Podcaster and Simplecaster Luke Brawner has been working on a massive multipart podcast project called Breakin’ Hearts. He has accumulated digital reams of research, audio, video, photos and transcripts that at some point he will need to sift through. Even if he was the most organized person in the world, finding all the right clips to tell the perfect story is still a monumental task. In the most ideal scenario he would have organized all of his folders and files with the proper naming conventions. At bare minimum he would also have written summaries, added keywords and cross-referenced his files as he went. I asked him how he was doing all of this. Turns out his answer was Google Drive and spreadsheets. He told me that the method he was using had been passed on to him by a veteran industry professional and that this was standard practice.

When anyone mentions using spreadsheets for solving problems all the warning bells start ringing in my head. The world needs less spreadsheets not more. Surely this is not “the way” that people organize insane amounts of data that they then need to reference long after they’ve forgotten all the important details. I began researching what the industry teaches and uses, fully expecting for Google to reveal that someone was already solving these problems. Instead of finding something, I was surprised to find that Luke’s method was the “correct” way and nobody appeared to be trying to make it simpler or easier.

It was immediately obvious to me that a solution, tailored specifically to long-form content creators, could become an extremely valuable and time-saving resource. This was the moment that Tape Index was conceived – a radically simple organizational system designed for content creators. Initially, Tape Index will solve the pains that Luke and others experience in trying to manage the storage, organization, categorization and retrieval of endless information and media. While this might sound like yet another Dropbox or Google Drive clone, it is not. The magic occurs in how those files are processed upon upload and how the content creator can reference their work with the least amount work necessary.

Between Luke’s industry knowledge and experience and my technical skills, we have been working hard for the past 5 months to bring you the first iteration of Tape Index slated to open for private Alpha in January 2024. Stay tuned for more details in the coming weeks and months!