Cornelius Ryan – Podcastreporter.com

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In this episode of The Podcast Reporter, we discuss a theme that I do review annually — and that is, in remembrance of the Allied invasion of France in WWII in the battle for Normandy, we reflect on Operation Overlord (i.e., called D-Day — which, for airborne troops, was something that occurred with every combat jump, because every jump was referred to as a “d-day.”). I do this because I, myself, served in the US Army Airborne in the 505th Parachute Infantry Regiment of the 82nd Airborne Division (which was a major unit in the assault over Normandy in the early morning of 6 June 1944). And thus, to the thousands of paratroopers and glidermen that assaulted the Normandy fields, we honor and dedicate this episode to them.

I also was able to know one of the paratroopers who did assault Normandy in operation overlord — in fact, he had made all 4 combat jumps with the 82nd Airborne Division in WWII . His name was Al Essig, and he did pass away several years ago. May he RIP. As a paratrooper some 50 years ago, I do honor and respect the bravery of such men who volunteered to go airborne.

Now, for this episode, I deliver some audio of a book that was written by another paratrooper who served with the 504th Parachute Infantry Regiment of the 82nd Airborne Division. His name was Darrell G. Harris, and he also has passed away a couple of years ago. He wrote a book about his experiences in WWII, and it was called Casablanca to VE Day: A Paratrooper’s Memoirs. DG Harris had made 3 combat jumps — in Sicily, Salerno and Holland (in Operation Market Garden, which mission was immortalized by the book by Cornelius Ryan and movie of the same name called “A Bridge Too Far.”

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The above player, and the one below, are the mp3 files for the audio content of the book by DG Harris, Casablanca to VE-Day: A Paratroopers Memoirs.

Now, Ryan was the same author who also wrote the book, The Longest Day, which was also made into a movie in 1962, with a lot of stars and celebrities playing the actual roles of live veterans from WWII, in portraying both the airborne parachute element and the seaborne invasion on the shores of Normandy. One element that was different and which started a trend in Hollywood movies was that actual Germans spoke German in their portrayal of the Axis side, while British subjects portrayed the British forces, and the French portrayed the French forces. And each group spoke in their native language with English subtitles. So you did not have American or Canadian actors portraying Nazi troops and speaking German (in their broken accents). This has now become a trend in Hollywood to accentuate realism.

So, too, in celebrating the success of this incredible and monumental operation in time of war, we reflect upon the theme that breaking new ground in your medium should be something that you, as a podcaster, should consider in order to drive to success in your area of the podosphere.

By this, we mean that other podcasters are now going forth with the new podcast apps, or with new practices for requesting and getting donations (e.g., using the value-for-value model, which was encouraged and widely used by Adam Curry and John C Dvorak of The No Agenda Show for the past several years — and which other podcasters have now taken up as their own method of getting financial support in the donations from their listeners or “producers”).

So the question we ask now is “what can you do to make yourself different from the rest of the podcasts, in whichever way or manner or activity that you can bring to the table as fresh ideas?”

And if you reflect upon the enormity of D-Day, 6th of June, 1944, many of the activities and tools and tasks of the operation were new and many untried — but the end saw success for the Allies who dared to make the assault at a place and time that was not anticipated by the enemy (or, in your case, the “competition”).

What we would suggest is to have a planning session with yourself to reflect, analyze, plan and commit to a test of planning, producing, publishing and/or promoting your podcast in new ways or with new ideas in order to make your show more successful. If it works, then great! If it does not work, well, you have succeeded in sowing the seeds of perhaps what could be the next task, following, standard or item in the podosphere for others.

So if you are brave enough to plan and execute this new operation — just as the Allies did for Operation Overlord in assaulting Normandy in WWII (in many ways) — perhaps you, too, can achieve a breakthrough success for yourself and maybe for others in the area of podcasting. And we wish you well, as we will look for those who would be doing these types of innovations for success and promoting them.

So, in honor of the 82nd Airborne Division and those who found in the air and on the beaches of Normandy on 6 June 1944, we look forward to remembrance of Operation Overlord (both for the Airborne parachute and glider operations, as well as the beach assault on the shores). Remember, your contribution of creativity could actually turn out to be THE LONGEST DAY for you in podcasting.

Thank you for your attention.

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In this BONUS episode, we discuss a case-in-point that shows how a video that is considered “indirect” can help your business — especially if your entrepreneurship is podcasting or relates to podcasting.

As opposed to a “direct” video that is uploaded to YouTube.com in perhaps your branded channel or personal channel, an “indirect” video is one whose objective and purpose was originally for another party or program that is not yours — but where the popularity and the exposure helped you INDIRECTLY to grow your podcast and grow your business goodwill and promotion.

As my story develops as this example the video that was created was called “Introduce a Bridge Too Far” — and it stuck as my own ID label for YouTube in every type of correspondence in YouTube that occurs to this day (especially in video chat rooms).

In this situation, I had prepared a video that was less than 90 seconds in length and had submitted it in a contest to win the prize of getting to introduce a movie at the Turner Classic Movies Film Festival Conference in the early part of 2014. And the title of the video was promoted by TCM on the YouTube.com site as “Introduce a Bridge Too Far.”

Now, my introduction to the 1977 Joseph E Levine classic film directed by Richard Attenborough and called “A Bridge Too Far” (which was based on the book by Cornelius Ryan) was posted as one of many who submitted videos in the contest to introduce a classic film. Needless to say, I did not win the contest, and thus I did not get to stand in front of the TCM audience at this conference and present the intro for the film before its showing.

However, the result of the video’s broadcast was the same as a video whose purpose was to go viral. On the first day, there were over 24,000 views, and this grew since October of 2013 until February of 2014. And thus, my exposure from this type of medium was a positive impact to both my podcast show of The Podcast Reporter and The Struggling Entrepreneur and my business of Matrix Solutions Corporation in the areas of content creation, video creation for training and podcast consulting. And much correspondence resulted as feedback from not only the TCM audience, but also thousands of YouTube subscribers who were into classic movies, war movies, TCM, etc. — as well as podcasters and listeners in the podosphere.

So, what may be an opportunity for you to create some content (whether video or audio or blog or any medium) could actually result as serendipity for you to get a very positive result from a random act of participation in an “indirect” medium for other purposes that do result in promotion for your business or your show.

Thus, we hope that you as entrepreneurs or podcasters can also experience serendipity in creating content for your business or podcast with an “indirect” objective that can result as a very positive growth for both your bottom line or your podcast show.

Perhaps maybe you can get the same result as I did — but I hope that you will have a better ID or name that will promote you or your business or show directly (as many people ask me why my name or ID was called “Introduce A Bridge Too Far”.

Thank you for your attention.