CarolineEAnd

"...or he's already had it down because he's been a door-to-door Phish missionary for the past few years." Julia, I believe you mean phissionary. NAILED IT!

@Matt Both, if that makes sense. Scott kind of explains it in the video, but it's a way to classify one-off podcasts, special events, and more. They will each be individual podcasts with their own identities.

How does Analyze Phish sound? http://www.earwolf.com/episode/analyze-phish/

I figured we could share reviews and rare finds in our search for Summah Gum. I just tried out Orbit Strawberry Remix. DEFINITE contender. How about youz guyz?

Fanta makes a lot of good points, but let's also look at it this way: You want to introduce a friend to Comedy Bang Bang. You COULD just send them the link and hope that they listen to it themselves. But sometimes I'll find myself in the position of wanting to share a specific bit with a friend. I can remember times I've been at a friends apartment and I've played them iBrain or a particularly funny Would You Rather. In that case it is up to the friend to be so intrigued by what they heard in 2-5 minutes to put the effort into listening to a whole podcast. . I suppose my thinking is that Frank and Peter picked out 10 podcasts that are clearly good. Each of the ten had the potential to win and be part of Earwolf or else they wouldn't have been chosen. You'd think that as part of the Earwolf workforce I'd be ultimately concerned which who is going to win, but I'm actually finding myself more compelled by the coachings and discussions than with the results. Perhaps I fear that two sedentary judges with one guest judge would provide fewer viewpoints and less discussion. . It is all conjecture at this point, and I hope that my posts don't come across as shutting anyone elses opinion down. I think everyone has really neat ideas and I'm glad that the discussion is happening! Maybe I'm simply enjoying the current season so much that I don't want to see changes made and that's why I'm defending the structure so much.

Jamesy moved to NYC!

RE: Palooka- Personally, as someone who has been in a lot of judging scenarios and gets really emotional, I'd be glad to have the time to collect myself and calm down before I had to speak. Maybe I'm more emotional than most people (I definitely am) but to me the idea of being told you are eliminated and being immediately called upon to be articulate and grateful sounds awful.

Allan and Angela are both on my "list" (doesn't actually exist) of people I wish were on more podcasts. I was DYING laughing at this episode. Also, if you haven't seen this video of Allan, err, Bane Copperweird, check it out:

As someone who has listened to a bunch of Totally Laimes, the drops are used totally ironically and inappropriately and the guests always enjoy them and find them hilarious. They have about 5 (pac-man dying, Hallelujah, sheeeeee-it, Windows start up noise, etc) and like Rob said, it's similar to Scott's too-long (or not long enough, in my opinion) song intros.

-I don't disagree that two long-term judges would be good, but listeners are only going to listen to one episode and make a judgment so it's something the podcasts should be prepared for. It amazes me how many NEGATIVE iTunes reviews go up the day after the FIRST episode of a podcast. If someone doesn't like it they give it 0 stars and a mean comment. Listeners make judgments on one episode (if that). I've definitely given up on podcasts within 10 to 15 minutes. It's accurate for how the podcast will be received by listeners.

-Well, look at Totally Laime who already had a recurring segment but made a new one that would better fit the challenge. If you want to use the American Idol metaphor (and I haven't watched American Idol since Season One, so bear with me), there will probably be weeks where a contestant has sung an, I don't know, Aretha Franklin song for years at karaoke so they immediately know which song they'll do and how to stylize it, whereas other weeks they might not even know who Burt Bacharach is. I don't think this challenge was necessarily poised against people who don't have recurring segments, as two of the bottom three were using segments they already had.

Well then I hope Greg Behrendt is a guest judge (he has a bit about Tim Tams, for those who aren't ridic nerds)!

@Daniel: Soccer? Don't you mean footy? NAILED IT! Hey, Tim Tams, amirite? I am SO culturally diverse you guyz!

Throw in a couple of shorter ones, you guys. Pithy is almost always funnier and think about the length of the submissions that usually get read on air.

I CAN'T GET THE CAP OFF!

Ben, you can read about that on the Blog: http://www.earwolf.com/category/the-earwolf-challenge/

Oh my god! How GREAT would an episode with Bob Ducca and Marissa Wompler be? Oh wow....

A train on rolling skates seem so sad. Don't cry, rolling skate train.

This episode made me think about my favorite sketch shows and what they did that constituted "recurring segments." My favorite show of all time, sketch or no, is The State. I guess you could call the "Hi, We're The State" pieces Michael Ian Black did as recurring segments, although I think there are just 4 or 5 of those in total. You could maybe say Louie or Doug or Barry & Levon, but they didn't show up all too often either. What do you guys think?

I'm with Buddy about Cole and Vanessa. Especially Vanessa. Please Vanessa.

I think like many people, my response to meeting all the Challenge contestants was "I HAVE TO LISTEN TO ALL OF THESE PODCASTS NOW!" so I figured I'd start a thread for good starter episodes. I'll start off by suggesting a few good Totally Laime starter episodes: Paul F. Tompkins is their guest this week which...I mean, come on! You know the deal with him (he's great). In their introductory sample they used bits from the Aubrey Plaza and Adam Pally episodes. Those are both tons of fun. Lastly, Earwolf favorites Harris Wittels and Paul Scheer have both guested and their episodes are super great. I read a lot of forum posts from listeners saying that they've been listening to Totally Laime since Wittels appearance, so it's definitely an addictive episode. What do you guys think? I read a lot of comments from The F Plus fans. What's a good starter episode for that one?

Sean, you're thinking of Steve Oedekerk who did the thumb videos. Two totally unrelated people.

I really love the conversation going on in this thread. Something that I've seen echoed by several posters that is especially impressive and comforting to me is the emphasis on positivity. I agree with many of you in that I'd rather hear comedy stem from celebration rather than the breaking down of something. I can certainly get my snark on, but my sensibilities are less Gawker and more HelloGiggles if that makes sense (it probably does to one person). Something that I enjoy about Earwolf programs is that even when it approximates negativity it doesn't become judgmental or hateful. HDTGM generally stays more in the "HOLY SHIT" range than the "THIS SUCKZ" and Who Charted is 1 part "Who listens to this??" and 9 parts "What would you do if your kid changed his name to Afrojack?". I'm glad that this quality is being noticed and valued by other listeners. Now off to listen to Belle & Sebastian and talk about sunshine...

I'd compare judging sound quality in this challenge to judging an outfit on Project Runway based on a big stain. If the stain is big enough, nobody will notice the garment. It's the first thing that draws your eye and needs to be fixed. Plus, it might demonstrate carelessness on the part of the designer which is symptomatic of a larger problem. I only watched one season of Project Runway, so I'm not sure why I chose that analogy.

I'm pretty sure Paul did the Matzah bread rap and Ken did the "yeahs"