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LugRadio is a British Internet podcast, recorded every two weeks in Wolverhampton, England, and published in Ogg Vorbis and MP3 formats. LugRadio takes both a serious and humorous look at Linux and events in the free and open source software communities[1], as well as coverage of technology, digital rights and politics. The show was launched in 2004 as a result of discussions between several members of the Wolverhampton Linux User Group. Most releases of the show are licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution Non-Commercial No-Derivatives license[2], but shows released after December 2007 are under the Attribution-Share Alike 3.0 Unported license.[3] On June 30, 2008, LugRadio announced they would be ending the show at their convention, LugRadio Live UK 2008.

The show is presented by Jono Bacon, Stuart Langridge, Chris Procter and Adam Sweet. Jono Bacon and Stuart Langridge are the only two presenters who have been with the show from the beginning, with Jono Bacon being the only presenter to appear on every show. Previous regular presenters were Matthew Revell (Seasons 1 - 4), Adrian Bradshaw (Seasons 2 - 4) and Stephen Parkes (Season 1, and first few shows of Season 2). The show has also featured a number of guest presenters.

Guests have included Ximian co-founder Nat Friedman, Google Open Source program manager Chris DiBona, Sun Head of Open Source Strategy Simon Phipps and Eric Raymond among others.[4]

LugRadio has been a source of controversy, largely due to its irreverent tone. One of the largest causes of controversy when the show started was the swearing and bad languageTemplate:Fact. Originally this language was censored with animal noises, but this censoring was stopped part-way through Season 1.

History[]

LugRadio was conceived by Jono Bacon and Matthew Revell in 2003. The pair met at Wolverhampton Linux User Group and it was agreed that Stuart Langridge and Stephen Parkes would complete the line-up. The first show, called The Phantom Message, was released on 26th February 2004.

To get around limited availability of hosting for distributing the show, the LugRadio team produced a system allowing listeners of the show to easily mirror the show themselves; each episode of LugRadio still uses this mirroring system.

The show has gone on to produce five seasons, each building on the formula of the previous.

Season 1 saw a series of short shows, with each getting progressively longer. For the first part of the season, the swearing was censored with animal noises, but this trend ceased due to the show taking too long to editTemplate:Fact. This was back when the show was released the day after the recording - this recording schedule changed to the Monday following a release later in the season.

In Season 2, the team began interviews, and most shows since Season 2 have included at least one phone interview. These interviews are conducted using a telephone that is passed around the studio, which can often be heard in the recording.

Season 3 saw more series-like segments (a collection of segments around the same subject). This season also saw the presenters working to better plan content for the showTemplate:Fact.

Season 4 continued the formula from Season 3 but included more production valuesTemplate:Fact, with many shows including musical comedy segments. This has included musical versions of Pigeon Street, the theme music and other elements.

With Season 5, the LugRadio team made it clear that they had come to the conclusion that they needed to re-think the formula for the show, keeping the original ingredients, but keeping it fresh. The result of this has been more focus on content, some more expansive technical segments, better production content and additional themes.

On the 30th June 2008, it was announced that the show will end at LugRadio Live 2008, with the presenters saying they wanted to go out on a high.

Media Coverage and Awards[]

LugRadio has previously received coverage in Linux Format magazine, Linux User and Developer magazine and Linux Magazine as well as online coverage by sites such as Slashdot.[5]

LugRadio has been included on the cover CD of Linux User and Developer magazine.[6]

In 2006, LugRadio won the award for Best Marketing Campaign at the UK Linux and Open Source Awards in London[7] and won the award for Best Linux Podcast in the Christmas 2007 edition of Linux Format magazine.[8]

Production[]

When LugRadio started with Season 1, the show was recorded in Jono Bacon's home studio in Wolverhampton. The show was recorded on a desktop computer running Windows 98, Magix Audio Studio and using a Delta 44 sound card. The show used four drum microphones that Jono purchased while on holiday in Florida, and these mics were used right up until Season 5 when they were replaced by Sennheiser mics.

In Season 2, the show switched to using Cubase SX running on Windows 2000.

In Season 4 the show switched to using a TASCAM FW-1894 control surface, Dual Processor Power Mac G4 and Cubase SX on Mac OS X.

Phone interviews use an (as yet unpublished) recording unit that records an analogue phone line. The team have often expressed an interest in using Voice Over IP, but are yet to do so.

LugRadio Live[]

File:LugRadio Live 2007.jpeg

LugRadio Live 2007

LugRadio Live is an annual event organised by the LugRadio team and held in Wolverhampton. It is a Linux, Free Software and Open Source event intended to be fun, without the corporate agenda held by other commercial events.[9] It was first held in 2005 with 250 attendees, 14 speakers and 18 exhibitors including Ubuntu, Debian, KDE and O'Reilly.[10]

In 2006 LugRadio Live saw around 400 attendees, over 30 speakers including Mark Shuttleworth (who arrived by helicopter[11]) and Michael Meeks and 27 exhibitors including Ubuntu, OpenSolaris, KDE, MythTV, Debian, Fedora and GNOME.[12]

LugRadio Live 2007 took place on 7-8th July 2007 at the Light House Media Centre, Wolverhampton attracting hundreds of attendees from around the world. Speakers included Chris DiBona (Google), Gervase Markham (Mozilla) and a representative from the Department for Communities and Local Government.[13]

LugRadio Live USA 2008 took place on 12-13th April 2008 at The Metreon in San Francisco. The wide selection of speakers included many celebrities including Miguel de Icaza, Robert Love.[14] , Ian Murdock, and Jeremy Allison. The show attracted about five hundred Linux enthusiasts from many countries around the world with several traveling from as far as Europe and Australia.

Lugradio Live UK 2008 is scheduled to take place on 19-20th July 2008 in Wolverhampton at the Lighthouse Media Centre, Fryer Street, WV1 1HT

References[]

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External links[]

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