I'm addicted to podcasts -- audio files you can download to your iPod (or mp3 player) and listen to at your leisure.
Right now, I'm listening to the Onion Radio News, about minute-long clips of silly Onion stories. My other podcasts include Democracy Now!, which I listen to every weekday to catch up on my news stories (I'm not so much all over the Internet these days, and it's awesome to listen to while washing dishes/cleaning house/etc.); The Alan Watts Podcast, theology lectures by a Protestant minister/Buddhist monk; Dear Science, a science podcast; the Savage Love Podcast, Dan Savage's once-a-week, out-loud version of his sex advice column; This American Life; This Week in Science, weekly science news; and WNYC's Radio Lab, hour-long conversations about an array of topics, always fascinating.
I think it's funny how the communication medium of radio seems to have come full cycle. At its inception, radio was the way to learn about the world around you. Television took over some of radio's programming niches -- like the fiction shows and some (but not all) of the news. The Internet has now taken over many of television's programming niches -- but it's also opened the door for radio again. Now, the portability and convenience of a podcast make radio relevent again; you can download radio shows to listen to at your leisure.
In other news, there appear to be holes in several of my English Breakfast teabags. (No, that is not a euphemism for something else.) What gives?
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