Friendly Reminder: Your Smart Phone is a Voice Recorder
I was reading an interview with Natalie Portman a couple weeks back, and it covered more than just her entertainment career–going into things like her view on politics and her home nation of Israel. The writer of the article noted that before the conversation began, Portman pulled out her iPhone, turned on the voice recorder, and placed it on the table between them. She told the writer that whenever she discusses potentially controversial topics, she likes to have a record of what she said for reference and in case things get taken out of context.
While I don’t expect many of us will be doing controversial interviews, there are plenty of times in ministry and life in general where it is nice to record something. Perhaps you need to take minutes at a meeting, remember an idea, or capture a melody. For me personally, I prepare sermons better by talking them out rather than writing first. Using the voice memo app on my iPhone creates a way to capture that and transcribe it later.
A couple quick notes:
- Be sure that if you are recording someone else, you have their permission.
- Sound files can be large files. If you are like me and are always running out of space, be sure you have enough room ahead of time or clear out old recordings you don’t need anymore. This where note taking services with voice memos, like Evernote, can come in handy, as they are stored on the cloud.
Image by Flickr user James Cridland. Used under Creative Commons License. Cropped from Original.
