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Some Simple Things to Think About When Recording Audio

I’m beginning to get asked a lot of questions about recording audio. I’m thinking about voice recordings of Scripture. Here are some things to think about:

  • Equipment – you only need a USB microphone or decent headset with microphone, or a condenser microphone with pop filter and sound card (that plugs into your USB port)
  • You also need to make an acoustic baffle to absorb sound. This will cut out unwanted echo called ‘reverb’. Reverb can always be added later but there is no button to remove reverb, and people like FCBH, who we work with, are fussy about these things, as they know a voice with reverb is hard to listen to and understand (music, on the other hand, needs some reverb, especially the vocals). https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1bTK6tZzzaE is a good video on how to make a simple acoustic baffle. You can make a small tent in your room, but this gets hot and stuffy in places like Central Asia…

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Priorities of product development

What are the key topics to consider in planning and developing a new Christian product for discipleship, evangelism, education,  or other kind of engagement? What are the questions we should be asking ourselves as we consider ?

An initial thought about three P’s of product, protection, and promotion quickly expanded. Alliteration may have got the better of me or provided a framework for some valid thinking. Other p’s could be partnership, professionalism, pride (the good and bad kinds) , patience, perseverance, perspiration (effort and hard work), perspicacity (deep insight and discernment) , politeness (cultural sensitivity), pushiness, possessiveness (releasing organisational hold and letting community emotionally own products and process).

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Are you planning for your Media Ministry in 2021?

The Digital World Atlas is a site Mobile Ministry Forum is developing to provide a “one-stop-shop” for all your country-specific information needs! The current problem is that neither site will give you everything you might want to learn as a media ministry practitioner. That’s where our latest project comes in – the Media Ministry Background Data Research Tool. One item you won’t find in either of the first two sources (but coming soon from the Atlas) is the “religiosity” of a country’s people. Find data on that in the Data Research Tool’s Demographics.

  • It might be helpful to know the top phones people are using in your country.
  • You can find the top Android phones by country in the Mobile section.
  • How affordable is the Internet and how censored is it in your nation? We’ve got you covered in the Internet section.
  • What are people in your country searching for the most?? We’ve got a link to that in Search.
  • Who are the top TikTok influencers in your country? You will find a link in Social Media.
  • You’ll find this information and so much more in this tool, but you won’t find any of them in the Atlas or DataReportal slides.

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Adama’s Dream Released in Sierra Leone 

Adama’s Dream is a movie about a young Themne woman facing terrible troubles in her village in Sierra Leone. Can spirits, witch doctors, juju, charms or prayer help her fight off evil? Can God save her daughter from death? Can fear stop her from following her dreams for a better life?  The movie was premiered on Sunday the 21st of February at 6:30 pm EST.

You can watch the movie below :

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Paid and Unpaid Scripture Promotion With Facebook

  • by EMDC

This blogpost is based on a presentation made at EMDC.Online about paid and unpaid promotion of Scripture and Scripture-based resources through Facebook. The discussion of paid ads is focused on ads for specific geographic locations and includes a discussion of analytics from the ads. Unpaid promotion includes using the Facebook page directly and also personal accounts. The names of the presenters are not included due to security reasons.

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Missions Filmmaking Part 1 & 2 (EMDC Podcast Episode #3 & #4)

Missions Filmmaking Part 1

For our third EMDC Podcast episode recorded on November 16th 2020, Tim and Steve begin a series of informal discussions with experts that will focus on specific areas of ministry interest. For this episode and the next, it will be filmmaking–specifically for missions and non-profit ministry settings. We will hear from creative leaders representing International Media Ministries, Youth With A Mission, Create International, Ur Vision and Greater European Mission’s Gemstone Media.

Missions Filmmaking Part 2

For our fourth EMDC Podcast episode recorded on November 16th 2020, a selection of ministry filmmakers representing International Media Ministries, Youth With A Mission, Create International, Ur Vision and Greater European Mission’s Gemstone Media have been giving advice and recounting stories. We pick up the conversation as the group explores formal education versus on the job training.

— Send in a voice message: https://anchor.fm/emdclive/message

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Digital Publishing – a different paradigm

Digital Publishing – a different paradigm (Second edition, 2019)

Publish early, publish small, publish often

Author: Eric Graham (2019)

“Publish early, publish little, publish often – enabling users to engage with the content in small quantities, hopefully on frequent occasions and with sustained interest.”

This paper explores features of digital publishing and associated technology that are transforming approaches to Scripture translation and publication in minority languages. Understanding the nature and harnessing the potential of the small units of information that make up digital media products is a key theme.

The paper recommends that digital publication starts at an early stage in a translation project, making small units of Scripture available to the language community in audio and text formats as they are translated (Scripture as micro-content). It explores the idea of iterative and incremental publishing as a Scripture engagement strategy.

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EMDC – Past Present & Future (EMDC Podcast – Episodes 1 & 2)

EMDC Past Present & Future Part 1

EMDC founder and podcast co-host Steve Baughman talks with podcast host Tim Cowley about EMDC’s past, present and future including pivoting in 2020 and the launch of EMDC online. This first of two episodes will not only go into some of the who and why behind EMDC, but will begin to look at some of the main topics that find a home in the EMDC universe: apps, websites, ethnoarts and culturally intelligent media.

EMDC Past Present & Future Part 2

This episode is the follow-up and conclusion to a recording from November 6th 2020 focusing on EMDC’s past, present and future. Podcast host Tim Cowley has been chatting with EMDC Founder Steve Baughman about the new developments with EMDC, including the launch of the new online training and connecting platform.

Steve also began introducing some of the topics they plan to cover over the course of season one including apps, websites, ethnoarts and culturally intelligent media. This second part highlights future episodes that will include conversations with experts in scripture gadgets, filmmaking, audio & radio, orality & storytelling and scripture engagement.

— Send in a voice message: https://anchor.fm/emdclive/message

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LUMO Gospel Films

This is the story of Jesus. This is the story of hope for mankind. 
This is the greatest story ever told.

The Lumo Project is a multi-language biblical film resource engaging us with the life of Jesus through the four New Testament Gospels. It presents four films – one for each Gospel account – where we could experience the story of Jesus and the world of First Century Palestine in which he lived. This full-length feature film about the life of Jesus takes the actual four individual Gospel text as its script, word for word, unedited. Five years in the making, this epic production has been critically acclaimed by leading religious scholars as a unique and highly authentic telling of the Jesus story. Narrated by leading British actor David Harewood (‘Homeland’, ‘Blood Diamond’, ‘Merchant of Venice’) it is based on the latest theological, historical and archaeological research. With specially constructed sets and the extraordinarily authentic villages and countryside of rural Morocco, it immerses the viewer in the world of first century Palestine, and also breaking the stereotypical tradition of a westernised Jesus and his life story and presents it as it really was 2000 years ago. 

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EMDC Podcast Launch

In the gospels, Jesus is recorded thirteen times telling his would-be disciples to follow him. In our present social media age, follow is usually combined with like. Yeah, it can be cringeworthy but building a community means keeping in touch with one another and having effective ways to get messages and stories out to those who opt in to being a part of the community like we have here through EMDC.

In November of 2020, EMDC Founder Steve Baughman and I began hosting a podcast designed to introduce our growing number of community members to the “people, places and possibilities” behind the global EMDC network. Season 1, launching on Wed Jan 13 2021, is designed to cover some past history of our conference (for newcomers) bringing our community up to date on our current online offerings as well as include interviews with specialists in app development, websites, ethnoarts, filmmaking, audio/radio, scripture gadgets, orality & storytelling, scripture engagement and culturally intelligent media.

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Will WhatsApp’s change in privacy policy affect me?

Some people are worried about WhatsApp’s change in terms. They wonder if they should switch to some other platform, some other app. Those are reasonable questions. However, let’s take a step back and look at the bigger picture from a wider perspective before jumping to conclusions. Let’s act out of confidence rather than out of fear. After all, the Lord has given us many gifts, but fear is not one of them. ‘For God has not given us a spirit of fear and timidity, but of power, love, and self-discipline.’ (2 Tim. 1:7, NLT)

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Measuring Scripture Engagement in Digital Ministry

Discipleship and Digital Ministry 

If you are in a digital ministry setting, you know it can be difficult to decide how to differentiate between digital engagements and digital Scripture Engagement. We can get caught up in how many “impressions” we obtain, but forget that our end goal is to make disciples. The video below gives you a taste of how we at FCBH have been working to make disciples and engage with people digitally during this pandemic season. 

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How to Tell a Dangerous Story


“I know how you can tell this story,” I said to a colleague with a smile. “Someone did something that made a positive change among some group of people in some country, and it’s so amazing everyone needs to know about it!”

We were talking about how to tell stories from “sensitive” or high-risk contexts, and I said this jokingly as we considered what could and could not be said in stories. We had a good laugh and proceeded to find a solution.

While I said this in jest, this is a basic formula for telling impact stories. Of course, usually when applied, it includes real information—not just “something” or “someone.” Yet, what do you do if putting these key details into your story threatens the project you want to write about or risks the lives of your subjects? Should these stories be left untold?

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Mobiles, Media, and Ministry: Lessons for Trainers and Learners

The Mobiles, Media & Ministry: Lessons for Learners & Trainers curriculum contains 41 lessons, 360 pages of trainer guide materials, 70 pages of student handouts, and over 1,000 presenter slides.

The lessons are divided into four topic areas:

  1. Foundations of Media Ministry: Principles and practices for developing media materials and strategy that lead to follow-up and discipleship.
  2. Mobile Ministry: The mobile phone is the device through which most media ministry efforts will be experienced. These lessons teach the capabilities and limitations mobile technology provides and how to adapt your media ministry efforts.
  3. Social Media: These lessons teach you to connect with the lost via social media so you expand your reach among almost any people you want to reach.
  4. Do-it-Yourself Media: These lessons teach anyone to create authentic, contextually-relevant media that can reach thousands.

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Why We Don’t Start with Bible Translation

When a new programme starts it’s often tempting to set it up as a Bible translation programme. Sometimes that’s appropriate. In many cases, for a variety of reasons, it’s not. This is because:

  • It’s a minority language
  • People tend to be bi- or multi-lingual (at least if they live in towns, or have been educated)
  • They’re oral preference
  • They’re illiterate or semi-literate, or literate only in the language of wider communication
  • They aren’t yet Christian believers
  • etc.

If any or all of the above are true, then it’s good to start with language development and Scripture engagement rather than full-blown Bible translation, where you translate whole books of the Bible, and aim for a full Bible or New Testament + Psalms or Panoramic Bible. Sometimes the only reason for doing the latter is the kudos of the team, which is not a good reason. We’re aiming for transformed communities, not team kudos!

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Audio/Visual Scripture & Outreach Media Sources

The following is a question that I regularly get asked by “on-the-ground” workers- “How can I find out what scripture/ministry media is available online in my people’s language so I can download and use in our outreach?” The below are the main websites I know to point people to that allow them to search for and download media in their language:

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Who? Why? What? Where? When?

Five W’s to think about when creating content for the web

 

The EMDC blog is new but we represent a large community of experts and explorers in new technologies and techniques. This post is written for newcomers and experts alike and covers the Five W’s. These are sometimes also referred to as the six W’s (adding “how”) to the list.

In other languages they may start with different letters but the concepts are the same. We need to ask basic questions whether writing a blog post, designing a site, or creating any content.

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Where collaboration meets creativity

  • by S Roberts

They arrive in groups of six to eight, disembarking from small vans with luggage and high hopes. 

These men and women have come from the ends of the earth to attend a yearly meeting of the minds. Anticipation grows as the travelers sign in to the invitation-only event. Here in this secret, sacred space, technology, media and Bible translation converge for three weeks of connection, training, collaboration and ideation. 

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