One of my favourite podcasts is The Daily.
This is one of their best. Listen here:
American Anti-Semitism is a much more complicated issue than I thought.
The racist President clearly encourages anti-Semites. Recall how Trump defended these A-holes.
Click PLAY or watch it on YouTube.
Yet he consistently defends Israel. Why is that?
I finally learned that white extremists want Israel to survive so American Jews will flee there.
Recall when pundits were saying podcasting is dying?
Not so.
Apple Podcasts currently hosts north of 550,000 active shows, a bump from the 525,000 the company reported back in April — that’s a considerable jump from the 3,000 programs it hosted when the program launched back in 2005. …
I’ve been a daily listening fan since they started.
On The Media has been my favourite for perhaps the last decade.
Most people still get their audiocasts from iTunes. It’s not perfect. Nor is the Podcast app on IOS.
On the upside Apple is quite strict about who gets hosted. I never hear of any Nazi podcasts on the platform, for example.
For some reason I’ve not been listening to the highly acclaimed audiocast much over past years.
That’s got to change. I’ll be listening every week from here on in.
Recommended – #638 – February 9, 2018 – Rom-Com
I’ve cursed Steve Jobs 10,000 times for not perfecting wireless headphones.
The new Apple AirPods are good and bad.
The good? No wire tangles. They fit. They don’t fall out. Battery life is excellent. You can tap them to start and stop play.
The bad? Bluetooth is not 100% reliable. Audio cuts out quite often. There is no volume control without Siri. They are expensive at US $160. And … not everyone thinks they look cool wearing them. 🙂
Audio books and podcasts are important to me. I’ll get good value out of that $160 over the lifetime of the AirPods.
Still, I’ll normally use them in preference to my regular headphones.
Click PLAY or watch the Johnny Ive pitch on YouTube.
Here’s a real world review. Good and bad. Click PLAY or watch it on YouTube.
The fit and sound exactly like Apple earbuds.
On The Media is my favourite podcast.
WNYC’s weekly investigation into how the media shapes our world view. Veteran journalists Brooke Gladstone and Bob Garfield give you the tools to survive the media maelstrom.
So far I’m very pleased. Small form factor. Very durable. Good for travel. Good for my Coaching presentations.
I was inspired to buy a UE Roll when the speakers in my old laptop stopped functioning.
Wirecutter:
After listening to 30 of the most promising new Bluetooth speaker models on top of the 48 we originally tested last year, we think the UE Roll is the best choice for most listeners. It combines above-average sound quality with a waterproof, travel-friendly design that practically begs to be slipped into your suitcase or laptop bag. You can find speakers in the same price range that sound a little better, but in our opinion, you can’t find one that matches the Roll’s combination of sound quality, design, utility, and price.
Seems everyone I know is now listening to audio books and podcasts. 🙂
In the fall of 2014, the medium of podcasting achieved a milestone moment. The podcast Serial – which reinvestigated the 1999 murder of Maryland high school student Hae Min Lee – became the fastest podcast to reach 5 million streams or downloads in iTunes history. Although the success of Serial – a spinoff of WBEZ’s This American Life – clearly represented a new peak in the popularity of podcasts, Pew Research Center data show that the medium has, in fact, been steadily growing its audience …
I’m currently subscribed to about 70 podcasts. But truly only listen to about a dozen of those. They are all free via iTunes.
I have about 20 audio books lined up into the future. I pay an average of about $10 for those.
I buy from Amazon – Audible.com.
The advantages of audio over reading are many. But progress in the switch over has been slower than I would have expected.
Sadly, Apple has mostly bungled podcasts. Their apps have been lousy. Yet the competitors have not dented the importance of iTunes in distribution.
Audible is too dominant in the audio book market. They don’t innovate. They charge too much / title. Yet competitors have not dented the market leader, Amazon.
related – Against all odds, print books are on the rise again in the US
Sounds horrendous. The hunter faced death threats from outraged conservationists.
But the issue is far more complex than it seems at first glance.
The permit came from Namibia’s Ministry of Environment and Tourism. Each year it targets several older rhinos that are no longer able to breed but still pose a deadly threat to younger males. The proceeds are meant to go toward anti-poaching and conservation efforts.
That $350,000 does much to protect black rhino. Many hunters are keen conservationists.
Want to know more?
Back in 2014, Corey Knowlton paid $350,000 for a hunting trip to Namibia to shoot and kill an endangered species. He’s a professional hunter, who guides hunts all around the world, so going to Africa would be nothing new. The target on the other hand would be. And so too, he quickly found, would be the attention.
This episode, producer Simon Adler follows Corey as he dodges death threats and prepares to pull the trigger. Along the way we stop to talk with Namibian hunters and government officials, American activists, and someone who’s been here before – Kenya’s former Director of Wildlife, Richard Leakey. All the while, we try to uncover what conservation really means in the 21st century.
Listen to the story on RadioLab.
I’m a fan of Freakonomics Radio, the audiocast.
… hosted by journalist Stephen Dubner, with economist Steve Levitt as a regular guest. Freakonomics Radio occasionally hits No. 1 on iTunes, with 4 million downloads a month …
Dubner and Levitt have 3 Freakonomics books, the most recent of which I just read.
Think Like a Freak: The Authors of Freakonomics Offer to Retrain Your Brain
It’s short. But good.
Freakonomics attempts to shed light on topics misunderstood by the general public.
Tom Merritt vs Mike Elgan
Tom Merritt is probably the smartest Technology pundit of them all, better (even) than his former boss Leo Laporte.
Unlike Leo, Tom is egotistical and not nearly as likeable.
Still, Tom was my #1 tech news authority before getting fired by Leo late 2013. His salary of $200,000 or so was not being recouped. Money was the main issue, I believe.
Tom was replaced by … Mike Elgan.
A guy I’d never heard of. Something of the opposite of Tom Merritt.
Mike was terrible on audio at first. No gift of the gab, at all. Reviews were tragic. Over the months he got better and better. Mike is very smart. And very well connected in the Tech world.
He has 3,289,961 followers on Google+.
Though I don’t do much on Google+, I follow Mike on TWIT.
I just subscribed to Tom’s audiocast Daily Tech News Show.
I’ll listen to both. They are quite different.
Rick McCharles 