Tag: blog

Cast of the Week VI

CotW VI
You’ll find all the nominees for this week at https://ykyz.com/c/na?faveOf=cotwvi

u/Mattasher writes:
Before we get to the winners of Cast of the Week VI, I’d like to send some shoutouts to folks who made our week this week:

Shoutout to Conner u/lifebitespodcast who brought in Paul Sating, our very first AmA guest. For more information about our AmA program, send us an email.

Shoutout to Joanie, who opened up a second microcast under the name CriminalCreatures, to help answer the age-old question of when should pigs be hanged for their wrongdoings.

Shoutout to Violaceous Curiosity, who took the bait from last week’s edition and seeded the definitively NSFW channel, MFK. A reminder to everyone that you can start new channels anytime you like, on the fly. Just type in the channel name at the end of the URL and go.

And now, on to the winners. But first, the runner’s up.

Ep 44 How a Gemini Takes A Compliment- Skit by Astrocast By Diz
In this fun mini-skit, Diz does her best to peg Gemini’s, and asks that other age-old question, “What grown man wears Sketchers?” I’d also recommend Diz’s other astrological one-act episodes.


EP 62 Drug Smuggling on a cruise by Dancing Bartender
In this episode, the Dancing Bartender tells the story of some Canadians who smuggled more than a little cocaine into an Aussie port of call, wherein their party comes to an abrupt halt.


EP92 IKEA by ThatbeardedSwede
When Fredrik started his microcast, I expected it would take no more than a week to get to the main event, IKEA, and soon after that I expected our favorite Swede to go off-road and leave behind his Nordic Kingdom as a topic. Instead, Fredrik found nearly a hundred fascinating episodes about life in Sweden before hitting his informative IKEA ringer and shows no signs of deviating from a topic that’s proved to be much richer than I ever expected.


And now, on to the winners:
Second Prize
Ep52 Twinings Tea – Drink Like A Royal by SnippetsWithSophia
 In this well researched, perfectly scripted episode, Sophia takes us on a historical journey into the origins of British tea and tells us how to drink like a Royal, so long as we’re willing to part with a few Pounds and put up with the pungent smell of Earl Grey blend.  


Grand Prize
Ep23 Black Tax by Asi Voluptuous Voyager
In this episode, Asi discusses the tricky dynamic when family ties are turned against children who manage to escape from poverty, and now-grown-up kids are morally blackmailed into paying a “tax” of financial gifts to those left behind.

Asi’s episode is wonderfully specific in its details, yet universally understandable in terms of the emotional dynamics it sets up, and, as I know from personal experience, this is a phenomenon that extends well beyond the black communities of South Africa.

Cast of the Week III

CotW III winners

Before we get to the winners, some general notes:
• All microcasters, paid or unpaid, are eligible, except for Prospectors (see https://ykyz.com/blog/index.php/microcaster-levels/)
• To be considered for a prize, you must have proper episode titles and have set your email and avatar. Unfortunately this week we had to exclude some wonderful nominations on that basis.
• When choosing winners, we first narrow down the field by removing casts with poor audio quality or a topic that has connection to your microcast theme.

You will find all of the nominees for this period at: https://ykyz.com/f/cotwiii

Because this was an extra long period, we’ve added more winners and runner’s up than usual. We had lots of great nominations, but a handful of them really shined.

Here’s u/mattasher with descriptions of this week’s winners. We begin with the runner’s up:

EP. 32 Skincare Emergencies by Brown Skin Pearls. This tightly crafted, interesting episode introduces us to new uses for feminine wash.


Ep. 45 Side Hustle by IAmMillennial. Jonathan perfectly captures the moment many of us find ourselves in, where trends in tech and economics have led so many of us to become gig workers of one kind or another.


EP53 VR Gaming by NerdyOldGuy. Joel drew half-a-dozen responses for his personal take on virtual reality gaming and motion sickness.


Finally, a shoutout to ykyz’s own Teresa (ThatOneGirl) for her excellent four-part series A Place called Ohio).

And now, on to the winners! Because this was a longer period, we’ve picked two second prize winners.

Second prize
EP59 The right of public access by ThatbeardedSwede. Here’s another lovely slice of life episode from or favorite Swede. This episode discusses the tradition and laws related to public access on private property, including the right to pick berries and mushrooms. We also highly recommend ThatbeardedSwedes’ other nominated episodes on Fika and The Stockholm Syndrome.


Ep13.Spicy Food by staplezz1301. This episode mixes the author’s personal relationship to spice with a view of spiciness as a metaphor for Mexico in general. As staplezz1301’s asks, “What’s life without a little bit of spice”.


Grand prize
EP06 a ruler by fashionmusings. This well researched, high effort episode focuses on a fascinating intersection of fashion, politics, and history. Who knew there used to be cops wandering around South Korea armed with scissors to give hippy scofflaws an on-the-spot trim?


Congratulations to fashionmusings and all the other winners and runners up. Keep your eye out for great episodes for next week’s contest!

Cast of the Week II

Cast of the Week (CotW) winners

All CotW entrants are nominated by you, and chosen by ykyz founder u/mattasher.

You can always find the most recent nominees at:
ykyz.com/f/castoftheweek

u/mattasher writes:

We had lots of great microcast episodes this past week! But before we get to the winners, I want to highlight a few non-microcast Bleats. The most interesting conversation starter of the week was Amandalotta’s “iPhone for littles?” which drew lots of strong opinions about kids owning expensive cellphones. Feel free to check it out for yourself.

Amandalotta also asked the vital question, Where do you find a dog with no legs? See the answer for yourself.

Special mention also goes to ThatOneGirl for her 4-bleat series on “The Demon Midwife”, a fascinating story that just missed the deadline for last week’s Cast contest.

Runner’s up for CotW:

Ep.4 Life Bites – Story Idea by Life Bites Podcast
Conner presents an interesting dilemma, Do you wake up a sleeper only to tell them that the world is about to end?

EP4 Travel Skincare by Brown Skin Pearls
Clare provides practical, specific advice about skincare and travel. Solid, informative, interesting.

Ep. 19 YouTube by IAmMillennial
IAmMillennial swears he doesn’t fall down YouTube rabbit holes, then takes us down his most recent YouTube rabbit hole, babies sneezing. Who knew that was a thing?

Second place:

EP35.Homeschool vs Public School by ILoveEveryone
ILoveEveryone presents a single strong, well researched argument related to equity and state funding of public school, vs the lack of support for home school students.

First place:

Ep29 Music and Peace by Music and Peace
Addie gives an impassioned, yet calm and thoughtful meditation on gatekeeping in music. Perfectly scripted and well recorded, Addie’s plea for opening up the musical garden to all those who want to admire it, is worth listening to at least twice.

Some final thoughts this week about the microcast. Some of you are beginning to get the hang of the format, and to dominate it. As you go about producing your episodes, keep in mind the distinction between microcast episodes and Bleats generally. General Bleats are about conversation. Microcast episodes present information and perspective. They may ask for feedback, but they aren’t just topic starters to kick off a conversation. Note in particular how The Broken Down Starship’s outstanding “Biggest Disappointment” episode introduces a topic, then does much more by going into details about the topic generally, and outlining a specific case of disappointment with well-thought-out context.

Cast of the Week I

Winners of the “Cast of the Week” contest

Today marks the end of the first contest for the best microcast of the week. Thank you to everyone for nominating episodes!

You can always find all most recent nominees:

ykyz.com/f/castoftheweek

Note there are two pages of nominations. We created this list using the new ykyz favorites feature. See if you can figure out how to favorite Bleats and view your list of favorites.

Before we get to the winners, here are the runner’s up from last week:

EP9 Guilty Pleasures by Life, Love, & Vibes:
This fun episode goes through the top three guilty pleasures of microcaster Life, Love, & Vibes.


EP5 On Fandoms by The Broken Down Starship:
In just one minute, this insightful episode captures the complicated dynamic between fandoms and their shows. 


EP21-Gingerbread by ThatbeardedSwede: 
This lovely, mouth watering episode by ThatBeardedSwede hit all of our senses, and left us with a warm glow of nostalgia.


Ep12 Music and Peace by Music and Peace:
In this tightly scripted, densely informative episode, Addie gives us a great introduction to the intersection of music and peace in the 60’s.

And now, on to the winners!

Second prize goes to:

Ep 1.8 Hygge by 60 Second Shalom:
This delightful microcast episode gives a rich description of a Scandinavian term that means “the pursuit of everyday happiness”. Well recorded and perfectly paced, this sixty-second slice gave us lovely introduction to an idea that resonated with many other ykyz’ers.

First prize goes to:

Ep. 7 Introvert Nation by IAmMillennial:
In this episode, IAmMillennial nails the microcast format with a perfect mini-intro, high quality audio, and a well scripted text. The episode is fun, engaging, and despite the short length takes us on a mini-journey that captures a slice of IAmMillennial inner life, and of the times we live in.


Congratulations to 60 Second Shalom and IAmMillennial. Your prizes will be sent out today!

Keep your eye out for great episodes this coming week, and let us know if you referred any of the winners or runner’s up.