In our last lot of feedback, Chris said not to make our post titles so generic, so here I am with a punny title. What next as in its a Beta Presenation explaining what happened next from the pitch… but it’s also the name of our digital artifact… funny right?
Anyways, moving on from my lack of good humour. Our digital artifact, What Next? is a podcast about conspiracies. It then makes a link to the future including potential happenings, suspicions, and predictions. The idea is that conspiracy theories are something that almost everyone is interested in, so we want to educate them on different ones and how they will still be relevant in our lives and future in five, ten, even twenty years.
What Next? is available to listen to here, it is also available to listen on Apple and Google Podcasts.
TIANA PAOLETTI 
Hey Tiana,
Before I move onto specific feedback about your DA, I just wanted to give some quick feedback regarding the beta presentation itself. Firstly, you did a great job of showing how you responded to pitch feedback and iterated your project as a result. You also presented very well just by speaking as you didn’t use many visual aids which can be difficult to do, so well done. I also liked how your blog post gave contextual information such as how your podcasts are relating to the future etc. while your actual video focused more on your project prototyping, so again well done on using your mediums efficiently. The way you’ve set up your blog is also top notch.
I love the idea of conspiracy podcasts. Myself and the other executives of the Digital Media Society are also recording podcasts for our DA and our most recent one included a spontaneous segment on conspiracy theories! So you’re definitely correct when you say that many people enjoy conspiracies, particularly university students so your social utility is spot on. If it helps with coming up with future episodes, here’s a list of some interesting conspiracy theories that you might like to cover:
The Reichstag Fire: https://yesterday.uktv.co.uk/blogs/article/who-really-started-reichstag-fire/
9/11: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/9/11_conspiracy_theories
NASA Moon Landing: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Moon_landing_conspiracy_theories
Titanic: https://www.history.com/news/titanic-sinking-conspiracy-myths-jp-morgan-olympic
Simulation: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Simulation_hypothesis
I’d also recommend visiting forums such as Reddit to find new ideas or even a potential audience, as conspiracy theories are niche (but also controversial at times), so they aren’t widely spoken about on platforms such as Facebook or Twitter. Here’s a link to the official conspiracy subreddit which has over 870k members: https://www.reddit.com/r/conspiracy/
I look forward to listening to your future iterations! Cheers,
– Alex
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Hey Tiana,
I actually really like your idea on conspiracy theories, they’re interesting and open a lot of discussion onto what they are, especially with connecting with audiences. I guess the only thing to be careful with is to make sure there is a line and tone with your podcasts into how you will adress them, either in a comedic or serious tone, and to make sure the topics are of interest.
I suggest looking at The Joe Rogan Podcast https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCzQUP1qoWDoEbmsQxvdjxgQ He has a lot of guests, even talking to his audience about different conspiracies. The Alex Jones episode is the craziest, a long one, but does bring a lot of conspiracies if you have time to look at it for ideas
I would also suggest the flat earth theory, theres a netflix documentary on it, and was really interesting to see the people suggesting different theories based on one whole theory itself.
A good Australian conspiracy theory is the Yowie, the Australian Bigfoot, its pretty interesting because people claim not that long ago to seeing a Yowie, I think thats an interesting Australian conspiracy https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Yowie
Excited to see what becomes of your DA and hope to listen to your first ep. soon
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Hey Tiana,
Your DA sounds really interesting and I’m excited to listen to the series! I love the idea of doing a podcast, as you said it makes getting your point across a lot easier. Choosing a topic like conspiracy theories will definitely open you up to an engaged and loyal following. I think to understand the exact type of audience you’re trying to create for will help your podcast have the most success. I found this studying that examined people’s motivates for believing in any conspiracy theory https://econtent.hogrefe.com/doi/10.1027/1864-9335/a000306. This could be helpful in also discussing the fandemonium surrounding conspiracy theories.
Another interesting research, by Sage paper, Political Extremism Predicts Belief in Conspiracy Theories looked at if ‘extreme political ideologies, at either side of the political spectrum, are positively associated with an increased tendency to believe in conspiracy theories.’ https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/full/10.1177/1948550614567356. In one of your follow up episodes I feel it would be ideal to add these types of insights into the podcast to give your listeners a well-rounded look into the concept of conspiracies and would be a bonus to use this to analyse if these factors are why conspiracy theories will be prevalent in the future.
I’m not sure if you have already written your scripts for the next podcasts but if you did want to go down the true crime path and keep it within Australia a great topic to use could be the Ivan Millat conspiracy theory. This has recently come back into the media news cycle and I would love to hear your thoughts on it through the podcast.
https://www.abc.net.au/mediawatch/episodes/who-dunnit/10325828
https://www.who.com.au/real-ivan-milat-wynn-kaaspercheck
I’m really excited to see your final DA. I think it would be great!
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