Craigslist.org founder Craig Newmark isn’t known as an audio-visual content creator, but he still got to speak (via webcam) during the Podcast Hotel conference at the Triple Door. His topic: Why he believes bloggers and podcasters can help subvert the corporate news media, by bringing “citizen journalism” to large audiences. To his right, NPR Online worker Robert Spier explained that the NPR.org web site isn’t streaming All Things Considered (it’s in deference to the local affiliates).

Also in attendance at the confab: The legendary former KJR/KUBE DJ Charlie Brown, now in the business of selling PC sound-editing software.

I didn’t learn a whole heckuva lot at the event that I didn’t already know. And I still haven’t committed to creating a MISCcast yet (I’m doing too many under- and un-paid gigs these days). But I met some cool people, and began to fantasize about what any audio adventure of mine might contain.

THE FIRST sign of spring in Belltown–cherry blossoms on First and Second Avenues. Yes, brighter days are ahead.

…the proverbial question: If a thousand right-wing radio hosts are in a forest and nobody hears them, do they make a sound (or just a lot of wind)?

Despite getting their hand-picked choice of a judge, the Repo Men’s attempt to throw out the gubernatorial election failed, at least in pre-appeal mode. As our ol’ pal George Howland reported, the GOPpers’ case kept getting shriller and less substantial as the trial went on. It was as if they expected the judge, and all the people of the state, to be just as gullible and manipulable as talk-radio audiences. Either that, or they ran their side of the trial solely to provide more yelling points for their radio goons, as a long-term PR strategy.

…of the digital media age just might be that onetime symbol of hidebound, bureaucratic broadcasting, the BBC.

According to the alt-media conventional wisdom, when TV and radio ratings decline, major-label CD sales slump, and major-studio movie ticket sales stagnate, it’s supposed to be a hopeful omen toward the impending demise of the “dinosaurs.” But when book sales show a similar slump, we’re all supposed to get outraged n’ frightful that those rubes out there in bad ol’ mainstream America aren’t consuming what’s good for ’em.

The truth lies elswhere.

High, low, and middlebrow content throughout the mechanical (print) and analog (broadcast) media have had to make room in the public “mindspace” for these newfangled digital media (Internet, DVDs, video games, et al.). It’ll all sort out eventually, leaving some investors (of time, energy, and/or money) into various of these media prosprous and others forlorn.

I arrived at the notorious “can of Spam building” on Howell Street, across from Re-bar, promptly at 7:15 a.m. Entercom now runs four stations from the building, including KNDD, where I was supposed to speak.

The 16th floor entrance beheld a permanent sign on the glass doors: DOOR IS LOCKED. RECEPTIONIST WILL OPEN. Only there was no receptionist. There was nobody in sight. Here it was, commercial radio’s most competitive day-part, and the joint seemed deserted.

After fifteen minutes of this ominous/glorious silence, Justin Chamberlin, KNDD’s morning show producer showed up at the door, let me in, and guided me down a thin, steep spiral staircase to the studio.

Down on the fifteenth floor were all the usual radio-station wall decorations—”goofy” promotional displays, Gold Record Awards honoring the station’s part in promoting assorted silly corporate-rock hits. After a short walk we were in the studio, overlooking I-5 and the west slope of Capitol Hill. DJ No-Name briskly introduced himself. I sat at a vacant microphone, quickly donned some headphones, and the interview was underway.

This is an hour at which, if I’m awake, I’m usually incoherent. Nevertheless, I managed to speak at least semi-lucidly for twelve uninterrupted minutes (a rare privilege in bigtime, morning-drive-time commercial radio, as I don’t have to tell you).

I talked about how Cobain wrote that he’d wished he could have been as audience-lovin’ as Freddy Mercury. I listed a few of the most important people in NW music history, such as early recording engineer Kearney Barton. I plugged Loser and The Myrtle of Venus. I mentioned my attendance at Neumo’s for Kim Warnick’s “retirement roast” the previous night. (More about that later, perhaps.)

Then it was time to play another Green Day oldie or whatever. Chamberlin efficiently saw me out the door. My bit to help save an endangered industry was through.

Yr. ob’d’t web-editor will be heard on KNDD-FM, 107.7, this Monday morning at the ungodly hour of 7:15 a.m. Interview topic: The past, present, and future of Seattle music. (I still predict a huge hammered-dulcimer revival in the 2010s, which will cause kids in the 2020s to yearn for the good old days of techno.)

…the stick-in-your-head ad jingle?

Legendary New York Newsday columnist Jimmy Breslin gives some reasons “Why Kerry will beat Bush.”

Mark Crispin Miller insists, “Bush/Cheney have to lose, as all such crackpot movements must. In fact, it wouldn’t be inaccurate to call them losers – as that is clearly how, deep down, they see themselves, for all their would-be macho swagger.”

I’m listening to Air America Radio in stretches as long as I can take. From time to time, I turn it off and listen to happy, upbeat music. (Arling and Cameron, Pink Martini, the Shins, and, of course, the Presidents of the United States of America).

And I’ve found something to keep my eyes away from political blogs, at least for periods of time. I’ve enrolled in National Novel Writing Month again this year. I don’t know if the resulting story will be saleable, but it’s a great exercise. I’ll tell y’all more about it later.

…of This American Life‘s fun-with-fraud report.

…to John Peel, the legendary BBC Radio DJ who “broke” everybody from the Undertones to the White Stripes, and who from all accounts never lost his craving for new and exciting sounds.

…that the Bushies “want no debate. They want no facts, no analysis. They want to denounce and to demonize the enemies that the Hannitys, Limbaughs, and Savages of talk radio assure them are everywhere at work destroying their great and noble country.”

…to believe ex-KVI scandalmonger Mike Siegel is, or ever had been, a “liberal radio talk-show host.”

Air America Radio, “America’s Progressive Talk Radio Network” and home to Al Franken and Janeane Garofalo, comes to Seattle starting Monday. It’ll be on 1090 AM, most recently the site of “Young Country” KYCW, and previously the longtime frequency of the old KING-AM.

It won’t be on in time to strongly affect the elections here. (Washington ceased to be a “swing state” weeks ago, as evinced by the recent paucity of Presidential campaign commercials on local TV). But, with any luck, it’ll be around long enough to drum up public support for progressive ideals, no matter who’s occupying the seats-O-power.

A local radio station has joined in the “podcasting” fad. KOMO-AM offers several feature stories each day in the format, instantly downloadable via an RSS feed.