News from Reading University:  Provisional statistics from the Met Office show 2012 was the second wettest year in the UK national record dating back to 1910, just a few millimetres short of the record set in 2000.

The University of Reading is home to both the Department of Meteorology, one of the leading centres for the study of weather and climate in the world, and the Walker Institute for Climate System Research, which oversees research into the causes and effects of climate change.

Professor Nigel Arnell, Walker Institute Director, University of Reading said:

“Rainfall has increased in recent decades over many parts of the Northern Hemisphere and we’re seeing rain falling in heavier bursts. The record-breaking weather in the UK in 2012 fits with that picture, and we’ve seen the effect of all this rain with disruptive flooding across many parts of the country.

“While rainfall varies naturally from year to year and decade to decade, there is increasing evidence that the build up of greenhouse gases in the atmosphere is starting to affect rainfall across the globe.  That means we are likely to see flood frequency increase further.  The sort of wet winters we currently see over Northern Europe just once every 20 years could happen almost every other year by the end of the century, but curbs on global greenhouse gas emissions could significantly reduce the expected increase in flood risk.”

2012 was a year of contrasts in the UK – austerity, welfare cutbacks, dreadful weather, press intrusion, but we also had the feelgood factor of the Olympics and the diamond jubilee.  Pod Academy’s podcasts tracked these issues, turning to research and academia to explore things in more depth – check out, for example,  Ruth Lister and Fran Bennett on poverty, Angela Phillips on the Leveson Inquiry  and Sunder Katwala on British identity.

In 2013 Pod Academy will continue to look behind the headlines, to give you the backstory on current issues.  If you are an academic with research that you think will enlighten and entertain, that throws new light on stories in the news, contact us at thepod@podacademy.org.

Roger Howard, Chief Executive of the UK Drug Policy Commission writes:

If you have more than a passing interest in (illicit) drug policy, you could be forgiven for thinking one of two diametrically opposed things at the moment.

If you naturally gravitate to the anti ‘war on drugs’ camp you are probably feeling pretty good at the moment. Two states in the US (Washington and Colorado) recently voted to legalise the production and sale of marijuana and some 18 states doctors are allowed to prescribe medical marijuana. In Uruguay, the government has taken the unprecedented step of tabling legislation to licence growers manufacturers, distributors and purchasers of cannabis so that in 2014 you’ll be able to register as a cannabis user and be able to buy the monthly equivalent of about 20 cannabis spliffs . And on top of this, a widening group of South American political leaders is challenging the US drug policy hegemony. The Organisation of American States has taken the previously unthinkable step of setting up a task group to look at different drug policy options, even though the US remains firmly against so-called ‘legalisation’. All of this might give you hope that the mass incarceration, drug fuelled crime and global ill-health, whether physical or psychological might just be at a crucial tipping-point in the history of drug policy.

On the other hand, if you are of a somewhat ‘nervous’ disposition, you may be thinking this could be the start of a very slippery slope, where the supposed insatiable demand for mind-altering drugs will further undermine societal cohesion and damage lives. You will probably have at the back or even front of your mind worries about the perverse consequences and impacts that have flowed from the commercialisation of tobacco, alcohol and even some pharmaceutical products.  Look at the new problems we are seeing from the overprescribing of prescription drugs you will say.

In truth, as Sue Pryce book, ‘Fixing Drugs-The Politics of Drug Prohibition’  and my own Commission’s recent report,  ‘A Fresh Approach to Drugs’  (UK Drug Policy Commission www.ukdpc.org.uk ) show, there is no simple or silver bullet for fixing drug policy. It is not a ‘solvable’ problem but rather one where incremental steps to reduce harms and get people to behave more responsibly in their drug use behaviours are, probably, realistic goals. And as Sue and I discuss in the interview, there are still some very practical things that governments, politicians, the media, professionals and the public can do to help steer our country’s drug policy through a fast-changing and challenging world. Because ,as we are all too familiar with, psychoactive drugs now reach in to every nook and cranny of 21 century British life.

Maarten van Schaik writes: Lord Leveson’s two-thousand page report was published on 26th November 2012, putting a fuse in the barrel of gunpowder lying under the political debate about press freedom and journalists’ ethics.  Lord Leveson called for the introduction of a new regulatory body, which had been strongly lobbied for by Hacked Off and Media Reform. They consequently wrote positive press statements on the report. But the recommendations go against the wishes of the Press Complaints Commission (PCC) to keep regulation tied to the media industry itself.

To facilitate the creation of Leveson’s independent regulator, new legislation is required.

It is the prospect of this new legislation that has lit the fuse under the political debate.  The Prime Minister has rejected the recommendation, saying it would infringe  Britain’s tradition of press freedom and democracy. The Liberal Democrats – the Conservative’s coalition partner – have however released a conflicting statement, embracing the call for new legislation. In this, they are supported by the Labour Party as well as dissident members from the Conservative Party. Mr. Cameron’s stance on its recommendations and the turmoil the Leveson has created in the House has made it to the international headlines. With this in mind, we went back to Angela Phillips, Reader in Journalism at Goldsmiths, University of London, who we had interviewed for our recent piece on the Leveson Inquiry.

She applauds the recommendations of the Leveson report as it allowed for the introduction of an independent arbitration process for complaints of libel and invasion of privacy, so they could be resolved without the costly business of going to court.   Phillips sees the legal changes needed, and the introduction of an independent organisation, as a move towards greater press freedom, not a restriction on it.

What do you think?  Would new legislation be a good thing, strengthening free speech or would it undermine some of the very foundations on which British society is built?

If you have not listened to our interview with Angela Phillips on the Leveson Inquiry just yet, you can do so here.

One of the Pod Academy’s main aims is to inform current debate with academic research.  That is why in the week that the Leveson Inquiry report is being published, we have an interview with Angela Phillips, Reader in Journalism at Goldsmiths, and one of our Board members, providing background on the phone hacking scandal.

Angela suggests that the tabloid press’s illegal activities need to be understood in the context of the dwindling sales figures of newspapers, that it was easy and cheap to find out what celebrities were doing by hacking their phones, and it enabled the tabloids to compete directly with the innuendo and gossip on the internet – to which they were losing their readers.  In her view, this is all part of the death throws of the dinosaurs of the old media, clawing each other and everybody else to death while they try to keep their audiences on board.

So phone hacking was the canary in the mine – newpapers are dying.  In 10 years time, will we all be reading the news, listening to the news and viewing the news on our tablet computers?  Join the debate.

Will Viney writes:  In recent years the range of skills required to be a successful academic have broadened and academics are now expected to keep up and  interact with a rapidly changing media environment. There may have been a time when a doctoral student could have spent years, maybe even their whole career, not completing their PhD thesis. Holed up in a library somewhere discussing their work with a small number of like-minded specialists; a time when ‘public engagement’ probably meant going for dinner with the college Master and his wife. Thankfully, things have changed. Now under the twin pressures of fiscal austerity and global competition, pursuing an academic career is dominated by the demand to make research publicly accessible, relevant and ‘engaging’ for those both in and well beyond any one discipline or audience.  But how are .

Mountain Chief Making a Phonographic Record, 1916. Courtesy of Library of Congress Prints and Photographs Division

young academics expected to fair in this claustrophobic environment – teaching, researching, administrating, publishing, applying for yet another short-term contract, andbeing some kind of media darling? There are no easy solutions but many have found that fostering new research subjects, realising that you’re not in direct competition with everyone, exploiting the intellectual gaps left after decades of disciplinary protectionism and a willingness to make the most of new technologies, to be fantastic ways to reach a bigger audience, demonstrate the relevance of their research to others and to have a meaningful impact on the formation of public opinion.

Many of the podcasts that Pod Academy produces feature young academics that are making the most of the speed, simplicity and flexibility of academic audio. Pod Academy has also teamed up with Engentia to provide media training. As part of the OPEN course, we have seen graduates and early career academics start the day in a room of strangers and end that day having conceived a new collaborative project, planned, recorded and edited a podcast, and then broadcast that podcast to everyone for their feedback. Our work with Engentia is meant to help others make a pleasurable noise about their work, giving advice on how to develop academic research for a non-specialist audience, along with instruction on how to use recording devices and editing software, and how best to utilise the free resources that are available online.

Many are rightly cautious that ‘going public’ in this way might simply distract from the basics – doing research and pursuing more recognised research outputs. The success of Nigel Warburton’s Philosophy Bites or René Wolf’s Backdoor Broadcasting shows that there is a huge quantity of fascinating, academically-driven audio out there, much of it complementary to the seminars, papers, chapters and books that academics must write to survive. Moreover, the success of the OPEN programme has shown how producing podcasts is far from being a mere distraction. Podcasting hones invaluable skills in communication and collaboration, it can allow new ways to express research findings and reach audiences that may not have access to university libraries or journal subscription services. Podcasts are by no means a magic bullet for those squaring up to funding cuts and government assessment, but they open up new ways of communicating just how interesting academic research can be.

Mike Brown, one of Pod Academy’s producers, writes: A transcript is all part of the service – we make the podcast and then transcribe it, adding links and additional information.   Sometimes the podcast producer will do it , while other times another team member takes over.  It’s probably true to say that transcribing is everyone’s least favourite job!

Transcribing interviews makes you very aware of pacing. While an interviewer usually has prepared questions and experience in production, interviewees come from various professional backgrounds and vary widely in their delivery. Some speakers change pace unexpectedly or correct themselves on the spot. You also have to account for accent, background audio and what the speaker is likely to have said given the context.

You have to mentally dedicate yourself to it. It’s not the sort of thing you can half-heartedly trundle out thinking about your plans for dinner tonight. The routine I follow is straightforward: closed door, headphones on, big mug of tea, and a computer screen with a blank document and a podcast open. You ease into a rhythm of pause-play-pause as you type away trying to get everything down. A few hours later, I resurface beaming with pride. That’s the plan at least. Any lapse in concentration and the process grinds to a halt.

Afterwards it gets sent through to the rest of the team for checking and formatting. Assuming everything is fine, the process starts all over again for the next one. With any other clip it would probably be dull and tedious, but the variety of content means every time a new podcast arrives in my inbox I know it could be about absolutely anything. Walking tours, community development, modern atheism…you come away having learnt something new every time, and that’s the motivation behind losing evenings to a task that would drive even the best mad.

If you’d like to volunteer to transcribe one of our podcasts, please get in touch – thepod@podacademy.org.

Welcome to the first entry in the Pod Academy blog. This section will be updated regularly with news about what the team’s been working on and what can be expected in the future.

We are an independent, not-for-profit platform for podcasts on academic research. Our podcasts cover a broad range of topics, from left-handedness to national identity to laws on feminism. Guest speakers have included lecturers, writers, activists and academics, and the list is ever-expanding.

PodAcademy has been noticed by several leading professionals and journalists, and was featured in Times Higher Education. The publication described the project as “a clever clearing in the fraught jungle of academic publishing”, referring to Pod Academy’s unique output model  – a podcast plus a transcript with links to further information.

If you are an academic with interesting research to share, get in touch – we are always keen to hear about new work we can feature in one of our podcasts.  Drop us a line to thepod@podacademy.org.

PodAcademy is an academic output for the 21st century. Be sure to follow along with our updates and subscribe to our Facebook and Twitter pages.