‘Beyond ME’ podcast discusses out-of-this-world possibilities

What started as engaging lunchtime conversations with friends has led three second-year RIT mechanical engineering students to start a biweekly podcast, Beyond ME, with a variety of topics including engineering and much more.

“It’s a podcast where mechanical engineering students go beyond M.E., and where the things we talk about are beyond us,” said Ben Jacobson, one of the founders and hosts.

Finian Richardson, another member of the podcast, said finding guests isn’t that difficult. “We try to reach out to people who have a wide knowledge base. We ask ourselves, ‘Who do we want to talk to, what do they specialize in, and do we know anything about it?’”

A recent guest on the podcast knows a thing or two about engineering, but RIT President David Munson also talked about his upcoming retirement, his legacy, and the future of RIT.

“I found the students to be very well prepared, thoughtful, engaging, and lots of fun,” Munson said. “I appreciate the service they are offering to the RIT community.”

Jacobson, of Oradell, N.J., along with Richardson, of Richmond, Va., and Liam Bennett, of Portsmouth, N.H., have completed nearly a dozen episodes and have more than 100 followers. Their podcast is now accompanied by video on YouTube and Spotify.

“We’re trying to grow this, turning it into something larger,” said Richardson, who is the podcast’s video producer and head of logistics.

The first episodes had Jacobson’s friends talking about social media and electric vehicles.

“Because the three of us are mechanical engineering students, we kind of turn everything back to engineering,” Richardson said. “The closest people we can get to are mechanical engineering people.”

But other topics have included colonization in space, the future of humanity, robots, AI, social media, music improvisation, and what quantum computers are meant to do.

One guest, Adjunct Professor James Chin, who teaches engineering, talked about self-organization to improve productivity, and then talked about it being used in ballroom dancing, which he also teaches outside RIT.

“I like thinking about different concepts and enjoy the exposure to interesting people,” said Bennett, who serves as a co-host. “We’re pretty open to any topic.”

Jacobson and Bennett came up with the notion of starting the podcast last spring, which started with conversations at Brick City Café.

“Usually, they were about AI, but sometimes were about anything, and I always left those conversations feeling good,” Jacobson said. “It felt really rewarding to have a long, meaningful discussion in between the craziness of classes and assignments.”

Once they decided to start the podcast, they found a location to record, set up microphones and stands, got headphones, and started recording on a laptop. They normally use their own equipment, but appreciated WITR’s willingness to let them use the station’s recording equipment for Munson’s interview.

“We process the audio, put in an engaging hook, add an intro with our theme music, record three angles of video and switch between them,” Jacobson said. “We publish to all major platforms, have thumbnails, chapters, an Instagram account, and release 3- to 10-minute clips to YouTube,” said Jacobson, who serves as the podcast’s producer and audio engineer. “It’s a ton of work, and although it’s not the original minimalistic format, the core idea remains the same: we want to have meaningful, interesting conversations with cool, unique people.”

Jacobson called recording and sharing the conversations very fulfilling and said the podcast gives them an excuse to think deeper each week.

“If we didn't have the podcast, we’d get too caught up in school work to have these discussions by ourselves,” he said. “Plus, having the podcast gives us an excuse to talk to people that would normally be out of reach. It’s how we were able to sit down and talk to President Munson.”

Bennett said co-ops planned after this semester will make it difficult for the three of them to be together, so they’ll likely have to transition to online and Zoom formats at that point. And after they graduate, they hope to continue the podcast, or pass it off to other students who share their passion for deep conversations.

“This is something we’re proud of. We put a lot of effort into every single episode. And we want this to continue after we graduate,” Richardson said.

“The most important thing to me is to keep having meaningful conversations, especially about topics outside engineering,” Jacobson said. “It’s cool to look at the numbers and try to get listeners and grow our audience. While I would love for us to have thousands of listeners, if we only have a hundred loyal fans and we believe in the content we produce, I'll be perfectly happy.”