The Tech Guy |
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| Genre | Talk |
|---|---|
| Running time | 3 hours (without commercials) |
| Country | United States |
| Languages | English |
| Home station | KFI AM 640 |
| Syndicates | List of Affiliates |
| Hosts | Leo Laporte |
| Starring | Leo Laporte |
| Recording studio | Petaluma, California |
| Air dates | since January 3, 2004 |
| No. of episodes | 825+ |
| Audio format | Mono |
| Website | Audio Download Page Tech Guy Labs |
| Podcast | RSS Feed |
The Tech Guy is a US-wide syndicated radio show, hosted by Leo Laporte formerly of TechTV and now TWiT.tv fame. The show, which was first exclusively broadcast on KFI AM 640 in Los Angeles, California, was picked up for syndication by Premiere Radio Networks in February 2007. The show currently has over 100 terrestrial affiliates in cities including Los Angeles, California, San Francisco, California, Houston, Texas, and Washington, DC. The show also airs on America's Talk on XM Satellite Radio. Leo streams video of his side of the show on TWiT Live. He used to not air the show's caller audio at the request of his affiliates, however as of early 2011, Laporte has started including caller audio on the episodes distributed on TWiT.
The show is a mixture of interviews and call-ins, as well as Leo's own thoughts and opinions on current events in technology. The current weekly guests are Scott Wilkinson to talk about home theater on Sunday, the Giz Wiz Dick DeBartolo from Mad to talk about gadgets on Saturday and Chris Marquardt of Tips from the Top Floor to talk about digital photography. Prior to June 2008, weekly guests included: Steve Gibson, Paul Thurrott, and Ron Rosberg; these guests were dropped to make time for more callers, which Leo cited as being the more important part of the program. The guest interviews are often pre-recorded to accommodate the guests' schedule. The guests connect to the show using Skype.
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Leo Laporte has been doing one version or another of his technology talk show since 1990, including a syndicated show originating from KGO. The current incarnation of the show began on KFI weekends in 2004, only months prior to the cancellation of Call for Help and The Screen Savers from the newly merged G4techTV in the United States. According to Leo, he had to find a way to keep talking about technology, and facetiously mentioned that if it wasn't for KFI green lighting the show, he would have ended up "having to talk to [his] wife about it."[1] The show ran weekends on KFI at 11 AM. Leo also appeared on Bill Handel's morning show on Fridays for The Laporte Report segment, and continues to do so. Leo also does a Laporte Report live segment for CFRB in Toronto, Ontario Saturday mornings.
In late 2006, Leo notified his audience on net@nite that his contract with KFI was going to expire soon, and it was hinted at that he would only continue with Clear Channel if The Tech Guy was syndicated. With the help of management at KFI, Premiere Radio Networks picked up the show for syndication, and it was announced on January 27, 2007 that it would roll out nationally.[2] On February 17, 2007, the newly syndicated Tech Guy radio show launched nationally on eleven radio stations, including KFI. The show has added many affiliates, and has grown sharply from the original twelve to over one hundred (as of the summer of 2010).
The post-syndication KFI feed of The Tech Guy is customized so that it does not lose its local Los Angeles feel. The presentation is similar to that of Handel on the Law and Mike McConnell. Dr. Dean Edell's show is also customized with KFI identification within the show, even though the show originates from KGO and is on tape delay.
There is a public Internet Relay Chat that takes place when the show airs live on the irc.twit.tv server in the #twitlive channel. Leo participates in the chat during commercial breaks, under the name "Leo," and often refers to the chat to give him additional information to assist with some of the callers' questions. The channel is moderated to keep the chat clean and about the show being broadcast. There are several moderators in the chat room, including Dan, Mike_B, Mick, Inferno / Jay-san, Shooby, Sascha, and Coleen. Shooby and Sascha have both been responsible for keeping the show notes in the past, however now James DeRuvo is responsible for the show notes posted on Leo's site.[3]
Every show is available as a podcast on the TWiT network, distributed via RSS feed at twit.tv/TTG. Until June 2011, shows were posted intermittently up to a week after their first airdate in order to meet the requirements of Laporte's Premiere contract for exclusivity purposes for the radio affiliates, and the live and taped video versions of the show required caller audio to be muted.
After Laporte renewed his Premiere deal that month, these conditions were relaxed, and the show is now allowed to be posted hours after first broadcast to TWiT, and caller audio is now heard on the live video and TWiT.am audio feeds. The new deal also allowed Laporte to solicit his traditional TWiT advertisers to sponsor the podcast feeds, while retaining his advertisers for the radio version.
The show was produced from Leo Laporte's TWiT Cottage but moved to the new TWiT Studio known as the TWiT Brick House in July 2011. It is streamed to Premiere Radio Networks via Laporte's direct ISDN line connection to Premiere at 64 kbps. From there Premiere uploads it to their satellite network for distribution. Leo also streams his side of the show on TWiT Live.
July 24’s show was the last program produced at the TWiT Cottage, with Laporte parading through downtown Petaluma after the end of that day's show to the Brick House with his staff and onlookers to inaugurate the new facility, which opened an hour later with that week's This Week in Tech. The first Tech Guy show produced at the TWiT Brick House was on July 30, which also was the first broadcast from Leo's office set, which was built to resemble the former Cottage studio.
Laporte's Tech Guy radio show is syndicated to several affiliates across America. The show originates from the "TWiT Cottage" in Petaluma, California, a community north of San Francisco, and while KGO is the San Francisco show affiliate, KFI in Los Angeles, California is considered the show's flagship. The show runs live weekends at 11 a.m. Pacific, 2 p.m. Eastern, with some stations delaying their airing until later in the day. Some affiliates opt to pick up both shows each weekend, while others only choose to run one day.