Helping Out at Humorless Rants

Helping Out at Humorless Rants

A few months ago, I wrote an article announcing Elizabeth’s new podcast, Humorless Rants Podcast Does James Comey Firing. Well, they are gearing up to do their 17th episode and judging from the 16th, it’s really blossomed. Still, their website hasn’t gotten much love. So without really being asked, I have stepped up. (Stepped up, barged in, potato, potauto.)

Elizabeth does the podcast with two other people: Kara and Kevin. She alternates the two as co-hosts. So the last episode was Elizabeth and Kevin, and the next one will be Kara. That’s good; it spreads the work around and adds variety.

Let me make another recommendation to check out the Humorless Rants podcast. It was good at the very beginning. But it’s really blossomed in 16 episodes.

They are also getting good guests for the show. The last show was mostly about Nazis — interestingly recorded before the neo-Nazi rally in Charlotteville, VA. It featured Jesse Turner who has made a deep study of Nazis. The next episode will feature Neera Tanden. That’s a pretty good “get” for a fledgling podcast.

The Humorless Rants Website

Elizabeth asked if I could do something for the show’s blog. I can’t really remember what it was. But she made the mistake of giving me full access to it. That, combined with being something of a WordPress expert and having very little self-control led me to give the site an overhaul.

When I first saw it before, I was confused. It didn’t have any links. There was just a huge header and what looked like the first (default) post of a blog.

I had just written an introduction for the 16th episode, You Can’t Reason With Nazis. But after I published it, I couldn’t find it. It didn’t show up on the first page. This led to me poking around in the admin area of the site.

Behind the Scenes

At first, I was texting with Elizabeth. Since she didn’t seem to mind what I was doing, I just went with it.

I can’t say that it’s current state is great, but it’s usable now — with links to the about, contact, and blog pages. Given that the website is meant to support the podcast, it really ought to be set-up the way Frankly Curious is — with the blog roll on the front page.

The problem with this is that it would eliminate the use of the blog for anything other than posts about podcast episodes — and there is already one. What’s really needed is two blogs: one just for episode posts that would be displayed on the home page, and another with everything else.

This is easy to do if you are hosting your own WordPress install. But Humorless Rants uses WordPress.com. This is my first experience using it, and it does not have nearly as many options as a self-hosted install.

To the Future!

Eventually, I will probably push Elizabeth to change the site to be self-hosted. It all depends upon how involved I am in this. I wouldn’t mind managing the website and writing the episode introductions. It’s nice because there is no real pressure, given that the real product is the podcast.

But regardless, the Humorless Rants website is now in a state where anyone can add to it, and where visitors will be able to find the information they want.

Let me make another recommendation to check out the podcast. It was good at the very beginning. But it’s really blossomed in 16 episodes.

One thought on “Helping Out at Humorless Rants

  1. LOL — “made the mistake of giving me full access to it.” God bless Elizabeth, she’s a warrior for our side, but even I know that if you have access to a website you’ll try to fix it.

    That’s like my volunteer gig at the history park providing golf cart transport to people with mobility difficulties. Of course I’m told repeatedly not to transport anyone with a wheelchair. If 92-year-old grandma is laboring in humid heat to push 91-year-old grandpa, get on the cart, folks. No, other cart drivers should not do this, there are real safety concerns, but fuck that noise, I know what I’m goddamn doing.

    The park manager finally gave up on telling me not to and settled for “be very careful.” Indeed he is correct, and indeed I am.

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