There is an old parable below:
A giant ship’s engine broke down and no one could repair it, so they hired a mechanical engineer with more than 4 decades of experience.
He inspected the engine carefully, from top to bottom. After seeing everything, the engineer unloaded the bag and pulled out a small hammer.
He knocked something gently and the engine came to life again. The engine has been fixed!
7 days later the engineer mentioned that the total cost of repairing the giant ship was $20,000 to the ship owner.
“What?!” said the owner, “You did almost nothing. Give us a detailed bill.”
The bill said:
Tap with a hammer: $2
Know where to knock and how much to knock: $19,998
In any Introduction to Podcasting training I ask whether the idea the student wants to create an audio product around is preaching to the converted, or accessible to anyone. Neither is an incorrect answer, but it challenging to be both. As an example I’ll use the long running Dr Karl Podcast, hosted by Dr Karl Kruszelnicki, Lucy Smith, and scientific guests. Science with Dr Karl has been a weekly segment on triple j, since 2005, and the podcast has 537 episodes. Dr Karl is one of those wonderful souls who is able to make science, on youth station and for nearly two decades, fun, cool and interesting for anyone to listen to.
Some other regulars in the top ten of the Australian Podcast Ranker in a similar vein to Dr Karl are the US’s Stuff You Should Know (up to more than 1500 episodes now) and the Australian anonymously hosted Casefile True Crime, released weekly, and looking at a different true crime case over one or two episodes. A woman I know recently told me that when she arrived from Brazil she was already a huge true crime fan and Casefile True Crime was incredibly helpful in acquirement of the English language.
The Ranker’s No 1, The Hamish and Andy podcast, a comedy / society and culture podcast, is also one that you could pick up and enjoy even if you didn’t know either of the high profile pair.
I get a lot of new, interesting and innovative podcasts come across my desk and so I will be honest (as I was to Rebecca) that when I saw that Bloomberg, the global business, finance and economics publication, were releasing a new podcast simply called Bloomberg Australia Podcast, I couldn’t imagine it being of any interest to me, or being able to create impact in a saturated and competitive market.
Bloomberg Managing Editor Australia / New Zealand / Pacific Islands Rebecca Jones
But then I read the bio (and then went online and read more) about Australia/NZ/Pacific Islands Managing Editor of Bloomberg News, Rebecca Jones, and she piqued my interest. Rebecca started in finance and in stockbroking, talking to clients, giving quotes and placing orders. With what she wryly calls a ‘nerdy’ passion for business, economics and the story behind the stocks, as well as the front end figures presented to us on the news, she decided to pursue journalism as a career, joining Bloomberg in the US 18 years ago, but never losing her Melbourne twang.
Three years ago, mid Covid, she stepped into her current role. She was also completing a PhD at Monash University, not in finance or economics, but in Creative Writing, taking a deep dive into how journalism, history, literature, research, and true crime, could combine. Her project, inspired by the Virginia Woolf essay, “The Death of the Moth“, about the life and death of a seemingly insignificant creature, was interwoven around a probe into suspicious death of her ancestor, an otherwise unknown Danish musician, found partially decapitated in 1873.
A personal beef of mine is that radio, journalism and podcasts aren’t considered “artforms” in the traditional sense. Literature, theatre and music are, but radio and podcasts, which straddle the three previously mentioned, sit, with Baby, in the corner.
After reading Rebecca’s back story I wondered if this weekly podcast that will “lift the lid on the biggest stories shaping Australia’s place in global business, featuring expert views from Bloomberg reporters who draw on the company’s expansive news networks and data intelligence” might offer more than that.
While Rebecca was still working in stockbroking friends would often call her to ask for not exactly financial advice, more an explanation, in layperson’s words, of what the Nasdaq actually does, or means, for example.
She said:
“That was the reason I wanted to this podcast. I was reading other literature, consuming other podcasts. I’m the head of Bloomberg News for Australia and I was feeling like this is not for me. I asked myself, who is this for if not for me? It won’t be for my colleagues, or my friends, who might be too embarrassed to ask what things mean.
The spirit of Bloomberg Australia is inclusive. For the mum and dad that didn’t start their careers with superannuation but are now facing at retirement. For the person starting out in the workforce hearing the news and thinking, ‘I know that’s something important, but I don’t know why’. To explain those topics, the topics that are the biggest in business news each week in Australia, and answering, what does that mean for me?”
Rebecca will be joined by Bloomberg colleagues to discuss most often just one major business topic each week, in an easily accessible fashion, with episodes no longer than 15 minutes. They will be released every Thursday afternoon.
I asked about this too, as I don’t think I’ve ever had a podcast specifically released in the afternoon before. Rebecca said it was about meeting people where they are, often heading home after work, cooking dinner, walking the dog and with 15 minutes to spare around other tasks, and often with privacy.
Bloomberg recently published a magazine story on the billion dollar Bluey phenomenon (subscription required). Alongside the Reserve Bank holding interest rates, and the growth in Australian GDP, these are other examples of stories that Bloomberg Australia will look at more closely.
Rebecca said:
“It’s seeing the business story behind a good story. The Bluey piece exploded! It was who’s got the licence? Where’s it going to go next? What has made Bluey such a success? The podcast I think will have people around the world listening and interested, but that said I’m talking to Australians, and it’s meant for us.”
The first episode of The Bloomberg Australia Podcast is released on Thursday afternoon September 26 and weekly thereafter. You can find it wherever you listen to your podcasts.
In Asia, Bloomberg’s Big Take Asia podcast just won recognition in the Asia Podcast Awards.
Analysis by radioinfo’s Jen Seyderhelm.