It’s no secret that I’m a huge fan of the TWIT network and the work of Leo Laporte ever since the good ol’ ZDTV days, and I frequent the TWIT app on my phone. I’ve attempted to emulate his Skypasaurus on my own terms (with hand me down LCDs and CRTs, unfortunately)
As those that listen to the show know, Leo’s been spearheading the expansion of his network there in Pataluma into a larger facility. I watched a recent video by Mr. Loic Le Meur (He’s a French fellow that does Le Web and Seesmic) that was showing off the progress of the renovations, and a little bit about Leo’s strategy and goals for the network.
Why should you care about Leo’s success? It’s the opportunity. It’s an outline as to what building something for yourself can be. This Week in Tech’s network is littered with personalities and journalists that seem to be refugees from mainstream media and other bigger online outlets bought by the bigger fish (like CNET now belonging to CBS).
His path has served as something of an inspiration to me, as I’ve served to attempt to build out something similar, but in my own direction, and tapping into the community around me here in Pittsburgh, but on a shoestring budget.
“I’m building a playhouse for myself”
If that isn’t the ultimate goal, I don’t know what is. Who doesn’t want to wake up in the morning, do what they want to do, as Leo puts it “..without having to ask for it” The ability to not answer to a higher up to server your niche that you’ve carved out for yourself, as he has with tech news. You see all sorts of networks popping up, such as 5by5> and Grizzly Bear Egg Cafe filling in those niches with people talking about what they want to and not having to answer to anyone. Maybe as a true venture. Maybe as an outlet to the creative restraints of their day job as mine started out as.
It’s fantastic to see something built from the ground up, from an audio “studio” in his attic (which I feel akin with my basement setup) to this large facility. You’ve seen the number and variety of shows grow, and configurations shoe horn into the TWIT cottage space. Watch what he’s done, read his wiki, and the same with these other podcasts. The big ones and small ones. You’ll learn a thing or two about how to achieve your own goals.