Categories
Canadian Tech News Podcasts

Canadian Tech Roundup – Episode 0

I finally got around to recording a podcast version of my Canadian Tech News series.

Co-hosted by my old friend Notian episode 0 is meant to be a dress-rehearsal/proof of concept. I’ve already identified a few issues and I’m sure Ian will have suggestions of his own. But please feel free to leave feedback. Technical or otherwise.

[podcast]http://bit.ly/cWJkTc[/podcast]

The intro music is KDR Assault by Binärpilot.

Categories
Podcasts Review

Top 3 Podcasts of 2009

I love podcasts. In 2009 I probably listened to more hours of podcasts than music. Here are my top 3 podcasts of the year. As with my Top 3 Board Games of 2009 these are not necessarily podcasts that launched in 2009, instead they are podcasts I really got into for the first time in 2009.

1. Car Talk

Car Talk has been on NPR for 33 years. It has been podcast for 3. The hosts, Click and Clack even made a cameo in Pixar’s Cars as Rusty and Dusty Rust-Eze. I am probably one of the last people on earth to have heard the show. I’m not too sure how to explain my fascination with the show.  If you’ve ever owned a car, or ridden it one, I highly recommend this show.

Wikipedia
Official Site
iTunes Link

2. The 404

As a die-hard Buzz Out Loud listener I was initially turned off when they hijacked the BOL feed at CES 2009 (or was it ’08?). I didn’t give them a chance for quite some time. Once I gave them a chance I quickly grew to love their brand of humor. If you’re of BOL or anything on the TWiT Network, definitely give these guys a listen.

Official Site
iTunes Link

3. AppSlappy

Scott Johnson w/co-host Eric take about iPhone apps news and reviews. It’s basically the same tried and true formula used on The Instance: a little bit of news, some  rumours and scuttlebutt, a few reviews and user feedback. Makes for a great and informative show.

Official Site
iTunes Link

Honourable Mentions: Everything else from Frogpants Studios – Scott Johnson is the new Leo Laporte; The Movielicious; Hype Machine Radio

Most Irrelevant Podcast of 2009: The Dawn & Drew show. I know they’re pioneers and I used to be a big fan. But it just became too much of the same boring 90s psuedo-hippie BS. 2009 is the year I finally unsubscribed for good.

Categories
Podcasts

Podcasts I Subscribe To

…In alphabetical order:

  • Audible Ajax – Infrequently updated. Interviews with key figures in the world of AJAX. 3.3/5
  • Buzz Out Loud – Daily. Easily the best tech news podcast. 5/5
  • CBC Radio 3 Podcast – Weekly. An hour of good Canadian music. 3.5/5
  • Best of As It Happens – Daily. CBC Radio long running (40+years?) current events show in podcast digest. Mon – Thurs it’s the best segment of the day. Friday it’s a weekly recap. Listening to this makes me feel old. 3/5
  • Diggnation – Weekly. Video. You really should already know about this show. It’s getting a little old, I’m only going to give it 3.8 out of 5.
  • ExtraLife Radio – Weekly. Comics and nerd culture. 3.9/5
  • Gadgettes – Weekly. CNET podcast where ladies (+ Jason Howell) talk about tech. 3/5
  • The Instance – Weekly. World of Warcraft podcast, still listen to it even though I haven’t played in months. 4/5
  • Mailbag – Weekly. Video. CNET’s Molly Wood reads funny emails. 3.7/5
  • net@night – Weekly. Leo Laporte and Amber Mac talk about the internet, I’ve found out about MANY great Web 2.0 startups through this podcast. 4/5
  • Quirks & Quarks – Weekly. CBC Radio’s long running science show, in podcast format. 3.5/5
  • RCRD LBL – Weekly. Roundup of the best music on RCRDLBL.com. 4/5
  • Search Engine – On Hiatus/Canceled. CBC Radio’s EXCELLENT show about the internet. Even if it doesn’t come back on the air, the back episodes are worth a list. 5/5
  • Spark – Weekly/On Hiatus. CBC Radio show about culture surrounding the internet. Frequent contributions from Cory Doctorow and Merlin Mann. 5/5
  • tech5 – Daily. John C Dvorak’s take on the day’s tech news. 4.5/5
  • This Week in Tech – Weekly. Leo Laporte and friends discuss the week’s tech news. The guests are often really lame and it tends to drag on. But when it’s good, it’s great! 3.3/5
  • The 404 – Daily. The best way to discribe tihs is A Tech Morning Show. Usually hillarious. 4.8/5
  • White Coat, Black Art – Weekly/Currently on repeats. CBC Radio’s show about the Health Care Industry/System in Canada. Always interesting, sometimes a little dry. 3.7/5
  • Xbox Live’s Major Nelson Radio – Weekly. Xbox live’s Director of Programming provides an inside look into what’s going on with the xbox 360, with a good dose of general gaming banter. 3/5
Categories
From The Archives Podcasts Review

Podcasts: what’s on my iPod

I’m pretty sure I’ve made at least a couple of posts about podcasting. I can’t be bothered to read my past entries to see exactly what I said, but I’m pretty certain it was somewhat negative. My main problem with ‘podcasting’ was (and still is) the term itself…Even though I’ve made a couple attempts at podcasting myself, truth be told I didn’t really get it. That is, until I got an iPod.

My wife bought me a black 2GB iPod Nano a couple of weeks ago as an early birthday present. Once I got comfortable with the iPod interface in general and iTunes itself (not a pretty app to run on windows) I started subscribing to a couple of podCasts. A few I’d listened to before and a couple of new ones – I’ll get to that in a minute. After loading up a few hot new podCast, I was immediately impressed, it gave my iPod a completely new use. The way the iPod seamlessly syncs with iTunes makes it an extension of my computer and the internet. If you have an iPod and you’re not listening to podCasts you’re missing out on half the functionality. If you spend a lot of time in front of the computer and you find yourself getting tired of listening to music (maybe you’re just old), check out a podcast.

Anyways, I thought I’d list a podcasts I’m currently subscribed to:
CBC Radio 3
100% Independent Canadian Music
A weekly podcast, with 19 episodes to date. Plays a mix of indie music, similar to what you might hear on DNTO, everything from emo to hiphop. I’ve listened to 3 episodes so far. One of them was pretty good, but i might just be saying that because they played moneen. The other 2 weren’t really great. It’s the sort of mix I might like to listen to a road trip, or late at night. It does makes use of mp3 chapters, which is interesting from a technical standpoint.

Diggnation
Diggnation is a weekly tech/web culture show based on the top digg.com social bookmarking news stories. Hosted by former The Screen Savers hosts Kevin Rose & Alex Albrecht.
Always entertaining, usually informative. As these two guys have actual broadcast experience, it’s one of the best. Also has a corresponding ‘vidCast.’

Hi My Name Is Mark
defeat, crushed dreams, and high karate. The life and times of Mark Hoppus…
former bass player for blink 182. Only 2 episodes. So far it’s better than I’d expected. For fear of legal repercussions most podcasts either stay away from music altogether, or limit themselves to “podsafe” music. Because Mark Hopus is actually *IN* the music industry he’s able to get permission play anything he likes, additional he interviews almost every artist he plays. The music is obviously lite, pop punky/emo. Mark also makes great use of the mp3 chapters feature.

Security Now!
Steve Gibson, the man who coined the term spyware and created the first anti-spyware program…discusses the hot topics in security today with Leo Laporte. Published weekly late Thursday night.
I’ve listened to all 7 episodes. The topics discussed in classic Leo Laporte style fairly rudimentary. I could see this show being educational/useful to a lot of customers i used to talk to when i did tech support. Initial I thought I’d give it a chance, the subject matter is a little more technical that the normal Leo fare. It’s going down hill. If the dumbing down-ness continues next week, I will probably unsubscribe.

techPhile
Gadget, Tech & Geek on the go. Listen in for news, reviews, and interviews with today’s shakers and movers in the techworld.
Essentially tech news with a Canadian spin. I was about ready to unsubscribe – the content isn’t too interesting – but it looks like he’s got some good interviews coming up. So I’ll give those a listen.

The Dawn and Drew Show
Gadget, Tech & Geek on the go. Listen in for news, reviews, and interviews with today’s shakers and movers in the techworld.
This show is podcast daily (as far as i understand it’s their fulltime job at the moment, they’re syndicated on satellite radio). That’s probably one of the only reasons I listen to it. I first heard about this show on another podcast. Dawn and Drew get a lot of props, but the show isn’t anything special. The show really isn’t about anything, they basically talk about their life and their fans and joke about sex. It’s serves as my mildly amusing morning radio show on the bus.

The Web 2.0 Show
Welcome to the Web 2.0 Show podcast with your hosts Josh and Chris! Join us as we discuss Web 2.0 technologies, business and ideas with industry leaders.
Pretty straight forward. If you’re not familiar with the term ‘web 2.0’ check the wikipedia article. They’ve only put out 3 episodes to date. The first had horrible audio quality, I couldn’t listen. The second was only midly educational. The 3rd is still sitting on my iPod. I’m pretty excited about web 2.0 so I’ll give this podCast another chance.

Saved the best for last…
This Week In Tech
Your first podcast of the week is the last word in tech. Join Leo Laporte, Patrick Norton, Kevin Rose, John C. Dvorak, and other tech luminaries in a roundtable discussion of the latest trends in high tech. Winner of People’s Choice Podcast and Best Technology Podcast in the 2005 People’s Choice Podcast Awards. Released every Sunday at midnight Pacific.
This is *THE* tech podcast. It’s a behemoth. They don’t know for certain, but I don’t think anyone would be suprised if they found upwards of a million downloads per episode. The original name of the show was “Revenge of The Screen Savers” and that’s essentially what it is. In addition to the reccuring hosts, the discussion often includes former TSS guests and personalities. Despite Leo Laportes presence, this show manages to be an exteremly informative discussion of tech topics. Reoccuring topics tend to be: google, digital rights, IPTV/IPMedia, bittorrent as well as other generally geeky topics. They’ve recently moved the show to a “live” venue (first the apple store in cupurintino, then a bar in toronto, now rotating california resturants) with a live audiance and a video shoot – a first in podcasting. The majority of hosts are media veterans making this a very well produced affair. Episodes typically run 60 – 90 minutes.

Categories
From The Archives Podcasts

inDiggnation 1.0

The first ever response cast, Indiggnation! The first installment documents issues with digg.com and foreseen problems with the OpenID protocol.

  • Ian can be found at www.notian.net
    Ryan can be found at ohryan.ca
  • Intro music is Melt-Banana – Showroom Dummies
  • Phrase BlogCast
  • Here is the story I mentioned a digg that links to Engadget, which links to cNet. Shuffle vs Super Shuffle. I did find another digg article that has very similar text, but linked directly to the Net article.
  • The ‘Premiere Episode’ that Ryan mentioned was when we tried to do a podcast with a $7 thrift store microphone that sucked soooooooo much balls. We also sounded like idiots almost the whole time. If we ever get famous, it could be released to embarrass us.
  • Ryan’s digg: Better Bandwidth Protection
  • Top 5 Hacker movies
  • algorithm
  • Open ID
  • I did a test with the OpenID system on LJ and it says “You have to be logged in” as opposed to presenting you with a log in screen (though this may be different than when Ryan first tested it.) I tested it on Deadjournal.com, and noticed a problem in that if you don’t have a paid account, you don’t get a subdomain, and the OpenID auth uses user.livejournal.com so it links you just to an error page, good going LJ!
  • The obscure URL Ryan mentioned is located, here.

Next episode of indiggnation? Coming…. maybe.