Talks on Talks – A podcast built around LDS General Conference #LDSConf

As an avid podcast listener, Wes Eggett was disappointed to find that many LDS-themed podcasts focused their attention on controversial topics, negativity, and questioning church doctrines or practices. Like many, he turned to General Conference talks to liven-up his commute with the words of President Monson and the Apostles, but that soon led to another problem.

“The conference talks went by so quickly,” he said, “that there wasn’t enough time to really consider the principles being discussed. When you read or sit down and study talks, you have the time to digest them, and I wasn’t getting that by just plowing through the audio.”

In an effort to simulate the effect of studying General Conference talks, he teamed up with friend and classmate Jason Farrell to start the Talks on Talks Podcast. After crowdsourcing the funds to get into the podcasting world, the two have gone on to release more than twenty episodes discussing talks from the last two conferences, with one to two episodes being released every week.

“Every episode begins with a quick bio and fun facts about the speaker,” Jason explains. “Then we discuss the main points from the talk and play the actual audio from the conference center, which helps listeners feel like they’re still getting the spirit of the talk.” To make the listening experience more enjoyable, the pair keeps the discussions light-hearted and sprinkles in their own personal experiences. And, as they wrap-up each discussion, a segment called “The Virtuous, Lovely, and Good Report” allows them to share uplifting quotes or news stories not associated with the talk itself.

Their initial fear was that the episodes were longer than the conference talks themselves, but the response has been overwhelmingly positive. Just as they had thought, the chance to slow the talks down and consider each concept has helped their audience discover things they otherwise would have missed. On receiving this feedback, Wes said:

“Seeing our first five-star reviews on iTunes was such a rush, but it’s even cooler knowing that we’re helping people get more out of conference.”

As their audience has grown, the hosts are now planning to include more interviews and have guests share their own favorite conference talks. With nearly 40 talks per biannual conference and a backlog of decades worth of addresses, they look forward to talking about talks for as long as they can.

The Talks on Talks Podcast can be found on iTunes, Apple’s Podcasts app, Stitcher, and Overcast. You can follow the progress of the Talks on Talks Podcast on Facebook (@talksontalkspodcast), Instagram (@talksontalks) and at www.talksontalks.com.