top | item 3580367

Podcasts for Hackers

197 points| joshuacc | 14 years ago |designpepper.com

74 comments

order
[+] 2arrs2ells|14 years ago|reply
NPR's Planet Money Podcast: http://www.npr.org/blogs/money/

Lots of examples of people hacking various economic systems (i.e. buying dollar coins to get airline miles) as well as the occasional economics behind tech podcast (Marco Arment & JoCo were both featured recently), and a great way to get a sense of the macroeconomic landscape.

[+] firefoxman1|14 years ago|reply
I also love the Motley Fool podcast. They have a lot of great info packed into each episode, while staying true to the Motley Fool style of humor and amazingly simplified explanations of complex topics.
[+] awolf|14 years ago|reply
I highly recommend Back to Work.

The signal to noise ratio is a problem, but we're talking about some pretty high quality signal and some pretty hilarious noise.

Yes: Merlin can be _extremely_ rambly and he often has a hard time staying on topic, but when he is on, he's on. The last three episodes have been especially great on topics such as risk, valuing yourself, and looking at the big picture in determining how to live your life and career. They resonated very well with me as someone who has taken the plunge of quitting my job and working on my own apps and projects.

[+] spacemanaki|14 years ago|reply
99% Invisible is in the same category of general nerdy podcasts like Radiolab (i.e. not just meant for programmers). I think this show specifically would be interesting to hackers, on manufactured sounds for digital interfaces, but there's a lot of good stuff in the archives.

http://99percentinvisible.org/post/3230995265/episode-15-the...

[+] jorde|14 years ago|reply
Absolutely agree on 99% Invisible. Roman Mars does a fantastic job and episodes are really well produced. If you're interested on design, this is the show to listen. Episodes are short, 5-15mins.

I actually discovered this during the Christmas break and listened all the episodes in few days. Now it's the highlight of my week.

[+] radicalbyte|14 years ago|reply
The podcast might be nice, but for some reason they don't publish links to the mp3 in their podcast RSS feed.

Ironic to see a podcast about design making a simple UX mistake like that.

[+] alain94040|14 years ago|reply
It may be time to start a news podcast, the "hacker new podcast", where 3 of the top HN users discuss the day's headlines and comments on HN - 5 minutes/day.

Think of it as a summary of HN for HN fans who don't have the time to read all the comments.

[+] leot|14 years ago|reply
Slate's Gabfests would probably be a good model for these. They're really entertaining to listen to, and very insightful.

They've never discussed it explicitly, but their "formula" seems to include:

- usually at most three main topics (occasionally more)

- a closing bit of silliness

- they make sure everyone has had time to prepare something to say on the topics to-be-discussed

- each person has a computer handy (but I never hear anyone typing, which is nice)

- they have some facility for including external audio (for discussion, e.g., music or ads)

- one person leads the discussion, trying to keep people on topic, and making sure that a transition happens to the next one at the right time

- keep the podcast between 45 and 60 minutes, fairly consistently

- they release it at a regular time

- it's weekly, and comes out at a regular time

[+] petercooper|14 years ago|reply
TechZing was doing something similar with its panel shows but.. definitely not 5 minutes or each day ;-) I give your idea a thumbs up but podcast production is pretty hard work so it would take some rather dedicated souls to pull it off well.
[+] mmahemoff|14 years ago|reply
A few podcasts I like which focus more on broad technology trends, tech in society, and the future:

* Seminars About Long Term Thinking: http://longnow.org/seminars/ A little like TED, but longer talks and more focused on tech and long-term thinking. Don't miss Brewster Kahle's recent talk about the Internet Archive (http://longnow.org/seminars/02011/nov/30/universal-access-al...).

* Triangulation: http://twit.tv/tri1 Interviews with tech luminaries on the TWIT network

* Technometria: http://itc.conversationsnetwork.org/series/technometria.html Interview/conversations led by Phil Windley, creator of IT Conversations, which is also worth checking out (http://itc.conversationsnetwork.org/ ; the original home of the StackOverflow/StackExchange podcast).

[+] biafra|14 years ago|reply
2600's Off the Hook - http://www.2600.com/offthehook/

And there are several very good german podcasts:

Chaosradio - http://chaosradio.ccc.de/

Chaosradio Express (CRE) - http://cre.fm/

mobilemacs - http://mobilemacs.de/

[+] Derbasti|14 years ago|reply
Funny how German podcasters pretty much unanimously decided not to do ads or sponsoring while american podcasts are often littered with ads to the point where it gets unbearable.

Compare and contrast the TWiT network or 5by5 with Tim Pritlove or BitsUndSo

[+] bootload|14 years ago|reply
how could "StackOverflow" not be listed here? love listening to this show because it is a) technical & b) funny in a "Statler and Waldorf" sort of way ~ http://blog.stackoverflow.com/category/podcasts/

and also ByteIntoIt, a real radio show also podcasted & streamed ~ http://www.rrr.org.au/program/byte-into-it/

[+] VMG|14 years ago|reply
will there still be a stack overflow podcast though after Jeff quit stack exchange?

the last episode is from december 8th 2011

[+] polyfractal|14 years ago|reply
Stanford's "Entrepreneurial Thought Leaders Seminar" is pure gold if you are looking for high-level business, innovation and entrepreneurial discussions.

http://etl.stanford.edu/

[+] AbyCodes|14 years ago|reply
No Podcast list is complete without mentioning Software engineering radio: http://se-radio.net

This compilation of podcasts by Skilldrick has some real good ones: http://skilldrick.co.uk/2011/08/podcasts-i-listen-to/ Especially, The Changelog and FLOSS weekly.

Also another small compilation from infoq: http://www.infoq.com/news/2011/09/archcasts I especially enjoy On Architecture with Grady Booch: http://www.computer.org/portal/web/computingnow/onarchitectu...

Stack Overflow (now stackexchange, you can find the old episodes on itconversations), and techzing podcasts are packed with wit and humor. Listening to Joel, Justin and Jason, brightens any day.

I also subscribe to Compucast: http://computersciencepodcast.com/podcasts.html and Channel9: http://channel9.msdn.com/

Herding Code: http://herdingcode.com/ and radio free python: http://www.radiofreepython.com/ are on my "to listen" list.

[+] petercooper|14 years ago|reply
Thanks for including some that I'm involved in! :-) I want to suggest two others (which are not mine):

Founders Talk - http://5by5.tv/founderstalk - a frequent interview podcast with founders, true HN style. The guests are often programmers.

Mixergy - http://mixergy.com/ - same as above but with more of a business slant. Mixergy is huge though and Andrew is perhaps as much a "friend of HN" as we could get IMHO :-)

[+] joshuacc|14 years ago|reply
Not a problem. I really enjoy your shows.

smacks head Not sure how I missed Mixergy. Thanks for the suggestions! I'll add them momentarily.

[+] stevepdp|14 years ago|reply
There's a great collection of podcasts here: http://hackermedia.org/ and here: http://www.thelinuxlink.net/

The 2600 family of shows: http://www.2600.com/offthehook, http://www.2600.com/offthewall and the Hackers On Planet Earth conference archives: http://blip.tv/2600magazine/rss

Security now: http://twit.tv/sn

This Developer's Life: http://thisdeveloperslife.com/

The Linux Action Show: http://www.jupiterbroadcasting.com/show/linuxactionshow/

Techsnap: http://www.jupiterbroadcasting.com/show/techsnap/

Ubuntu-UK Podcast: http://podcast.ubuntu-uk.org/

Free As In Freedom (The Software Freedom Law Show): http://www.softwarefreedom.org/podcast/