Pondering on podcasts

Well, I'm done with school 'til next semester. I'm getting an A in my class. Out of the 160 points possible for the first four assignments I got 160, so I'm just going to assume that my final project will get a good grade too!

Most of you know I have ADD. At work I listen to audio books to keep my brain awake and entertained. Several months ago, shortly before iTunes started carrying them, I discovered PodCasts. I had heard about them and they sounded interesting but I never really got around to finding out just what they were about. After the first episode of The Signal came out I decided to see what else was out there.

I found some geeky ones about Macs, and I found some comedy ones with people just talking about their lives, and I found some geeky Sci-Fi ones, and I found one chock full of cover song goodness. I also found some boring ones and some that were interesting but I just couldn't listen to the guys voices.

This was shortly after I had loaned Niki at work my Firefly DVDs and created an instant addict. So, in my need to spread the love, I sent both Niki and lucky13charm the url for The Signal. I also sent them the url for Coverville.

Because of the "no installing programs" rule at work we couldn't put podcatchers out there so we were manually downloading. Then iTunes added podcasts. I sorta ignored the no software rule and put iTunes on my computer anyway. I figured that if IS said anything, I could pull the "I'm just a girl. what did i do wrong?" routine. But the guys in iS wanted iTunes on their computers too so they pretty much just look the other way.

Whenever I found a new PodCast I would let the girls know. Both of them listen to TWiT now too. Although neither of them filled out the poll so they aren't 'officially' part of the TWiT 3% club like I am.

When Leo read the stats from their poll I couldn't believe that the number of women listening was only 3%. (although i didn't have any problem believing that over half their listeners were single...) I know TWiT's demo would skew more towards male than female, but i didn't think it would be that drastic.

Then I started looking to see if I could find any other stats about the gender split in general among PodCast listeners. There's really not much out there. I saw one poll that had women at 15%. Also, the female attendance at the Portable Media Expo was listed as about 15%. Still not really high numbers.

I was talking to Niki about that and I was mentioning how many women I knew who listened to PodCasts. That's when it dawned on me. Almost every woman I know who listens, listens as a direct result of me recommending something to them. When I said that, Niki said. "You are the Geek Grenade. Spreading geekness everywhere."

So, *kaboom*, I'm gonna spread some more of that geekness with some links to PodCasts I like. These links are to the shows actual page, although you can go to iTunes to subscribe to them.

Coverville
~You just gotta love over 150 shows of just cover songs

TWiT
~Ultimate geeky podcast. The king of tech, Leo Laporte and his TWiT army

Weezy and the Swish
~The Swish used to be on a talk show on G4 called Unscrewed with Martin Sargent. She is pretty and funny

Slice of Sci-Fi
~Two guys with actual radio experience who talk about Sci-Fi stuff

The Dragon Page, Winging It
~Sister show to Slice of Sci-Fi. They drink and they talk about whatever they feel like

Keith and the Girl
~Two New Yorkers who work as clowns to pay rent. She's a singer and he's a comedian

The ADDCast
~A guy somewhere out east who is basically a male version of me

Cush: Things I Say
~A guy in LA who is a musician & stuff. He combines funny with deep thoughts with music. And he has a good radio voice

The Twisted Pickle
~This guy is in Omaha and his wife doesn't know that he does a PodCast. He's done over 50 of them and he went to the Expo, but she has no idea

Martin Sargent's Infected
~Tech TV's Martin Sargent. Only one episode so far. The beautiful thing about PodCasting is that we don't have to actually see Joey The Intern any more

Radio Free Burrito
~Two episodes so far. The man has the gift of the funny and the writing skills

Gay cowboys

hellbob had mentioned that he didn't have much interest in going to see Brokeback Mountain. It opens on the 9th. I'm thinking of going on either Friday night or Sunday afternoon. Anyone else interested? lucky13charm, I'm assuming you are?

(no subject)

Wanna go see Mason Jennings on Saturday??

Mason only has one concert scheduled, and it is at First Avenue on Saturday night. This concert is sold out, but the HellHouse has one extra ticket! With the TicketBastard fees, the ticket is still a bargain at $19! The show is at 6pm so you won't even have to stay out until all hours if you don't want to. If you've never heard Mason's stuff you are missing out! Here's his web page: http://www.masonjennings.com/
iTunes has his music. So does eMusic.com if you don't want to deal with the Apple protected format.
As I said, there is only one ticket. First come, first serve. Unless of course you want to offer more money than the first person. I'm perfectly willing to let y'all get into a bidding war over it.
:)