All of the words I said out loud for S01E27 of Audio Drama Debut, my podcast showcasing new audio drama, fiction and RPG trailers.
F/X - Fountain pen writing, and then being capped. Fire gently crackles in the background.
The Librarian: Hello there, come in, come in. Sit down and pour yourself a cup of Banya-cha. I'm almost certainly going to be asking you lots of questions, so make sure you're not too parched.
You see, we've had a few problems with our new Rating System of Audio Fiction. The idea is that people come in, and give the dramas, books, stories, actual plays and a few other things we have a score out of five. Then we'll have an idea on what the audience likes, what iT doesn't, and maybe we can help recommend things to people similar to what they've rated highly.
However, with all this lockdown nonsense, we've not been able to get people in to rate the shows. We gave out a lot of rating cards, and I'm sure they've all been thinking hard about how they will fill them in, but we obviously had to cancel collecting them up. Always the risk of contamination. Oh here, take this spoon for your tea. Don't worry, I've licked it clean.
This means that in the meantime, we've had to delegate the task to one of our staff, Mr. Fidget. Unfortunately, it would appear he didn't quite understand the concept, and so I've got a couple of hundred shows here that are rated 6, 7 and 8 out of 5. Hell, there's three here rated 9 out of 5. One about a strange town and a missing holiday romance, one where all the stories start with the same line, and finally one about a wounded veteran coming back from Iraq.
Honestly, I think Mr. Fidget is probably our worst employee.
F/X - Pleasing ding.
The Factchecker: This is not true. Mr Fidget is a good boy.
The Librarian: Yes, apparently this isn't sufficiently objective with just me looking after it, so the Director has insisted that this tinpot factchecker observes the process. Anyway, we can't have all of these shows rated above the limit, so I've moderated them all down to a sensible score based on the visitor feedback we do have.
There's not very much, unfortunately, but we do have a single score from a single show that someone seems to have rated in one of our listening stations. They don't seem to have rated it very highly at all - just one star. Still, that show was rated five out of five by Mr. Fidget, so that gives us a baseline to drop everything down. We can adjust all of the other scores based on that one.
F/X - Pleasing ding.
The Factchecker: This is incorrect. The show you describe is not part of the library's catalogue, no matter how often you put it on a shelf.
The Librarian: What? This is my...er that show about a brilliant but humble librarian who saves the world? It only got one star?
F/X - Pleasing ding.
The Factchecker: It is true that the show was rated only one star by the visitor in the listening station, however it is important to recognise that Mr. Fidget rated the show five out of five. This was the only five out of five Mr. Fidget awarded, and it was the lowest score he gave.
The Librarian: Well, in that case, I think we have to accept that the moderation may be flawed. The higher score on that show will have to remain. It will be the only five star show in our catalogue.
F/X - Pleasing ding.
The Factchecker: Not in our catalogue.
The Librarian: Anyway, a few other things that haven't been rated yet are these new trailers, which are what I assume you're really here for.
First is Pulp Fury Radio, a podcast anthology series featuring a range of genres such as Sci-fi, Noir, Mystery & Fantasy. Giving our audience something new, by bringing back something old.
[CLIP - Pulp Fury Radio]
The Librarian: Then Dying Breeds is a mockumentary series about clinging onto the old ways. Your host and roving reporter, Gervaise Sareen, searches out the people and professions of yesteryear to see if their days are numbered, or whether there's life in the old dogs yet.
[CLIP - Dying Breeds]
The Librarian: For this week's RPG, join the Umbral Theater as we explore various worlds and a variety of gaming systems. Whether we're taking down monsters at a surfing competition or battling legions of demons we're bringing you along for adventure!
[CLIP - The Umbral Theater]
The Librarian: And finally Merryweather. Betty is a journalist who gets an interview with a man who murdered 21 people in a mass shooting. He claims that Merryweather, the international candy manufacturer made him do it. Betty starts to realize that there could be more to his claims than she originally thought. From then on she is entangled in a very dangerous conspiracy where she is forced to question who the true monsters among us are.
[CLIP - Merryweather]
The Librarian: And that's that. Please feel free to tell us what you thought of those, preferably with a rating out of five. Tell you what, you can tell us on the Library's Twitter account. It's @TheAmazingLibrarianShow.
F/X - Pleasing ding.
The Factchecker: This is not true. It is @AudioDramaDebut.
The Librarian: Anyway, cheerio!