Brendan was kind enough to bring his creation to the station and spend some time with us before the show to explain the project.

Here are some pictures of The Recompute:

And here is a video shot by Dwight Silverman using QIK

Bendan joined us on the air for about 30 minutes beginning at about 8:30 pm CST and it was a GREAT conversation.

Even though this was a fundrasing episode, we didn’t have to do any fundraising as we met our $1,500 goal prior to airtime. This was due to a generous matching pledge by a listener named Ian and the efforts of our fans via Twitter and Facebook.

During the KPFT pledge drives, Technology Bytes is responsible for raising a certain amount of money toward the overall station goal. This usually equates to about $1,500 during each show we broadcast during the drive.

We have always said that once we make our goal for any given episode we’ll stop begging for money and just do a regular broadcast.

If you are a regular listener of Technology Bytes you may recall that during the last KPFT pledge drive, we raised our $1500 goal in the first 45 minutes. This was unprecedented, and obviously very exciting for everyone involved. It also meant that we had a one hour and fifteen minute oasis of non-fundraising programming in the middle of the KPFT pledge drive.

Fast forward to the current pledge drive. Last week we met our $1,500 goal, but it took us up to the final minutes of the show to do it. This is pretty common. In looking ahead to the second fundraising episode we pretty much expected the same thing. That is, until we got the following e-mail:

I would like to make a significant donation to your show. I notice that
sometimes large on-air donations are followed by fallow periods. I wonder
how best to maximize my contribution. I’m thinking that a matching
contribution until the show’s record completion time (45 mins?) might work
well. So I would contribute $750 in the record breaking scenario, and less
otherwise. What do you think?

E-mail were exchanged to validate the claim and we’re pretty confident that this is a legitimate offer.

So basically, this listener will match up to $750 in pledges that come in under the 44 minute mark to help us meet our $1,500 goal AND break the record.

That means if we raise $750 in under 44 minutes we’re done for this fundraiser. And it doesn’t have to go down to the wire, either. If we raise $750 in the first 10 minutes, we’re done.

OOOH! Here’s a thought. Let’s take this one step further!!! If you call 713-526-5738 RIGHT NOW and make your pledge and specifically state that it is for Technology Bytes, we might make our goal before the show even begins. But you have to make sure the volunteer that answers the phone knows you are pledging for Technology Bytes and not for the current show so the amount will be credited to our show.

Another option, make an online donation!

Make your pledge NOW and donate whatever you can. We can do this and we can do this quick.

Tonights show featured guests and an audio makeover by Mike McGuff.

J.R Cohen of Coffee Groundz also dropped in with delicious cake balls for the hosts and guests.
Mike McGuff came for the geeks, but stayed for the food.

Our pre-Christmas extravabonanza. Cynthia joined us in the studio to read her special Christmas poem and at about 9:20 pm we were overrun with Christmas carolers. Around 100 or so people following the Sideshow Tramps through the Montrose, singing songs and playing music. They performed two songs on the air with us before moving on.

Here’s a video that Dwight shot on his iPhone:

It doesn’t really capture the full magnitude of the chaos. We had people clogging the hallways all the way from the studio back into the lobby and out the front door of the station.

Best pre-xmas show ever!

We also has a “voice-off” where we pitted the dulcet tones of Groovehouse against the highly polished, commercially tuned vocals of McGuff. Right after the top of the second hour each recited the intro to Barry White’s “Can’t Get Enough Of Your Love”

Hilarity ensued.