This is the status of Technothusiasts.  Please listen or read (or both) what we have to say if you are a current listener or reader of Technothusiasts.  It concerns our future.

Heru and I have been doing this for over 2 years now.  Heru and I used to be roommates and we’d always have discussions about technology and other topics.  We decided to just start recording us talking.  We had no overall plan.  We started recording sitting in the living room using the built in mic on Heru’s Macbook Pro.

Since then, many things have changed and a few things haven’t.  The main thing that I want to talk about is engaging you all (our audience).  Having you all be a part of Technothusiasts is what we strive for.  For over 2 years, we haven’t gotten any feedback.  Not one.  Starting off, that was ok.  It takes time.

But 2 years later, it’s starting to bother me.  I feel like we’ve tried almost everything.  We changed from one podcast and broke it up into like 10 little podcasts, and then went back to just a couple.  I upgraded our sound.  Now I run a studio with multiple computers, mixer, mic, etc.  I’ve thought of every form of communication tool known to man (email, facebook, twitter, voicemail, etc) and mentioned it at the beginning of every show.  We’ve gotten guest hosts and been guests on other podcasts.  What else can I do?

Another thing that bothers me is that the number of listeners hasn’t gone up in 2 years either.  We’ve had spikes here or there but we sustain a small number.  Now I don’t want to make this all about numbers.  Sure, I want more listeners but it’s more important to me that for you all that are listening, that you are a part of this.  We want to hear what you think about us.  We want to hear your opinions on what we talk about.  We want your questions.  We want you to tell your friends about us.  We’ve said it time and time again that we aren’t wanting to talk at you but rather talk with you.  And that’s the truth.  We are just a couple of normal people just like you.  We’re no “professionals”.  We are just talking about what we talk about anyways and recording it.  We’d love to have you involved.  We NEED you involved.

With all the changes we have made, not one of them do I know if you liked the change or not.  With no feedback, we have no idea how we are doing.  It could be that we have changed something that you don’t like.  We just do our best to try to make things better based on what we think.  But we aren’t the end all be all of this.  Perhaps you want more guest hosts, perhaps some more podcasts, perhaps less, we don’t know.

Here is what I do know.  We need you.  We need your participation.  Times have changed for Heru and I.  At the time we started, we were roommates and both single.  It was a lot easier to do this.  Now, don’t get me wrong, we love doing this.  It’s one of our passions.  But since we started, Heru has moved away, I’m in a relationship, I have a son, and we both have other projects as well.  We’d love for Technothusiasts to be at the top of our list.  We do take time and money to do this.  If it isn’t important for you, then we won’t make it important to us and we will stop doing it.  And we don’t want to do that.  This isn’t a threat by any means.  We will be sad if we have to end this but by no means will we be upset.  We have given our all to this and that’s what is important. So please, engage with us.  Even if one person contacts us, that’s enough for us to keep going.  Don’t be scared.  Your feedback can be just between us or it can be on the show.  It’s up to you.  And don’t forget you can follow us on twitter, facebook, google +, and now diaspara.

Goals for the future?  Obviously getting feedback, like I’ve been saying.  I would also be thrilled if we got enough financial contribution from our audience that it paid for doing this.  And it doesn’t cost a whole lot to do this really.  The costs involved are the domain, website hosting, podcast file hosting and the hardware.  The domain and hosting is a monthly (or yearly) cost.  Hardware is just one time purchases.  We have most of what we need now, although, I’d like to upgrade to a better mic and I know Heru would like to as well.  You can contribute to us financially by supporting our sponsors (dreamhost.com or hover.com) or by simply sending us a paypal donation.  No donation is too small.  You can donate a one time donation or a small monthly donation.  It all helps and is greatly appreciated.  If we can get feedback and financial contribution to pay for this, I’d be happy.  Long term goals, I’d want our audience to grow so tell your friends/family and get even more financial contributions.

Bottom line, the future of Technothusiasts is you.  I have no time frame of waiting to see what happens necessarily.  I’m going to just see how it goes.  So again, don’t be shy.  Any feedback, whether it’s positive, negative, indifferent, is appreciated.  We want to you apart of this.