bitman
Has anyone noticed that GE is trying to get selfie kids interested in real science?

I really like those GE ads.  They are doing it to raise the GE brand image of course, but as you noted they inadvertently (or maybe intentionally) are making quite a strong social commentary.
 

bitflipper
It's not impossible. Listen to the NPR or BBC podcasts and radio programs to hear how it's supposed to be done.

That is true for the main programs (Morning Edition, etc)  But one of the very worst sound engineering jobs I have heard was on an NPR program called Live Wire Radio.  I love the program, but the audio is excruciatingly bad.  Actually I think it is getting a little better lately.
 
And most of the NPR "call in programs" like "A Way With Words" actually take their calls in advance and then produce the whole program to sound as if it were a live call-in when it isn't.  The live call-in shows are really horrible across the board.

"We went to the moon on vacuum tubes and duct tape."
 
@bitman: That is the quote of the week!!  Not to hijack this thread, but it's amazing what ingenuity can do in the face of limited technology.  As has been observed more than once, Sgt. Pepper was recorded on two four track tape machines.  It just tells me that often our recordings aren't bad because we lack the right plugins/amps/mics; but because we lack creative insight.
 
Thank you for your indulgence, now I return you to the thread concerning audio levels.

bitflipper ... It's not impossible. Listen to the NPR or BBC podcasts and radio programs to hear how it's supposed to be done. ...

I
do think that, both of these had a higher dedication to RADIO, than what is out there today, though, specially in America ... where you can tune in to a FM station here in Portland, and it is definitly louder than the other FM station that does Country and Western here in Portland, and both are louder than many other (comparatively speaking) AM stations.
 
BBC, specially, has at least 60 to 70 to probably about 100 years of broadcasting experience and they are very tight in their procedural side of things, and they know about recording, specially when it comes to voice, comedy and the use of effects ... which was huge in the days of The Goons, and later with Monty Python.
 

bitflipper ... But I think the main reason talk radio sounds so bad is limitations of the telephone and Skype connections they rely on. More and more, interviewees are talking over cell phones and there's only so much an engineer can do to mitigate the dreadful audio quality of cell phones. Quite often, when you're listening and thinking "turn it up!" it's really because noise, excessive ambiance and restricted frequency response are interfering with intelligibility. Compression can't help with that.

 
In many cases, I just call this pure amateurism. There was (maybe still is) a station here that did nothing but just start a beat and let anyone add whatever on top. I wanted to go beyond that and actually play music, and they didn't want me to do that, so they would not have to pay any rights on it ... but I could do weird things with stuff (play backwards and such) so it would be unrecognizeable. The idea was interesting, but not being able to do more than just .... "nothing" was not appealing to me, and not on an ego like level ... I am more about the music, and the arts, than me.
 
it's strange, but obviously a new idea and concept for what radio might do or not do. But in talk, and news, and the like, most radio stations are just simply unprofessional and a bunch of kids and hackers playing around with the knobs. I have not found, in both major FM stations in Portland, a single professional in there, that knew what they were doing other than bringing in young girls to have sex with in trade for a new album/cd they want.
 
It was always like that!