And then during the listeners choice campaign around the winners event, we have a kind of outsized eyes on Signal, and that people see a boost in listenership, they see their work being shared around, and so it does have kind of tactical resonance on audience numbers. And so those are a bunch of reasons to apply.

Davy Gardner: I think that there is a case to be made that you don't need to submit to awards or to festivals. I think that you can just make something and be happy with what you made. I think a lot of what we think about is from the creative perspective, what might, uh, you know, the value be in recognition? And I think a lot of that is psychological and emotional for a lot of creators.

It can, of course, lead to, you know, deals and financial opportunities and things like that. But it's also great. I mean, we have standalone pieces at the Tribeca Festival. So it's just, it's already been made. There's no, you know, no one looking to acquire it or anything like that. It's just a really wonderful piece of audio that needs some place to shine.

And if Tribeca can be the place in the industry that allows for that recognition to happen, that's meaningful and important to the creator, but also to the listeners for, you know, they don't hear things like that necessarily, because most things are sort of engineered for a financial future.

Jeff Umbro: I'm going to ask my final question. I'm going to ask each of you to answer this. How have you seen your particular event foster community amongst podcasters? And I would love to have like specific examples if you have them.

Chioke I'Anson: A filmmaker came to Resonate last year. He was working on a, like a podcast film, and he met a producer who then agreed to work with him to like make all these kind of like changes and adjustment to his film.

And then they started recording like new stuff. They recorded stuff. I saw them recording it On Air Fest. You know what I'm saying? They're probably going to release this like podcast film that has taken a 180 from where it was even like a year ago. So like I've seen, I've seen like straight up new collaborations happen coming out of Resonate. And also, side note, you know, I went to On Air and Tribeca this year, and both of those events felt like family reunions.

It was just like, the elevator opens and you see someone that you haven't seen since the last festival, and everyone hugs, and they're all so excited, and then you go out to a bar together. That stuff, which just kind of seems like fun stuff is actually crucial for the creative impulse, right? In just the same way that getting recognition can help kind of carry someone forward, that family feeling also can help creativity, can foster creativity.

Davy Gardner: Tribeca Audio has been a, I mean, it's, it's so much fun. I think that my first answer is just that it's a really good time and people make friends and I agree with Chioke. One of the most satisfying things is hearing like, Oh, these two people who met at Tribeca last year are now doing the official selection this year. That kind of thing.

I wouldn't necessarily say that this is so unique to Tribeca Audio as much as Resonate, On Air. These are places where you have time to see people that are passionate about the same thing you are and to be physically with them. It's a community and yet can have that sort of family aspect to it.

But yeah, we have. We stay in touch, the officials, like new creators, stay in touch with each other, and it's something to look forward to, and it's something that isn't a one time moment. It's throughout the year, it's a continued group.

Jemma Rose Brown: I haven't yet attended a Signal Award, but I heard that last year, I think it was around 60 percent of the attendees came in from out of town to attend. And so it was a lot of people meeting each other for the first time, which I think is pretty cool, something I thought a lot about really intentionally when I was building On Air Fest was how to make it feel inclusive and that word is a word that gets thrown around a lot, but really to make an event where people feel not just invited and welcome, but a sense of belonging is actually a very hard mathematical equation to solve.

I really wanted to make On Air Fest feel like an embrace and that wherever you're at in your audio curiosity to audio full fledged creative career, you would feel welcomed and belong. And, and I want to impart that same feeling at the Signal Awards winners party as well, because people can have a lot of imposter syndrome in this industry.

It's this funny thing where there's like, no obvious path for how to enter and yet everyone feels like their backdoor was the wrong backdoor somehow. And so I want to continue to create events where your backdoor is like absolutely the like freakiest, best backdoor possible. All backdoors welcome.

Jeff Umbro: I love it. I can tell you that at the Signal Awards last year.

Jemma Rose Brown: Yeah. Tell me how it was.

Jeff Umbro: I actually wasn't there, but I have a photo of a producer and editor and a marketer on the Podglomerate staff that at that point in time had never met in person. And it brought me so much joy to see that photo because they're all standing there holding like one of the, the proxy, like statues and smiling, statuettes, smiling to each other was great.

Chioke I'Anson: Yo, can I say one last thing though? One of the reasons that community is so important is because excellence is contagious. If when I turn around and I look at all the people who were in the crowd at On Air Fest or Tribeca or the Signal Awards, I see people whose show is one of my favorite shows. I see someone who produced or edited or was the host of an episode of a thing that I loved, and it's like almost every face up in the room.

And so, if you're a person who's interested in getting good at podcasting to the point where you're uncovering the art end of podcasting, the get you in the feels end of podcasting, then these are the kinds of events that you've got to go to, so I will be seeing you cats at Tribeca next year.

Davy Gardner: And at Resonate and On Air and Signal Awards.

Jeff Umbro: All of the things, and all three of you have done a lot more than I think you all realize to build the community that we're all so proud of in this industry, so thank you all, and thank you all for joining us on the show today.

Thank you all for joining us on the show this week. You can find Jemma Brown at jemmarosebrown.com, J-E-M-M-A rose brown.com, or at signalaward.com. You can find Davy at davygardner.com, D-A-V-Y-G-A-R-D-N-E-R.com. Or by googling Tribeca Audio. You can find Chioke I'Anson at chiokeianson.com. C-H-I-O-K-E-I-A-N-S-O-N.com or at resonatepodfest.com. 

For more podcast related news, info, and takes, you can follow me on Twitter @JeffUmbro. Podcast Perspectives is a production of The Podglomerate.

If you're looking for help producing, marketing, or monetizing your podcast, you can find us at Podglomerate.com. Shoot us an email at listen@thepodglomerate.com or follow us on all social platforms @podglomerate or @podglomeratepods. This episode was produced by Chris Boniello, and myself, Jeff Umbro.

This episode was edited and mixed by Jose Roman. And thank you to our marketing team, Joni Deutsch, Madison Richards, Morgan Swift, Annabella Pena, and Vanessa Ullman. And a special thank you to Dan Christo and Tiffany Dean. Thank you for listening and I'll catch you all in two weeks.