Earlier this week I had lunch with a good friend (who writes an awesome architectural design blog) during which he told me about a great news piece he found online. After a few minutes I said that I’d love to read it and asked him to send me the link, he informed me it was a Podcast, and I informed him that I probably wasn’t going to listen to it. Let’s back up a minute…
I consume a LOT of internet. A lot. To quantify this statement: bazillions of pages.
I’m an RSS junkie with moderate speed reading abilities. Plus, I like to batch-process my data intake to increase the amount I can consume (for example: I sort my feeds as finitely as possible, so that my brain can access the topic schema more easily - so that if I have multiple stories on the same topic I’ll recognize it quicker, discard the piece, and move on).
My day job is to research the internet and then write and advise on what I learn, so in all fairness, I’d better be pretty good at getting through the vast amount of “news” out there. But that’s the problem - there is SO much news out there relating to the internet and a lot of it is actually very good.
Unfortunately, what all this is leading up to is my distaste for (and inability to utilize) Podcasts.
You cannot speed read or batch process Podcasts. I have trouble listening to something while working (especially talking…), so this deters me from listening to Podcasts during the day. Which only leaves me with commuting time - during which I like music too much to give up. I just don’t listen to Podcasts.
The problem is that there are some truly awesome people talking about truly awesome topics in Podcasts, and there’s a pretty good chance I’m missing out on a lot of great material.
To take yet another step back: the title of this post stems from a discussion about Social Technologies - and how Podcasts aren’t actually social at all. It’s a one way speech, not a conversation. Sure it’s a rich-media, but that doesn’t make it a social media.
But back to the point: Podcasts have value. There are a lot of people who love Podcasts and I think end user adoption is likely only growing - which means people will continue to produce great content in audio form… and I’ll continue to miss out.
So to sign this post off- here’s a short list of the Podcasts that people recommend to me the most… that I haven’t ever really heard.
Topics on Fire (Leslie Poston’s social media chat)
This American Life (NPR)
Bill Simmons (Sports Guy - link on the right)
The Moth (Short humorous stories)
Major Nelson (Microsoft / Xbox guy)
GDGT (The ultimately gadget podcast)
January 15th, 2009 at 1:20 pm
I listen to This American Life religiously. It’s what I’ve done this year in place of reading novels, and it gives me my fix of stories. Some of them are really funny, others are touching and beautiful. I love it.
Simmons’ podcast is hit-or-miss. Unlike his columns, where I can read the whole thing even if it’s on a topic I care nothing about (football, basketball), if he’s talking about one of those things on the podcast, it’s brutal. Other times, it’s hilarious. You pretty much have to look at the subject and the guest and be interested in at least one of them for it to be worth it.
I’m going to start checking out The Moth now….
January 15th, 2009 at 2:31 pm
@Dave
Simmons’ actually convinced me to listen to his podcast - I was home sick one day last year and he had just started doing them- and I thought it would be a good idea… but now I think I must have just started with a bad one… because it just wasn’t as amazing as I wanted it to be.
You’re right- when he writes- I don’t care what the topic is- I’ll read it and love it. But when it was 45 minutes about boxing?… ugh. No thanks.
But yes- check out the Moth - you’ll love it. I listened to three or four while commuting (in a time where I was in search of new music, which I no longer am) - and they were hilarious. And I also listened to this past week’s because it was by Mike Birbiglia… I’ll listen to pretty much anything he says.
January 16th, 2009 at 2:52 pm
Thanks for the shout out! You missed a good one last time with Dmitri Gunn, Scott Monty, Thomas Edwards and Jamie Sheu talking social media and fashion, but the recording’s up now… :) This week I’m talking WINE and social media, and I moved the time so my winery friend from Spain could play too. You should come on one and talk mobile social media and the gadgets that enable it… ;)
January 16th, 2009 at 5:11 pm
@Leslie
Thanks for visiting!
Your podcasts really do sound like something I would love. Seriously- great topics, awesome people- what more do you need? I’m going to give it another go.
And yes! Anytime there’s a talk going on about gadgets and social media - count me in.
March 2nd, 2009 at 12:17 am
I find something similar when I’m online and see a headline link that sounds interesting, and it turns into a video. I can’t speed through the video, or speed through a podcast and get nearly the info I can reading. It just seems like they’re mediums for specific types of information/entertainment, and that isn’t clear to some websites.