Podcasts, blogs, posts matter little and talks are only marginally helpful. The lowest hanging criteria are essential roles for distinguished organization, high compensation, press, and judging (either serving as a reviewer for an academic journal or conference or serving as a judge at a competition or event, such as a hackathon or startup/business competition). By the way, your gut is right; USCIS is sensitive to fake/manufactured press and this can undermine an otherwise strong petition.

Thank you! What kind of press would I go for? And how would an engineer typically get to the judging roles like these?

While the publication doesn't have to be a country's or industry's largest, it shouldn't be too small and for the press to count, it must be about you and your work or quote you. Regarding your second question, I don't know the answer unfortunately although I do know that there are a lot of such events.