Podcasting is a revolutionary technology for academe, enthusiasts say, because it lets students listen to lectures wherever they want — in the gym, in the laundry room, on the bus. In theory that kind of portability is powerful. But in reality, a new survey suggests, it might be overhyped.
More than 80 percent of podcast downloads never reach MP3 players, says the Diffusion Group, a technology-consulting firm. Most podcasts, in other words, are still being viewed on computers — unless, that is, they’re being summarily deleted. (Designtechnica)
31 Responses to Podcasts Stay PC-Bound
physioprof - February 29, 2012 at 3:02 pm
I’m doing my best to embrace what Jack Halberstam calls the new ways of being opened up by failure.
Why is it always ridiculously fortunate privileged people who are extolling the virtues of failure?
historiann - February 29, 2012 at 4:32 pm
Sam, do you want to stay in academia, or are you determined to find another metier?
the_honey_badger - February 29, 2012 at 4:43 pm
“I’m doing my best to embrace what Jack Halberstam calls the new ways of being opened up by failure.
Why is it always ridiculously fortunate privileged people who are extolling the virtues of failure?”
Because they imagine (based on the empirical evidence from their magical lives) that *if* they were “challenged by failure” that they would be victorious! And, they probably would be because their friends would start calling other friends and find them a job or loan them their summer place to “think and strategize the second-half of their lives” or any number of socio-economic parachutes would be available to them. They never recognize their privilege on any level and from that position of entitlement, preach it to those below.
And, that is my cynical take on that question this afternoon. You are welcome.
bigtwin - February 29, 2012 at 5:21 pm
Uhoh – don’t enjoy that life outside academe too much. You might just develop a taste for it.
pchoffer - February 29, 2012 at 5:29 pm
There’s always worse–Super Sam: like having a chair collapse under you at your favorite local restaurant and getting eleven stitches because you hit your head on the table next to yours, and the last thing you remembered was people at that table yelling at you to be more careful; Naked Sam: like none of your clothes fitting you any more (nuff said); Terrorist Sam: like when you have so many meter overtime tickets you can’t park downtown anymore; CV Sam: like seeing new hires make more money than you do after 30 years of teaching. Welcome to our world. Peter
Claire Potter - February 29, 2012 at 5:30 pm
My read on this — and I will be hands off in the conversation — is that the guy is saying he *has* failed, in the conventional sense, and he is trying not to take it to heart.
YYYYYY_Y - February 29, 2012 at 5:52 pm
Is this student a Zenith alumnus?
YYYYYY_Y - February 29, 2012 at 5:53 pm
Is this student a Zenith alumnus?
samconcord - February 29, 2012 at 6:29 pm
Re: Historiann — I am not giving up on academia yet since this was only my first year on the market. I am confident in the long run but feeling panic about how to pay the bills in the meantime. Also, like you and TR, I never want to be entirely “in” or “out” of academia, so you are both great examples of what’s possible…
latb - February 29, 2012 at 6:42 pm
There’s actually more to this than you think. There was an article in the NY Times a few months ago that profiled the principal of an expensive private school in New York City (Riverdale I believe) and what he said was that one of his biggest concerns was that these wealthy kids, who had essentially had everything handed to them that they ever wanted, would not be able to deal with their first failure when it came (potentially years down the road).
And that it was thus important to push failure as something natural, something that could be learned from, and something *usual* (like it is for most people!).
For every Sam, who can process their failure at some level, there are a dozen kids who have no idea how to even begin to cope with the slightest setback. That sounds obnoxious, even to me as I type it, but it’s true!
henry_adams - February 29, 2012 at 7:28 pm
Sam, “failure” and “success ” are the wrong concepts for the absurdly bad and overcrowded academic job market. You do your best to prepare, but after that it comes down to luck:
http://chronicle.com/article/Academic-Bait-and-Switch-Part/126914/
Try contacting Karen Kelsky at The Professor Is In for guidance in the job search.
Henry Adams
henry_adams - February 29, 2012 at 7:35 pm
Here’s a link to Karen Kelsky:
http://theprofessorisin.com/
You also should contact Paula Chambers:
http://versatilephd.com/
Henry Adams
history_anon - February 29, 2012 at 7:36 pm
When I was on the market a decade ago, I got well over a hundred rejections (not that I actually got all of them), and in the end, one offer. One is all it takes! Don’t give up yet, and don’t think of yourself as a failure.
maricueta - February 29, 2012 at 7:44 pm
“I’m an ABD, from the Ivy League; not a Phd., just an ABD”"— Congratulations for sticking it out. Strangely, some of your adventures are like mine, but alas, I couldn’t go on with solid, regular cash and nothing to live on after all the disseration and reserch rejections. (It’s a very old tune– I’m an old cowhand– if anyone remembers
tanyaroth - February 29, 2012 at 8:12 pm
Sam, life outside of academia is pretty fantastic. I spent one year on the job market as I finished my dissertation last year (and had an awesome fellowship during that time period). At one point, I thought I’d spend a second year on the market if needed, but I found an awesome job right up my alley outside of academia. Maybe a lot of people I knew in the grad school environment didn’t exactly approve of my making the switch to teach in an independent high school environment, but it turns out it’s perfect for my crazy blend of personality, interests, and love of teaching. If tenure-track is where your heart is, then that’s awesome, but for me, I just wanted to find a career I would love to go along with the PhD I worked so hard for. Good luck with everything!
jliedl - March 1, 2012 at 12:03 am
You still have a sense of humour, perspective and killer writing chops, Sam. I wish there were tenure-track jobs for you and all the other under-employed scholars. My own department is down by 1/3 of our faculty with no new hires in years and little hope of that changing. (But if we ever do get to interview again, I promise that every applicant will get personal follow-up and closure even if it’s not a job offer.)
Good luck with your application for “The Amazing Race”. I hate to say but you’re sounding savvy to say those are better odds to financial security these days.
darccity - March 1, 2012 at 4:46 am
1. Tenured profs cannot ever be forced to retire (the only profession for which that is so)
2. Colleges are dropping tenure as rapidly as they can. It’s down to 30% of faculty nationally.
3. Faculty hiring decision are made, or at least screened by the existing faculty, thus ensuring that the selection is based entirely on the answer to the following inappropriate question: “Which applicant can benefit me (the tenured faculty member) the most without threatening my status and power or ever make me look bad. The best qualified is not a relevant factor (if only because all applicants considered are superior to most of the current tenured faculty). And if by some chance you do get hired, the tenure decision will be base on the very same factors. That’s why the best don’t get hired or promoted.
bander40 - March 1, 2012 at 9:28 am
It’s the same people who talk about the importance of making the “right choices.”
cwillse - March 1, 2012 at 10:45 am
Sam – I found this a really lovely, funny, and moving read. Thank you for your wise words and good cheer.
historiann - March 1, 2012 at 11:44 am
You have a very impressive CV, especailly for an ABD, but the fact of the matter is that with so many impressive Ph.D.s out there, your resume might have been screened out because you haven’t finished yet. I think it’s quite unusual these days to get a job offer as an ABD, and even fairly unusual to get offers without a year or two of VAPping or adjuncting.
My suggestions to you are these, if getting a TT job is what you most want: 1) get your Ph.D., 2) apply for every job for which you are qualified, nationally and internationally, and 3) keep an open mind about where you might go and what you might do there while interviewing. It helps if you are the kind of person who can bloom where he is planted. Too many Ph.Ds limit their job searches because of geographical preferences, personal/family reasons, etc. While these are perfectly legitimate choices, the consequence is that they take themselves out of the running before they’ve ever had a job offer to contemplate.
I never, ever dreamed I would end up in Colorado, but I’ve found lots of things to like about it out here. I am very far away from my archival sources and most of my friends, but it’s worked out for me and those closest to me. Very few people (aside from TR, apparently!) can end up exactly where they started and/or where they most want to be.
One more suggestion: get a letter in your file next year from TR too, if you haven’t yet already.
historiann - March 1, 2012 at 11:45 am
That’s a real bummer, PCHoffer. I’m sorry to hear that you, too, are compressed!
graddirector - March 1, 2012 at 6:21 pm
Well said historiann!
Sam, you need to keep in mind that many faculty jobs get 100 or more applications. By applying to only 35, you have limited your chances greatly of getting a “hit”. Even the most competitive candidates often apply to well over a hundred positions (I applied to 400 over a two year job search). In the end, I got about 15 interviews and 8 job offers. The one I took did not look like the perfect job from the ad, but ended up being so once I visited. Folks often cull out jobs by not applying and don’t know what opportunities they could be missing.
samconcord - March 1, 2012 at 7:32 pm
Historiann and graddirector, thanks for the great advice. I applied to 35 jobs this year (out of about 75 plausible postdocs, VAPs, or tenure-track positions) mainly to avoid getting sidetracked from actually finishing my dissertation. I did not limit myself geographically but instead chose postings that seemed to be the best fit for my work, whether at liberal arts colleges, R1s, or regional comprehensive universities. I did not anticipate it being this difficult.
Next year I will apply to many more jobs (including lectureships and non-traditional postings), but definitely not in the 400+ range like you did, graddirector, since there aren’t that many jobs available these days. But congrats on the 15 interviews and 8 job offers…simply amazing!
samconcord - March 1, 2012 at 8:04 pm
Thanks! I am keeping my fingers crossed on a “campus visit” for Amazing Race.
samconcord - March 1, 2012 at 8:05 pm
Thanks so much!
historiann - March 1, 2012 at 8:55 pm
15 interviews and 8 offers? As Wayne and Garth used to say: We are not worthy! We are not worthy!, graddirector!
tomian - March 1, 2012 at 10:09 pm
I think Randall’s life is magical. He doesn’t give a #%+?, he’s hungry!
As for the rest of your comment, well stated. Privileged thirty-something’s who go all Bartleby after putting off work through years of graduate education bug the heck out of me.
graddirector - March 2, 2012 at 8:00 am
I will note that 8 job offers in my case was only a 2% hit rate when you take into account the huge number of applications I sent out. This is why I would say to anyone serious about the academic job search that they need to apply more aggressively. Also, while it could be as Sam says that there were only 70 jobs open nationally in his field last year, I am skeptical. Positions are often posted in a variety of venues outside of the Chronicle. If there are really only 70 positions total in a broad area of a any academic field with the very large number of colleges in the USA, I certainly understand the angst and resentment that many under or unemployed Ph.D.s express in these pages……
samconcord - March 2, 2012 at 11:03 pm
graddirector, here are the AHA’s stats on jobs last year: http://www.historians.org/perspectives/issues/2012/1201/Small-Signs-of-Improvement-in-Academic-Job-Market-for-Historians.cfm
There were 627 jobs posted (down from 1,064 in 2007-2008) and 912 new Ph.D.s. in History. We are now in the third year of many more Ph.D.s awarded than jobs posted, meaning there is a backlog of qualified candidates. There were 182 postings in all fields of North American History, which leaves even broad areas such as Colonial U.S. in the 75-85 range, if that.
jimdilly - March 5, 2012 at 10:46 am
I am a newly minted PhD at a major research university (in philosophy, no less). I applied to 37 schools, got 8 phone interviews, 3 campus interviews, and one job offer. I am not brilliant, I do not know any of the ‘right’ people, I come from a modest lower-middle class background, and I also come from the midwest, and am thus cursed with a ‘bumpkin’ accent. My dissertation will be read by 5 people and then never read again. Oh, and I have no college teaching experience. I should not have a job.
What I DID do was come into grad school with my eyes wide open. I knew that meritocracy is an illusion, that cultural capital in academia is more valuable, and that complaining about the trials of being a grad student (poor, under-appreciated, over-worked, under-funded, blah, blah, blah) will provide nothing positive in your employment prospects. I understood that giving a good, well practiced, well organized research presentation is more important than giving one laden with brilliant content. I knew that my conversations with faculty at prospective schools would be more important than my publications. I knew that I would likely have to take a job back in the midwest hinterlands from which I escaped. I also knew that my job search would have to be wide and long if it was to be successful.
I also waited. I did not enter grad school until I was 35 and could pay for the emotional as well as financial costs. I have wanted to get my PhD since I was 22 years old, but ‘deserve’ has nothing to do with ‘desire’ and so I waited until I was prepared to do it in more ways than just academics. I have had ‘real’ jobs and know what the ‘real’ world is like outside of the protected bubble of academia. That made me more attractive to my new employer.
NONE of us DESERVE jobs simply because we graduated. We get jobs because employers decide that we offer useful skills to them. Any doctoral student who does not realize that s/he is entering an employment sector that is increasingly competitive should be dismissed from their program. From a purely supply/demand perspective there are too many doctoral students and too many PhDs. If you go into this game you should be prepared for the consequences of that reality.
I am glad that this author did not complain about his plight. To me this indicates that he is actually prepared to be a faculty member (and then he can complain all he wants).
jimdilly - March 5, 2012 at 10:47 am
However, I don’t think he has failed. He simply hasn’t succeeded in getting a job. That’s not failure, is it? I’m with henry_adams; the ‘success’ and ‘failure’ dynamic is neither useful nor relevant anymore.