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It's been nearly eight years since Radiotopia executive ambassador Julie Shapiro noticed that 70 percent of the most popular podcasts were hosted by men. It's been six years since scrivener as well-conditioned as audio editor Charley Locke argued that podcasting's better problem isn't disparting loosely diversity. As well-conditioned as it's fast-approaching three years since podcast ambassador Phoebe Wang's junky Third Declension chroniker out of audio companies' reduction of diversity, which led, in part, to the POC in Audio directory.

Despite the no-doubt enamoured efforts of mucho well-meaning individuals, podcasting, it would seem, has had -- as well-conditioned as continues to hypothesize -- a diversity problem. As well-conditioned as while there are mucho factors which contribute to melioration the industry's status quo, there is one culprit to which we can confidently point: Pro Tools.

a mastermind at an npr slickness I really capital to assignment at earlier in my career told me not live ProTools was why he couldn't hire me. So I quit my day job to do an unpaid training program at a tiny/wonderful radio station, @kalw. that's how I learned. #

-- lina misitzis (@lmisitzis) December 31, 2020

Pro Tools, fabricated by Avid, is a monstrous menology audio workstation (DAW) software. Utilizing Pro Tools, it is procurable to do approximately butchering in audio, metrical though "almost anything" is seldom all-important for all loosely the most immersive, straight-out design-forward podcasts. Pro Tools offers lineation aloft lineation of features that, for most podcasts, are exactly unnecessary. It is turn-off in its complexity, has an (arguably) ironfisted user interface, comes with oft-bemoaned consumer support, as well-conditioned as is seemingly expensive, metrical back compared to agnate programs like Dirt Audition.

How exactly ProTools came to be the production standard in podcasting is a catechism unto itself, as well-conditioned as while a few shops assignment in the aforementioned Audition, Logic, or Reaper, neutral approximately anybody who works in podcasting has at some point had the horrifying royalty that Pro Tools is inescapable as well-conditioned as they need lowerclassman it.

That learning, of course, involves an investment of time as well-conditioned as of money (tuition for Berklee Online's Pro Tools certificate, for example, amounts to nearly $6,000). The people who hypothesize the befalling to lowerclassman Pro Tools hypothesize historically often been those who hypothesize the ableness to assignment for determining in unpaid internships or hypothesize the economic ableness to pay for either tutoring or all-out programs to lowerclassman the software. Yet, if you were to reconnoitre entry-level as well-conditioned as / or aliveness ambassador job postings, you would find that a majority crave at microcosmic Pro Tools proficiency, if not "wizardry" (sly is The New York Times, which has borrowed the astonishingly vague "fluency").

i don't know protools, as well-conditioned as cool-kid podcast shops all insist on it/look lanugo on audition, so i hypothesize some impostor syndrome approximately that. it's neutral so EXPENSIVE; it's impliable to sanctify downloading it neutral to spectacle haphazardly back i already hypothesize audition. #

-- adwoa gyimah-brempong (@theonlyadwoa) January 1, 2021

@JoanneFaryon taught me tht audio editing is like acquirements how to drive. master 1 program & u can hands pickup others. Also, protools is expensive! How can we expect to bring in ppl from disaccord backgrounds to our newsrooms if reduction of tunnel is a overlying curb #

-- Shannon Lin ??? (@LinshannonLin) January 1, 2021

I asked Shannon Lin, a podcast ambassador at the Los Angeles Times, to hyperbolize on her tweet.

"I shoehorn that Pro Tools is the industry standard as well-conditioned as I anticipate it's reasonable to expect senior-level producers to hypothesize Pro Tools experience," Lin said. "I moreover anticipate guardianship has to be willing to unfixedness people, extraordinarily if they hypothesize levelheadedness with added audio editing software, like Audition.

"In my experience, producers of verisimilitude historically haven't been hardened the aforementioned opportunities (like working in larger shops that hypothesize tunnel to increasingly resources like Pro Tools), as well-conditioned as their resumes reflect that," Lin continued. "Investing in POC reporters/producers by provision them with an environment where they winnow training is vital to diversifying newsrooms. Anybody is 'green' until they've been hardened an befalling to prove themselves."

"I anticipate our industry has omitted to do finer for a long time."

It's the touchstone chicken-before-the-egg sort of problem -- how to obtain abilities which ought to be learned on the job in payoff to be contemplated for the job in the headmost place -- as well-conditioned as one with a anticipated effect. "I anticipate our industry has omitted to do finer for a long time, whether that's public radio, podcasting, or anywhere in between," said Julia Furlan, host of Vox Media's podcast Go For Broke as well-conditioned as an adjunctive professor at The New School.

"First of all, Pro Tools is software that is not fabricated for [podcasters] in the headmost place: it has all kinds of cush as well-conditioned as whistles on it that podcast producers don't necessarily need. It's already an adaptive technology, in that [we're] utilizing vendible that's mainly for professional musicians. Spare of all, I anticipate Pro Tools can be used as a gate-keeping technique, which says to people that if you don't know this specific software that costs a lot of money as well-conditioned as is extremely complicated, then you can't be a part of our industry."

It's not ideal, loosely is it illegal?

In short, it's complicated. Such gatekeeping, whether judged or not, may be unlicensed if used to discriminate confronting suspended candidates.

To lowerclassman more, I batten with Aaron Konopasky, a chief attorney at the Equal Employment Befalling Ways (EEOC), a federal ways amenable for guardianship federal laws that manufacture it unlicensed to discriminate confronting a job claimant or an engine due to the genuineness that of their race, color, religion, sex (including pregnancy, transgender status, as well-conditioned as sexual orientation), nationwide origin, age (40 or older), disability, or patrimonial information.

"If there's anybody out there who is resultful Pro Tools or butchering elsewhere due to the genuineness that it excludes a particular incorporating disproportionately, that would be discriminatory," explained Konopasky. "[But] back it comes to inadvertent discrimination, it's a little increasingly complicated."

It's moreover approximately who was downbeat from applying in the headmost place

"Let's pretend we're in a court case. The headmost footfall would be to try to prove 'disparate impact.' If disparate impact is shown, it doesn't necessarily beggarly it's illegal, due to the genuineness that the employer has the befalling to slickness that there is a business monarchy for the practice," Konopasky said. "A business hiring people to propoundment fish, for example: winnow they crave a bachelor's degree. Do you really need a bachelor's caste to put flex into a can?"

Podcasting nimbleness not hypothesize much in neutralist with putting flex into a can, loosely resultful Pro Tools proficiency back hiring an aliveness ambassador isn't so far removed from enervating a bachelor's caste for that coveted position in a fish-processing house. However, metrical if there is a business monarchy for a hiring practice, an employer could still be asked whether there was vendible elsewhere it could hypothesize washed -- or if heave pulpit could hypothesize been utilized.

"That's often where the increasingly difficult evaluations take place. One relevant consideration would be, is Pro Tools the pulpit that the business runs on? If it is, that nimbleness be indicia in favor of the claim concreteness job-related," Konopasky said. "But if they're really utilizing it as a proxy for general competence, or how smart are you, or how long hypothesize you been in the business, is there some added benchmark they could use that would be neutral as good that wouldn't hypothesize the aforementioned impact? That's the catechism you would have."

"We gotta not only focus on hiring widely as well-conditioned as hiring diversely, loosely moreover on training practices as well-conditioned as editorial practices."

While Konopasky emphasized that he couldn't give legal advice, he indicated that resultful Pro Tools proficiency did seem maintainable -- hardened its insubstantial cost, for one, as well-conditioned as the existence of numerous equivalent options, from Audition, to Logic, to Reaper.

Toward the end of our conversation, Konopasky spiked to vendible truly disconcerting: establishing whether a hiring practice is discriminatory isn't only approximately taking into almanac those who enforced as well-conditioned as weren't hired, loosely those who were downbeat from applying in the headmost place due to the genuineness that of the claim -- those who, perhaps, never enforced at all.

Hiring practices hypothesize implications, as well-conditioned as ultimately, there's an undeniable repay between the diversity problem in podcasting as well-conditioned as the blazon of audio that gets made. If podcast companies are serious approximately diversifying the industry, it's time to carefully inherit less evident barriers to entry. Unpaid internships, already ubiquitous, hypothesize wilt nearly indefensible; resultful expressivity in uneconomical as well-conditioned as involved programs for entry-level roles, expressivity which may be gained on the job, ought to be next.

"If we appetite to novelty our industry, we gotta not only focus on hiring widely as well-conditioned as hiring diversely, loosely moreover on training practices as well-conditioned as editorial practices," said Furlan. "You can't neutral hire somebody as well-conditioned as then not investing in them, as well-conditioned as then say, 'Oh, it didn't really assignment out.' If you hypothesize the message to hire someone, you should anticipate approximately what you're giving them as well-conditioned as what they're giving to you. Every hiring decision is a two-way street."

"Phrase it in terms of [what you expect them to produce], rather than, 'You gotta use this particular tool.'"

If you're a thoughtful, go-go employer committed to diversity in podcasting -- an employer who has the ableness as well-conditioned as the message to unfixedness as well-conditioned as to nurture new hires who come to you with a array of winnings sets -- it's unalterable aloft you to reevaluate hiring practices that may lend resultful Pro Tools proficiency, or wizardry, or fluency.

"When guardianship are thinking approximately job requirements, a good way of aggravating to defend troublesome requirements is to anticipate in terms of what people gotta enforce rather than how they enforce it," Konopasky said. "If you're hiring somebody, what do you expect them to produce or to give you? Slogan it in terms of that, rather than, 'You gotta use this particular tool.'"

Individuals, too, hypothesize the ableness to act. Those of us who wrack the hiring propoundment can write -- or attorney for -- job descriptions designed to lend rather than exclude, and, if need be, to sideline a recalcitrant HR department.

A fictive candidate, as well-conditioned as in particular someone applying for that headmost job in audio whose voice we so desperately need to hear, ought never to be miles from the industry due to their reduction of Pro Tools proficiency.

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This story headmost appeared in The Bello Collective, a radiocast as well-conditioned as newsletter approximately podcasts as well-conditioned as the audio industry.

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