iPhone Apps I Actually Still Use, 2012

See my updated October 2014 list.

So it's been about three years since I did a post like this, and there are now thousands more of what used to be called "third party" iPhone (and iPad) apps that run on Apple's iOS platform. These are the apps I use regularly on my iPhone 4S.

My first home screen and launch bar. Don't worry; most of those e-mails aren't urgent. 

My first home screen and launch bar. Don't worry; most of those e-mails aren't urgent. 

Social Media

Tweetbot - My preferred Twitter app. Multiple accounts and timelines, mute functions, easy switching between lists, Instapaper integration, great search, highly customizable, with traditional RT retweets.

Tweetkeeper - Twitter will only let you download 3,200 tweets at a shot. With this app, you can download all of your tweets from this date forward -- and the tweets of others -- and keep storing them, for a permanent record. I save the tweets of some funny accounts I like, as well as my own.

Facebook - I'd rarely look at my timeline without this.

StumbleUpon - Serendipity in your hand. A way to find the stuff you didn't know you were looking for.

Buffer - With this scheduler app, spread out your tweets, Facebook apps and Alpha.app.net posts so you don't overwhelm your followers.

Alienblue - Makes Reddit less ugly. 

Launch Center Pro saves me a lot of time.​

Launch Center Pro saves me a lot of time.​

Foursquare - A waste of time, perhaps, and an obsessive compulsive addiction, but it pays off when you're in a New York neighborhood and want to find a place to eat or shop -- or remember the place with the great espresso that you stopped in two years ago. 

Utilities

Launch Center Pro - When you have as many apps as I do, it's helpful to have this in your menubar. It can dig deep into some apps and iPhone functions (like using the flash as a flashlight) and take you quickly to bookmarked Web pages. Create an Omnifocus to-do item or a Simplenote or search IMDB with just a few taps. Now if only Apple would let it toggle Wi-Fi. 

1Password - Secure access to your sensitive sites; protects your passwords and generates strong ones. If you lose your phone, this important data is encrypted.

TextExpander - Create typing shortcuts for longer phrases and even email form letters. Get a snippet dictionary for commonly misspelled words and words with accents and let this app do the work when you type. Syncs across all devices via Dropbox.

iTransNYC - I don't typically need a lot of help navigating the New York subway, which is this app's specialty. But I do find it useful on weekends or late nights. First of all, believe it or not, the New York subways have a schedule and trains are pretty much on time, so this app can tell you when the next train will arrive on a given line. And it also knows about all the construction detours. I am moving this one back out of a folder where it was hidden, now that Apple has apparently downgraded the Maps application with iOS 6. Updated. 9-25-12

Reading

Reeder - When I want to read or share articles from RSS feeds on Google Reader, I use this. 

Instapaper - The attractive "read later" app, with integration across all devices. Dark screen mode for low light conditions, attractive fonts, smart suggested readings list. I paid for search.

Flipboard - Turns links from RSS feeds, Facebook timelines and Twitter streams into a magazine format. 

Kindle - I have too much invested in Amazon books to use any other app now. I wish it had not been crippled by restrictive Apple iTunes store policies. Another option that lets you buy books directly is the Kindle Cloud Reader, a  Web app that can be installed on the iPhone screen via Safari.

NYTimes and Election 2012 apps. The home team, and in my view the best way to consume New York Times content and aggregated politics from multiple sources on the go. 

Workflow and Notes

Omnifocus - The best getting-things-done project app. Get rid of that gnawing fear that you have something to do all the time. Capture it now and  check it off later. Syncs across all your devices (but expensive to buy all versions).

Simplenote - Simple text notes, shared across all devices and computers using Notational Velocity. I put bits of text here when I can't figure out where else to put them.

Bento - A useful database program for projects and staff lists. Syncs over WiFi with your computer.

Dropbox - Easiest way to share files with your computers and other devices.

Evernote - A full-featured, rich sharing app for photos, Web content and more, for sharing across all computers and devices.

Reference

Webster's New World - Cheaper than the print version of The Times's official dictionary, and easier to search by typing the first few letters of a word.

Shorter English Oxford Dictionary - In print, this stretches to 20 volumes. Expensive, but cool to have on your phone. Useful for etymological information.

Terminology - A thesaurus-like dictionary of specialized jargon for many fields.

Wikipanion - Fast, easy direct Wikipedia search.

Podcasts and Music

Downcast - I've tried them all, and this podcast app annoys me the least. Streaming, auto downloading, search, an easy interface. Just be careful: Auto downloaded files will eat up your storage and data limits, depending how you configure this. I had a bad surprise when I left 4G downloading on during an international trip.

Spotify - I've tried RDIO, Pandora and many others, not to mention syncing the iTunes library I own. But Spotify gives me the right amount of control, selection and serendipity for music on the go. Stream just about any music out there for $10 a month, on all devices and computers; store some on the app if you're going to be disconnected. Share playlist with your Facebook friends. Good suggestions for new music. With most music I enjoy available here, I spend a lot less buying tracks.

Shazam - Hold it up to the TV, the radio, or the sound system in a public place, and it will tell you the name of that song that you just fell in love with. Still amazing after all these years.

TuneIn Radio - I am a fan of the eclectic music played on KCRW, the public radio station in Los Angeles, and my wife likes to listen to the BBC and a variety of local public radio shows. This app lets you stream these and many other programs from radio stations around the world. It syncs across your devices.

Health and Fitness

Sleep MotionX - An amazing app I use every night. You place it in the bed and calibrate it, then it detects motion to measure your deep sleep, light sleep and wakefulness. It helped me to diagnose my apnea problem, which woke me up repeatedly through the night. Now, with breathing treatment, I sleep through the night. The app alarm also finds the optimal time to wake you up in your sleep cycle. During the day, he app measures daily steps and tells you when you're sitting around too long. And it gives you lots of data in cool charts.

My 30-day chart from Sleep MotionX. I used to get about an hour less on average, so this is pretty good. ​

My 30-day chart from Sleep MotionX. I used to get about an hour less on average, so this is pretty good. ​

iFitness - Many suggested workout routines, option to save workouts, video demonstrations.

Lose It! - A meal planner and calorie lookup/counter that includes many common restaurant meals and store foods in its database.

Miscellaneous

Open Table - This is a useful reservation service for restaurants, with menus. I've gotten into a lot of places the day of the reservation. 

Cor.kz - A great way to track wine club purchases, Syncs with Cellartracker.com, a comprehensive wine database with user and expert reviews and ratings.

Dark Sky - Tells you the only thing you need to know about the weather, most of the time: Is it going to rain in the next hour? With radar maps.

Catan - Get your 'Settlers of Catan" fix and hone your skills by practicing against robot players with many types of playing styles.

Everyday - Shoot your picture every day and watch how you change over months and years. If you dare.

Hueless - Mimics an old-style black and white camera, with color filters. Make everything look like the 1930s. Every place looks like a noir film, and everybody looks better in B&W.

Meditate - A simple meditation timer with chimes, with variable settings for preparation, intervals and cool down. It displays a total for the amount of time you have spent sitting, which is not enough, most likely. Take heed. Do not squander your life.

First Week With the Apple iPad

Updated April 21, 2010.

The world probably doesn't really need another iPad review, does it?

There's a glut out of them out there.

And I'm not a tech reviewer. I'm a gadget nut, so feel free to discount my enthusiasm by the appropriate percentage. After all, I did pre-order this thing sight unseen so it could be delivered on Day One.

So this post will be impressionistic, just some notes on my first week with the device.

First: It's fast. Snappy. It makes the iPhone and the iPod Touch seem slow. It makes a Macbook seem slow.

Second: The battery life is amazing. You don't even think about the battery. I plug it it in every night, and have used it heavily many days. It has never dropped below 50 percent.

Remarkable for an Apple product: It doesn't get hot -- unlike my Macbook Air, or my iPhone, which can get uncomfortable to the touch and sluggish with heavy use. I have often thought that Steve Jobs was trying to brand me with his products. No more. A negative: At a pound a half, it's kind of heavy. Not as heavy as a MacBook Air or a Thomas Pynchon hardback, but heavier than a Kindle. The answer to this problem is the Apple case. I like it. It's simple and functional. You can hold it like a book. You can prop it at an angle. You can stand it up like a little TV, a far better experience than watching movies on a laptop or a desktop computer.

Another negative: In bright daylight, reflections can be distracting if you're trying to read or watch something. And it shows every fingerprint. I don't imagine using it in sunlight all that much.

Something I didn't expect: The photo frame function is great. I put thousands of pictures on the iPad. Then I just prop it up on the mantle and let it shuffle through them. I've never enjoyed having everyone crowd around the computer to look at pictures, and showing them on the TV involves too much rigmarole. This is more akin to paging through hard-copy photo albums.

Not entirely Apple's fault: Some apps are crashy or lack obvious features. You can't turn off Twitterrific's bird noises. Tweetdeck's beta won't let you click on links in tweets. What! (Update: This may have been fixed in recent days.) The ABC app crashed, but seems better after an update. That one has a touch of evil. You can pause and fast-forward/rewind programs, but not the commercials. I flash back to pre-TiVo days, plan my bathroom trips around them. Still, it's not as crashy as the original iPhone was after third-party apps started showing up.

Public use: I remember when I first got an iPhone, and a Kindle. I felt self-conscious taking them out on the subway. For one thing, while crime is down, you have to be a little nervous riding underground with a $700 piece of hardware. It's a bit nerve-racking to think about taking it out, feeling eyes on me. That's not my thing. I like to be left alone in public. I can't wait until everyone has one of these things, or something like it. And they will.

Mostly I expect to use this at home and on long trips. For that reason, I didn't really need the 3G version, and the lack of connectivity outside WiFi-enabled locations has not been a problem. In New York, WiFi is rarely far away.

Something else I didn't expect: I didn't think I would listen to music on the iPad, but I've surprised myself. First of all, the speaker is great, so it makes a nice little radio. I can play things for my wife without using the computer or the stereo or the Apple TV, and I'm not isolated by my headphones. So it's a great way to share NPR or Pandora or whatever I have on the device. I also listen to music or podcasts on the headphones while web surfing. It's a lot easier than juggling a second device, an iPod or an iPhone, for the music. But the lack of multitasking is a negative here: I'd like to be able to see what's playing at a glance, or pause it, without exiting my app.

About some apps: My employer's app, Editor's Choice [iTunes link], is beautiful, but it should allow link sharing through Facebook or Twitter and have more content. But reading the paper on Safari for iPad is great, so it doesn't really matter, I guess. And I do give credit to Apple for having the Amazon Kindle app on the iPad from day one. All my Kindle books, many of them untouched since my Kindle died, are there. I keep it next to the iBooks app. Amazon has the better selection and prices, and you can make notes in the app. The iBooks app and store has some cooler flourishes and feels better designed (the page-turning illusion is cool). E-book reading was my main reason for getting the iPad now as opposed to waiting for a future model.

The good news is that many iPhone apps, like iChess, work and look just fine with the pixel-doubling function.

Money grab?: It's annoying that some developers have decided to charge a second time for the iPad versions of apps I own for the iPhone. If you make a good one, I'll buy your other apps. Or give me a free trial version at least. And Time magazine -- $4.99 for a single issue, in an app that only works once? Give me a break. Another magazine app, Zinio, has a free selection, but it's a bit awkward to navigate.

An annoyance: I don't know if it's a bug or not, but I get tired of entering my iTunes password every time I open the iBooks app or the iTunes store. Other people don't report this problem, so maybe it's just me. The whole iTunes tethering business has been criticized in many reviews. Why do you need to hook the iPad up to a computer to get it started? Seems like a ploy to get iTunes downloaded onto PCs or to sell Macs. And why can't I just move documents and other user files directly from my computer or network without ramping up iTunes? (Yes, I know, there are apps for that -- I like Readdledocs, which just released an iPad version.)

A third thing I didn't expect: YouTube is back in my life. I was never one to surf around the site. I usually only go there with a link. The iPhone app was cool, but it crashed a lot, and the video was too small. The iPad is the perfect device for YouTube. The videos are just the right size. It's not as crashy as the phone. I spent an evening lost in the site. In general, it's a great device for video.

I've spent a lot of time streaming Netflix and watching TV. I've watched three shows on the ABC app, and skimmed comics on several of the comic applications. It's a cool experience, but I don't think I'll buy many comics this way. It's not the same as owning the art.

Bottom line: Is this a laptop replacement? Definitely not. Even if I get the keyboard stand or the bluetooth keyboard, it is hard to imagine writing long memos, blog posts or articles on this, or editing them. Perhaps I might get used to it, but from what I hear I expect it will be odd to have to use the screen as a touch-mouse while editing with an external keyboard. I still prefer the visibility of a larger screen for actual work.

I also like the ability to switch between a photo app, files and the document I'm writing. Even when multitasking is added in the fall with the new operating system, it is hard to imagine that being satisfactory except when I'm on the run. Having to sync Keynote or text documents through iTunes also seems like a hassle. Yes, I know there are ways to do some wireless document sharing, printing and storage on the cloud. But it seems complicated for big projects and day to day use.

Is this a phone replacement? No, it's too big, and I didn't get the 3G. There are apps that will let you make calls over the Internet, and I could imagine this as a Skype device, but there's no camera, front-facing or otherwise.

Is this a Kindle replacement? Yes. Reading on it is superior, and you don't need a booklight.

What I'm finding is that I am migrating certain functions to the iPad. Some things are simply not all that comfortable on a laptop -- watching video, playing casual games. My daughter loves the Phineas and Ferb game for the iPad, above.

It's fun to curl up on a couch or in bed with this thing. I've done that with a laptop, which is a bit awkward, and with my phone, which is a squinting experience much of the time.

I wish my laptop did email the way the mail app on the iPad does it. It's a better interface, and I don't see why it wouldn't work on a computer.

The iPad is better for using Twitter than either a laptop or a phone -- the touch interface and the size of the screen makes it an immersed experience.

The third-party developers just need to fix their apps; once Tweetdeck has links, this will be my main device for using Twitter. The large, touch-based experience is superior to the computer and the iPhone.

Ultimately, though, it's a toy, not a work device, at least for me. Do you need one? That's a bit like asking, do you need a flat-screen TV? No, you don't need a flat-screen TV, or any TV. Do you need to buy books? No, not really. You don't have to read newspapers or surf the Internet, either. And there are plenty of ways to do all of those things without owning an iPad.

But sooner or later, I suspect, you will see an iPad (or a device like it) doing something you love in a better way than you are doing it now. And it will be cheaper than it is now.

A Return to Guatemala via Stumptown

IMG_0132I've enjoyed a number of Guatemalan coffees -- the Finca La Folie from Ritual Roasters, Itzamna from Intelligentsia, the Nimac Kapeh and the Soma blend from Barismo -- so I picked up these beans on another side trip to Stumptown's Manhattan location at the Ace Hotel in the 20s. As always, the service was fast and pleasant, and I received a complimentary coffee because I was buying beans. (I was also playing around with Foursquare and its iPhone app, and discovered that there's a fierce battle to become "mayor" of this location.) Name Finca El Injerto

Origin: Huehuetenango, Guatemala

Roasted: Sept. 24 by Stumptown Coffee.

Purchased: Sept. 28 at Stumptown in the Ace Hotel at 18 West 29th Street and Broadway, Manhattan.

Description From the label: "A jasmine fragrance is met with flavors of Dutch chocolate, roast almonds, meyer lemon, plum and a chamomile tea finish."

In the cup Finca El Injerto has fierce partisans in the coffee world. I had received at least one heads up on Twitter to be on the lookout for it. The official blog Thumpology says this is the first farm that had a Direct Trade relationship with Stumptown. A Bourbon variety, this coffee is grown in a region of Guatemala just south of the Mexican border by Arturo Aguirre and his son. Here is an gorgeous video showing how the Aguirres grow their coffee (I love Stumptown geeks). This bean -- billed as the most popular coffee roasted and sold by Stumptown year after year -- is not to be confused with the Cup of Excellence winner Pacamera from the same farm, which I'm now interested in trying.

For the last couple of weeks, I have been drinking this as both regular coffee and espresso. It's pretty good. There was a slight bitterness, a flavor I couldn't place, that was off-putting at first, but quickly forgotten. Did I pick up a fragrance of jasmine mutating into chocolate and almonds and finishing with a tea-like grace? Oh, I don't know. I still find these descriptions rather precious and embarrassing. I guess I should get over that. I do like it, and there is a hint of nuts and chocolate, though not nearly as sweet as I tend to prefer. I have no idea what a meyer lemon and plum might taste like, and there's definitely a tea-like something in there, which reminded me ofNimac Kapeh (the tea flavor was much stronger in that coffee).

I've had coffees I enjoyed more (I think I liked Stumptown's Montes de Oro more, for example), from other regions, from Intelligentsia and other roasters, but this is definitely far superior to most of the swill out there. I wish there were more locations, since this one is a little off my regular path. I'l definitely drop by Stumptown again -- and I look forward to writing about the other coffee I picked up -- but I'll never be its Foursquare mayor, alas.

Podcast Zeitgeist, Jan. 26

This week's installment is the Podcast Zeitgeist of second chances, and probably the last such post for a good long while. I'll continue to listen to a few favorites, but a hiatus is in order. This started as an effort to make some notes about what worked for me as a listener. But it became an exhausting and time-consuming exercise, particularly since I sampled many more hours than I ever wrote about. It was cutting into my Twittering time. At some point I may summarize what I have learned, or not.[See all lists.]

  • Cranky Geeks 150: Big Wig Bailouts As tech podcasts go, this is one of the best, hosted by John C. Dvorak, with Sebastian Rupley of PC Magazine, Chris DiBonaof Google and Jason Cross of Extreme.com. Topics: Steve Jobs, Bernie Madoff, the fake Belkin reviews scam, disruptive technology like location apps and more. Dvorak keeps it moving. Good stuff. Running time: 31:40 minutes including several ads. Released: Jan. 21.

  • This Week in Media 123: Guns, Drugs and DVDs</a>. Daisy Whitney, Alex Lindsay and Dr. Kiki Sanford in a meaty discussion of new media technologies like Microsoft's Silverlight and CNN's Photosynth experiment for the Obama inauguration. YouTube music takedown notices. Do you stream or download Web video? Dr. Kiki: Streaming is getting easier, but buffering is still annoying, on the road. Whitney can't be bothered to download and sync video to a device. Beware: Even without DRM, iTunes songs contain your e-mail address. Depressing news from the old media business. Running time: 1 hour 7 minutes. Released: Jan. 20.
  • MacBreak Weekly 124: The Warmth and Saturation of Analog. Scott Bourne plugs his hard-to-remember photo critique site URL. Andy Ihnatko makes the funny. Frederick Van Johnson talks about getting laid off from Adobe. They are also joined by Alex Lindsay and Lisa Bettany. Twit site show notes are getting better. The health of Steve Jobs, again. Record iPhone app downloads (or are those just updates?) See the week's hardware and software picks here, including the very cool-sounding $200 2-gig Livescribe Pen. Running time: 1 hour 54 minutes. Released: Jan. 20.
  • This Week in Tech 179: Retail Therapy Laporte again, with Dr. Kiki, John C. Dvorak, Wil Harris of Channelflip, and Andrew Horowitz. Links discussed are bookmarked on Delicious. Good show, including a discussion of how Monty Python DVD sales shot up after the creation of an official, and free, YouTube channel. (Rathole: Military recruiting ads in movies and direct mail. Laporte says his teenage son gets junk mail: "Have you thought about what you're going to do when you drop out of high school?" Dvorak: "Let's get to some of these news stories.") Twitter raising cash. Foul-mouthed Carol Bartz, new Yahoo CEO, says she will drop-kick anyone who leaks, and then the leaking starts, inculding her breezy memo about "retail therapy." She is mocked. Health of Steve Jobs, again. The story behind Microsoft Songsmith, oy. CNN Photosynth, again. Various Obama tech stories, from Barackberry to Whitehouse.gov and the federal government's tech dark age. Huge traffic at Facebook. Dvorak on how to TiVo the Super Bowl properly and Horowitz on shorting the U.S. economy. Running time: 1 hour, 42 minutes. Released: Jan. 26.
  • Geek Loves Nerd 34: In-Laws The main segment is up front, an improvement over the last time I listened. This married Missouri couple gives advice to listeners about children, relationships and more. As the cute opening song explains, James is the geek and Jenn is the nerd. This week, they give advice about in-laws that I completely endorse as a married person with a child. Best example: Don't discuss your marital problems with your parents. They will naturally side with their own child and carry the grudge long after you have forgiven your spouse and forgotten about it. This is a clean podcast, but a warning: The views of sex roles are a bit stereotypical (men = breadwinners etc.) though perhaps that is intended humorously. Running time: 53:26 minutes. Released: Jan. 23.
  • The 40-Year-Old Boy: Episode 44. O.K., so much for the clean stuff. Here's a second listen from the world of blue podcast humor. Last week, the comedian Mike Schmidt depressed his listeners with an hourlong rant about his weight problems and stomach surgery. Listeners complained. That gives him a launching pad for a funny routine that range from "anonymous artless snark" on the Internet, Kevin Bacon losing his life savings to Bernie Madoff, people who sell meat door to door and more. The three-card monte story is worth hearing. So this is funny. And it's free. But the language is explicit. Running time: 1 hour, 17 minutes. Released: Jan. 14.
  • The Futile Podcast: "And the first word was Jesus" "Deconstructing 80’s & 90’s action movies. Relating them to comics, TV, and cartoons from then and now." Well, not quite. They review the first "Dirty Harry" movie, from 1971. Clint Eastwood as Callahan. He's no cartoon Rambo. He's a 70's antihero. It's seven minutes before any dialogue is spoken. The hosts attempt to decipher the politics of the 60s and 70s, with unintentionally humorous results for old people like me. Running time: 52:16 minutes. Released: Jan. 17. "Turns out he was 15 when they shot it." A review of the recent release "The Reader," based on the book. "This movie is about German guilt." What German movie isn't? Not an action film, unless you count sex scenes. I had to tune out at the spoiler alert. Running time: 29:42 minutes. Released: Jan. 21. "That ain't no cop gun Frank." Dirty Harry II: Magnum Force (1973). The franchise goes downhill (I think) but they like it. Nice dialogue on the nature of sequels. The nice thing about the "Dirty Harry" franchise is that it made Clint Eastwood rich enough to make good movies later in his career. Running time: 27:06 minutes. Released: Jan. 21.
  • Vomitus Prime 89: C'Mere and 90: Lovin' Nancyful Another reconsideration. I listened to this podcast back in November, and I was turned off by something or other, which drew some reaction in e-mails and on blogs from fans. Hey, it was my opinion. No accounting for taste. Perhaps I have been influenced by the hours of mediocre podcasts I've scanned -- I haven't even written about most of them -- but I'm ready to revise my opinion. It is foul-mouthed, gross, sick and frequently disgusting, but also funny. The regular hosts, Bill and Will, are entertaining storytellers who remind me of people from my own misspent youth. I say this knowing that they will respect me even less for changing my mind. Oh, well. Explicit language, obviously. They aim to shock. Running times: 1 hour, 26 minutes to 1 hour, 30 minutes. Release Dates: Jan. 17 and 25.
  • Sick and Wrong Podcasts 157 and 158 So after that, I figured I might as well turn to a podcast that bills itself as the No. 1 Source for Anti-Social Commentary. The first one marks the three-year anniversary of this podcast from Dee Simon and Lance Wackerle, which may be pseudonyms. A lengthy discussion of the police shooting caught on video in the BART and subsequent protests in Wackerle's neighborhood. Phone calls from drunk Australians. They also try to answer the question, why make an amateur podcast that makes no money? Apparently, they hoped to impress women, which has failed. They also interview the host of the fromtheville podcast, which stopped for no apparent reason one day. He doesn't seem to have been doing much. In the more recent episode, Wackerle explains why he bought a gun on inauguration day. And there's something about a kangaroo in Los Angeles. Running times: 1 hour 59 minutes and 1 hour 31 minutes. Released: Jan. 14 and 21.
  • Idiotboxradio 227: My Dad, The Baby! Speaking of Australians, here's one, a really weird and funny one, with a story told in stitched-together recordings of his children saying words and phrases. It's strange. But funny. And strange. The host says: "I think that my kids don't view me as an adult. Looking at it, that belief would have merit. (And before anyone thinks I got my kids to cuss, listen to the editing please...). I have to thank my beautiful girls Ella and Chloe for helping out on this one." Not for children. Running Time: 7:14 minutes. Released: Jan. 19.
  • Uhh Yeah Dude, Episodes 150 and 151 Like their counterparts at "Sick and Wrong," Jonathan Larroquette and Seth Romatelli are also celebrating nearly three years and 150+ hours of podcasting (I have been listening to the old shows and have about 30 hours left to go). The highlights of this one: chicken pox parties for children ("worst party ever"), the usual freakish true crime and medical tales, and Seth's story about getting an (unjust) ticket for -- shocking -- not wearing a seatbelt. The big news: They have finally revamped the long-inoperative UhhYeahDude.com, with show notes and listener forums. There's even a Wiki. Good on them. And as good a reason as any to quit reviewing podcasts. If most podcasters would put up some show notes or blog posts, and allow for reader discussion, they might be surprised by what happens. I have nothing to say about episode 151, which just dropped, but I am hitting publish and listening now. Looking forward to the part about the dog. Update: the story about rescuing the dog on a fixed-gear bike was great. Running time: 1 hour, 9 minutes. Released: Jan. 19.

    • Podcast Zeitgeist, Jan. 19

    Welcome to the Podcast Zeitgeist list: presented in apparently random order, at inconsistent intervals, its purpose obscure, its usefulness in doubt, its taste questionable, its methods and motives suspect. [See all lists.]

  • This Week in Tech 177: There's a Little Shatner in All of Us and 178: Call of Doody. I'm catching up here with two episodes. A special guest on the first of these was Star Trek's Geordi LaForge (Levar Burton). Burton held his own as a geek on a panel with Leo Laporte, John C. Dvorak, Ryan Block, and Lisa Bettany. A lot of talk about TVs. (Block: "Plasma TVs are on the way out.") Reviews of the "disappointing" MacWorld Expo and the Consumer Electronics Show. Whether the Palm Pre phone can save Palm (Dvorak: "They're done.") They end with the prospects for another Star Trek movie and a discussion of Geordi's visor. The latest episode, recorded Sunday night, devotes 20 minutes to the news that Steve Jobs is taking a temporary leave from Apple for health reasons, with a focus on news coverage, from Ron Goldman of CNBC to this profanity-laden Gizmodo post. Dvorak predicts that Apple will go into decline in two years. This is followed bya discussion of the Downadup/Conficker worm that infected 9 million Windows computers in four days (download the security updates, people). Laporte is wiggy on this episode ("Conficker? I hardly knew her!"), perhaps because he and panelist Tom Merritt attended a concert the night before by the geek troubadour Jonathan Coulton and the improv duo Paul & Storm. (The "doody" in the podcast title refers to panelist Patrick Norton, who has to change his son's diaper during the show and never returns.) The liquidation of Circuit City. A discussion of digital TV up-converters (Dvorak recommends a model.) Laporte recommends an audiobook: "Predictably Irrational." United Kingdom porn filters are blocking Wikipedia and the Wayback Machine. Are Are Google layoffs and the killing of <a href="">features like Jaiku and Dodgeball a sign of a market bottom? The episode ends with a clip of Coulton's "Mandelbrot Set." Running times: Both 1 hour 20 minutes, give or take a minute. Released: Jan. 11 and 18.

  • MacBreak Weekly 123: The Great London Fire The title is a metaphor from panelist Andy Ihnato. Laporte is also joined by Alex Lindsay. The three agree that MacWorld Expo turnout was low, and the show lacked drama. Could Apple's decision to pull out of the convention anger fans and hurt the company? Can MacWorld survive? David Pogue will give next year's keynote. Ihnatko on what organizer IDG should do: "They should treat this like the Great London Fire.It's not the result that one would have wanted, but when you wipe the slate clean, you get to rebuild this city in the world that exists today... If you were to build a really big conference today, you wouldn't do it like a 1985 trade show." Focus on public areas and community. In another blow, CES is looking to have an Apple-centric area. The big announcement at MacWorld, it turns out, was the end of DRM at the iTunes store, but Leo points out a big drawback to the 30-cent upgrade offer: You have to upgrade ALL your songs, even the lame ones you don't like anymore. Discussion of the iPhone and the Palm Pre. There's agreement that no company will dominate the cellphone market. Politicians switching to Mac: the latest, Mike Huckabee. Hacking PC Netbooks to run Mac OS (in violation of the Mac user agreement, it should be noted). BoingBoing has a chart. Apple seems to be (cracking down, apparently irked by a how-to video on Wired Gadget Lab. Leo mentions that the MacWorld Expo swag bag for presenters included $1,800 worth of gifts. They end with some a robust list of weekly picks. Laporte suggests this external battery solution for iPhone. I'm happy with the APC universal, which doesn't have be attached directly to the phone (it charges iPods and other devices too). Lindsay picks the rubber-covered Rugged LaCie portable hard drive, which I also use, for music. It's versatile, carries a lot of data and takes a pounding. The panel also reviews some portable document scanners. And there is a zen moment from Lindsay, talking about how multiple users burn out Firewire ports: "Computers tend to like to have monogamous relationships. You have a lot of people using them, they tend to fall apart." Running TIme: 1 hour, 10 minutes. Released: Jan. 13
  • "This Week in Media 122: Planned Viewerhood" This week, an interesting discussion about how digital video recorders, video on the Web and similar technology are changing how we watch. Watching a series all at once. Watching sports after the game is over, with fake suspense. No more competing for specific time slots. The viewer chooses. This is all good, but I offer three numbers to consider, the totals in my iTunes podcast subscriptions window: 463 items, 15.8 days, 19.32 gigabytes. That's not counting the regular shows stacked up on the TiVo, and the movies in my Netflix queue. Giving me control over content might mean I never get around to actually consuming it. Another topic: Should online video have closed-captioning for the hearing impaired? Speculation that Apple pulling out of MacWorld was the result of a Steve Jobs tantrum. More MacWorld/CES stuff. I feel like I'm hearing the same conversations over and over on these tech podcasts. May have to cut back. Running time: 58:47 minutes. Released: Jan. 13.

  • The Dinner Party Download, Episode 14 I'm glad these guys are back. The concept: Win your next dinner party. The Icebreaker is another animals-in-a-bar joke. Small talk: President-elect Obama's old car is on eBay, a Chrysler. Burger King PR stunt: Drop 10 Facebook friends, get a free burger. A Sundance-nominated history lesson with booze. Dr. James Bedford is super-cool. He was the first person to be frozen after death. The cocktail is "Death on the Rocks": Champagne, absinthe and ice cubs of fresh blood orange juice. The interview is Lamont Mozier, the Motown songwriter; don't ask him which was his favorite song. The food segment is about Kogi Korean barbecue tacos. It is sold off a truck that broadcasts its location on its blog and on Twitter. Outro song is A.C. Newman's "There Are Maybe 10 or 12..." A big sound, but interesting. Running time: 15:49 minutes. Released: Jan. 16.
  • Christian Comedy Podcast: January Week One With more than 160,00 subscribers, the host Mike Williams says, this is the most-listened-to Christian comedy podcast on iTunes. He starts with a squeaky-voiced imitation of that annoying YouTube kid FredThen we hear a few jokes from the "Stephen Wright of Christian comedy," Pastor Tim Jones, with his "weird mental mind." For example: "Remember, if you're standing next to Dracula in a group photo and you try to give him bunny ears, when the film develops it will just look like you're giving the peace sign... I asked her if she was a model and she smiled, thinking it was because of her beauty. But it was actually because she smelled like plastic and glue." I kind of like that one. There's a comedy song about a fiancee with a bad attitude from the new CD by the duo Bean and Bailey: "Who peed in your cheerios? Only heaven knows... Who got your panties in such a wad?" Ahem. You can fast-forward through the hunting bow ads in the middle. Robert G. Lee, a comedy writer for the kid show "Veggie Tales." tells jokes about rasising kids. For example: "If the Apostle Paul had had teenagers, Christianity would have been nipped in the bud! 'We're going to Corinth again? ...Everywhere you go, you're beaten, you're robbed, you're stoned. Do you have any idea embarrassing that is? Why don't you just write these people?' 'That's not a bad idea, young lady.'" Running time: 17:59 minutes. Released: Jan. 4.
  • Geek Loves Nerd: Teaching Gratefulness James is the geek. Jenn is the nerd. They're married. Their podcast took a holiday hiatus, but now it's back. He also does the Nobody's Listening Podcast, billed as "a clean comedy podcast." He has grown a beard. She thinks it is attractive but the beard sticks in her face when they kiss. They did nine minutes on the beard. Then I started skipping ahead. There was a lengthy discussion about their 11-month-old, their second. I had to bail, and never did hear how to teach a child gratefulness, an important topic. These seem like very nice people. I am not interested in listening to them on a regular basis. This is, no doubt, my own character flaw. Running time: 53:35 minutes. Released: Jan. 9.

  • Uhh Yeah Dude, Episode 149 This is not a clean comedy podcast. This is the pee in the Cheerios. It grows increasingly impossible to summarize what Jonathan Larroquette and Seth Romatelli are up to here. There are the usual offbeat topics -- lame celebrities at liveautographs.com (Hulk Hogan, Danica Patrick), that Amish heater infomercial, the drunk woman who called 911 on herself, some tots in trouble, an F.B.I. warning about cybergeddon, and a promising ABC hidden-camera show that outs racists, a belated appreciation for George Carlin and disgust with Adam Sandler. But the highlights are the personal rants and anecdotes: Seth about his experiences waiting in a line for a $14 juice, and several items from Jonathan: women who go out with jerks, a true story of martial arts justice from his school days, and a weird encounter in a guitar store. The promised "Uhh Yeah Dude" Web site is not yet online. Length: 1 hour, 11 minutes. Released: Jan. 13, 2009.
  • Smodcast: Smod Bless Us Everyone (70), Way of the Master (71), Hello Dere! (72). So, now that their movie has tanked, the director Kevin Smith and producer Scott Mosier are suddenly back with several episodes of this explicit humor podcast. In the first one they riff on Christmas and how people have trouble remembering their movies. "Making moves only seen in Belize." In "Way of the Master," they discuss the sexual possibilities and risks of staying abroad in youth hostels. The title refers to Kirk Cameron's Christian evangelical Web site, "The Way of the Master," which has a test of how good a person you are. Kevin and Scott take the test, and the discussion gets mighty dark. They also brainstorm a science fiction, the "slaptrack," in which everyone has the godlike power -- once -- to banish another person from this reality. And it's pretty weird. For the most recent, third episode, Mosier is traveling in Vietnam, so Smith is joined by another pal, and they spend a lot of time ragging on a third friend who isn't there and talking about breasts. As always, I enjoy the background soundtrack that is added post-production. I skipped two earlier episodes that were basically the DVD discussion tracks for the film, which I haven't seen yet. Running times: 52 minutes to 1 hour, 5 minutes; released Dec. 24, Jan. 9 and Jan. 16.
  • The Futile Podcast: "It Worked in Cuffs," "It Became Cobra," "It was an Academy Award winning training montage" I'm catching up on this action-movie discussion podcast. First up, "The Spirit." I've been a longtime collector of Will Eisner and his art, and I've been a Spirit fan since I was a kid reading the Warren reprints in the 70s. I've been looking ahead to this movie with dread and anticipation. Now I may just wait for the video. It doesn't sound like the film did a good job capturing Eisner's gloomy comedic world, or perhaps that world just doesn't translate to the screen. The podcasters compare it to the Tim Burton "Batman," "House of Games," and "Rocky and Bullwinkle." A bad trip. "This movie was just strange." Tonal inconsistency and acting problems. There's consensus that the movie failed to pull off breaking of the fourth wall, which they say "worked in 'Kuffs." (I'm pretty sure Eisner invented that technique in comics back in the 40s, but it was a technique he used sparingly.) The futile podcasters digress into a long discussion of sex roles, which was entertaining. The next, short episode is billed as a review of "Beverly Hills Cop," but is mostly a discussion of comedians with a quick recap of Eddie Murphy's career. The third of these podcasts is about Scorsese's "Color of Money," which I probably can't bear to watch again because of Tom Cruise, though this discussion reminded me it wasn't bad. And it made me want to watch "The Hustler" again. Running times: 31 minutes, 11 minutes and 33 minutes. Released: Jan. 4, 8 and 11.
  • The 40-Year-Old Boy: Episode 43. I dropped into this podcast cold, and perhaps earlier episodes wehre better. The Chicago comedian Mike Schmidt (now in L.A.) talks about ... stuff .. while his producer laughs in the background. (She's like a laugh track. I started to suspect she was a recording.) His Web site explains: "While friends his age are taking care of their kids, it’s all Mike can do just to take care of himself. Come listen to the stream-of-consciousness ramblings of a modern day Peter Pan: awkward, angry…basically, the kind of guy who would punch you in the face for referring to him as a 'modern day Peter Pan.'" In this episode, Schmidt says he used to weigh "500 pounds" and he got stomach surgery to fix it. He describes some medical particulars in excruciating detail then he tells how he got around the limitations of his surgically altered stomach and gained the weight back. The outro song, "Don't Give Up," by Peter Gabriel and Kate Bush, lays it on thick and underscores how sad this story is. Great song, though. Running time: 1 hour, 17 minutes. Released: Jan. 14.

    • Third-Party iPhone Apps Update 2

    {Update! New List! New Post! See the new list of iPhone applications I actually still use in this post, from September 2009.]

    I've added some new updates to the post "third-party iPhone apps I actually use," including MightyDocs, which displays Google docs offline (now with spreadsheet support); SayWho, a free voice-activated dialer; Amazon, which lets you shop and compare prices and even experiment with looking up products via iPhone photographs (it worked for me with a pretty bad photo of an obscure book); and Twitterific, which even in ad-supported free mode is overtaking my earlier favorite Twitter client, Twinkle.

    From iPhones to the Stars, Ocarina Melodies

    img_0005 {Update! New List! New Post! See the new list of iPhone applications I actually still use in this post, from September 2009.]

    For 99 cents I downloaded Ocarina, an app from Smule that turns an iPhone into a version of that ancient flute-like instrument. You press glowing "finger holes" on the touchscreen and blow into the microphone to play [Video].

    That's fun, but Ocarina does more than that. The app also uses the location software and a Google-Earth style globe to let you rotate the earth and listen to others play on their phones around the world. As they play one by one, visual images of the notes stream upward, as you watch from space. Around the globe, patches of glowing white show what are apparently concentrations of signals, particularly on the coasts of the United States and in Europe. One soloist sent a lonely tune up from an island of Hawaii. It seems the perfect instrument for the job. Halting, ghostly renditions of "Amazing Grace," "God Rest Ye, Merry Gentlemen," "Happy Birthday," and "Ode to Joy," reach for the stars one by one. You can click a heart to show your appreciation for the particularly talented ones. It's just cool. You feel connected with other musical beings on the planet. GPS broadcasting! Imagine what else could be broadcast through those mikes.

    The Smule site advises, "For best results, blow softly, as if you're blowing kisses." It insists on calling the iPhone "your ocarina."

    My daughter and I each gave it a shot. Our efforts sounded more like free-form jazz. Somehow I missed this app when it first came out earlier this month, and my older-generation iPhone apparently required the 2.2 firmware update first. But it's one of those apps that is sure to wow a friend, divert a fidgety kid or pass the time. I am sure some talented musicians will find ways to amaze us. I recently added it to my list of favorite third-party iPhone apps.

    Jeff Jarvis Asks, What Would Google Do?

    img_0440I recently skimmed a galley proof of "What Would Google Do?" by Jeff Jarvis. The book, available from HarperCollins in January, is structured as a series of rules or aphorisms about how Google does business, with some anecdotes from Jarvis about things he has observed in his groundbreaking work as a blogger and media consultant. The book reads like an expanded version of a PowerPoint presentation on the conventional wisdom of Web 2.0. Transparency. Learning from your customers. Simplicity in design. Always being in beta. The importance of links and search engine optimization. The information wants to be free business model. The let-it-all-hang-out-in-public lifestyle of Twitter and Facebook and blogs. (Jarvis gave an overview of his thesis in the Guardian on Monday.) None of this will sound new to anyone paying attention to the Web in 2008. But for those who feel like the digital world is quickly leaving them behind, or who regard the new trends and tools with bafflement, Jarvis's book will be a good tutorial, even if some of the lines sound like Tom Peters-style excellence-speak ("Your worst customer is your best friend"), or call to mind burning Vietnamese villages ("we have to kill books to save them").

    Jarvis offers a lot of Google-style advice for traditional media and other businesses facing a paradigm shift. His point in the section on books is that authors and publishers should turn their works into living texts online, as he promises to do with W.W.G.D. on his blog Buzzmachine. Smart plan. Books in this genre have a short shelf life, often measured in months not years.

    My Old Man, a Blogger Before the Web

    When the news of the day seems particularly big, I wonder what my parents would think about it all. They're dead, and gone with them are all the stories and family lore that I only half-listened to when I was younger. Rattling around in my head are half-remembered snippets of conversations about their childhoods in the Great Depression, long-ago presidents and wars, those scary Beatles with their rock and roll, pulp fiction and radio dramas. They lived through World War II, the atom bomb, the invention of television, Vietnam, hippies, Watergate, pet rocks, disco and the bad old 70's, the Cold War, the Iranian hostage crisis, recessions and more. They never saw my journalism career leap beyond the small-town stage. They never met their granddaughter. Then again, they haven't had to live through the worry of my blood-clot scares nor their other son's repeated deployments to wartime Iraq and Afghanistan.

    I wish they had kept journals, or blogged, so I could show what they wrote to my daughter. But they didn't keep diaries, and there were no blogs then, and I can only make out every other word in my mother's cursive script in letters that she wrote. She had me late in life, and she died in 1986, when I was 24, just starting out. Leukemia, after she beat colon cancer.

    My father, Ed, or Eddie, depending on who was talking, lived about 11 years longer than my mother, Kay, a surprise to him, considering his fondness for booze, cigarettes and red meat, and her abstention from most vices. He was a man of the old school, reserved when it came to affection, but often loud, angry, not always kind to her, or any of us. Before he retired, he worked as a bureaucrat for the national security state, and the cold war defined his adult life, as the war in the Pacific had defined his youth. He flew to then-exotic places like California and Florida when jet travel was still in its golden age, returning with stories of the Magic Castle, the Playboy Club, and beaches in January. He was a wit, sometimes the life of the party, always ready with a joke, the center of attention. My brother and I were his TV channel changers, his butlers. "Get your old man a beer out of the fridge." Indeed.

    My old man kicked the bucket from lung cancer complications in 1997, and my uncle was the executor of his estate.

    Long after the paperwork was done, my uncle mailed me a package of documents -- Army records from my father's Philippines tour, various vital documents, security clearance forms for the job with the Defense Department, a weathered brown wallet with a Playboy Club card, a stopped watch. And there was a spiral notebook, too, of some jottings, from mid-1986, not long after Ma died, leaving him rattling around alone in that big old house up in the frozen wastes in that rural air force town that he thought would be a great place for us to grow up (it was) and maybe even stick around (boring and in decline, so we didn't). They had lived for several years in the vicinity of New York City, but I know little about those years, apart from left-over photos (like the $1.25 souvenir shot above from Nick's in Greenwich Village, a jazz joint) and stories of living in Shanks Village, an outpost of former barracks turned into housing for veterans in Rockland County.

    Ed was never a good investor, lost his shirt in mutual funds once, but stuck with the old standbys of passbook savings, mortgages, pensions, certificates of deposit, a federal pension. In the end he ran up a lot of credit card debt, and nursing home expenses, and my uncle sold off the house to pay off the bills. But creditors can't touch life insurance, and it isn't taxed, and that nest egg got me seriously started as an investor.

    He wanted to be a writer once, so maybe I got that bug from him. He used to write wonderful jeremiads against banks and utility companies and, after he retired, politicians and the like. When he was young, he wrote some short stories. One was about a World War II veteran who was suffering from what today we would call post-traumatic stress syndrome. The guy blew his head off at the end, sort of an obvious ending, and Salinger did the same thing better, but his prose was just fine.

    After he quit the fiction game for a salaryman's life of paperwork, my old man spent the rest of his life reading impossible stacks of books and magazines (Gourmet, Playboy, Esquire), with the TV on most of the time, from the moment he walked in the door until he went to bed. His other hobbies were outdoor activities without a lot of talking -- golf, fly-fishing and ice-fishing, hunting with bow, rifle and shotgun. If there was a gutted deer hanging in the garage in the fall, it was a good year.

    He was the one who told me to learn about computers, there's money in it, and he logged me onto the Arpanet back in the 1970's with a terminal from work. It didn't have a screen -- it had a roll of paper. It connected through couplers that you screwed onto the telephone handset. The only people on the pre-Internet were military types and academics, sharing research and occasionally furtively playing text-based games and chatting. I caught the bug then. Networking. Talking. BBS's and Usenet newsgroups, eventually the Web when it was just a handful of sites. People looked at me funny when I talked about how it was going to change the world. Yeah, right.

    But then came the 90s, and the Web explosion, and I put my money in tech before it was a bubble. And when I got out, it was partly dumb luck and partly the old man's voice telling me this was a little crazy, slow down, they'll skin you if they can. He knew about hardship. When he was growing up in the Great Depression, his parents shipped some of the kids off to an aunt because there wasn't enough food for all of them at home.

    When I want to remember his voice, I read the few words he ever bothered to set down in his later life, mailed to me in that envelope from my uncle, painstakingly printed by hand, a blog before there were such things:

    4-28-86

    +Four weeks yesterday (27 April 86). Still seems unreal. Mass cards/ letters are trickling after the initial flood.

    +My feelings are more in check except when answering a letter or note from a close friend. Better than letting it build up destructively, I guess. Still having trouble concentrating on the job, or the so-called important things (ie. income tax, bills, refinancing the house.)

    +Worked in the garden yesterday for a while -- too hot. Planted some broccoli. Nabbed the boy next door to cut the grass -- explained the do's and don'ts. Trying to civilize this barbarian was probably one of my better ideas -- he won't kill the golden goose. Maybe!

    +My favorite fishing rod and reel (the ultra lite) has disappeared -- no idea where to! Must replace!

    +Got to get things sorted out.

    12 May 86

    +I never said this was a diary. It's a way of me communicating with myself, I guess. Mr. Y--- of C--- and Sons and I have struck a bargain of sorts. The head stone should be ready in about 6 weeks ($875). That, plus the funeral, took about $5,000, which is what I had figured. Another 20 years, it will be triple!

    +I planted some Impatiens on the plot on Mother's day -- she always loved them -- it would be nice if someone could do it every year.

    +I scared the shit out of E---- the other night, I suppose. I told her and B-- if it wasn't for you guys, the obvious solution to my grief, at first, was the obvious one. I think I meant it but when you're in deep distress, what the hell do you really know. I still cry every day! Oh God, how I miss her.

    13 July 86

    +All it takes sometimes is a little thing; a song that reminds me or a phrase in an old movie (e.g. "Chapter 2" when James Caan says "How dare she die -- I'd never do that to her"). Jesus!

    It ends there. I am impressed by the economy of language. He had a need to say something, write it down, and he did for a while. Then he moved on.

    But he kept on living, for years, in that old house, giving up fishing and hunting eventually, slowly losing his lungs to emphysema, driving down to his favorite Italian restaurant with an oxygen tank on a little wheeled cart, breaking his hips a couple of times, calling me with me updates on the upstate weather (136 inches of snow!). When I showed him the early Web, he was impressed, but he waved off my offers of a computer. By then, it was too complicated to learn something new. He spent most of his spare time gardening and running VCRs in every room to tape all his shows. He would have loved TiVo.

    My parents' relatively early deaths, their setbacks, their stories of growing up when everyone was poor, the 1970s with their cultural chaos -- all these experiences have made me skeptical of progress, not quite believing the balance in my 401K or that the good jobs would last, that my health would hold out, that anything awaits any of us at the end of the line besides a shrinking circle of pain. It's the kind of outlook that leads my father, a proud atheist married to a daily church-going woman, to let a priest mumble by his deathbed, I suppose.

    It was a few years ago that I got this stuff in the mail. My daughter was young, and I was inspired to write down some thoughts on my laptop:

    I spent part of this night sitting up with a toddler who had been throwing up periodically for hours. She will never know her grandparents, though she has her grandfather's eyebrows, as do I, and a little of her grandmother's smile.

    After she finally fell asleep, I sat for a while on my little bench in the darkness, listening to her breath, listening to mine, then to hers, then to mine, hers, mine, inhale, exhale, our mortal bodies sharing certain pieces of code, strands of DNA, mixed up and handed down through the generations, destined one day for cold stillness.

    But not yet

    Podcast Zeitgeist, Oct. 19

    Lately my music library has languished as I have loaded up my iPhone with podcasts of a certain type: Men (mostly) talking about gadgets, technology, movies, stuff on the Web, games, women, and news of the weird, among other topics. The list:

    • "Diggnation" Perhaps the most well-known podcast on the list. In various video and audio formats. Kevin Rose and Alex Albrecht drink beer and sit on a couch, going down the list of the top stories at Digg.com. Frequency: Weekly. Duration: 45 minutes or so, video.
    • "Smodcast" The director Kevin Smith and producer Scott Mosier shoot the breeze about making and watching movies, comics, growing up in New Jersey, porn and other topics. Weekly. An hour or more, audio only.
    • "The Totally Rad Show" Alex Albrecht is joined by Dan Trachtenberg and Jeff Cannata, for reviews of movies, TV shows, comics and video games. Weekly. About an hour, video.

    • "This Week in Tech" and "MacBreak Weekly" Two podcasts from Leo Laporte's Twit.tv empire that bill themselves as reviews of the week's technology and Apple news, with John C. Dvorak, Merlin Mann, Alex Lindsay, Scott Bourne and other regulars. But it's really a bunch of geeks and nerds shooting the breeze. Weekly. Each is about an hour and a half, or 50 minutes if you fast-forward through the improvised ads, which can get tedious. Another way to watch: Live on video, with a rolling peanut gallery chat room under the screen, and the talking goes into overtime.
    • "Uhh, Yeah Dude" Description: "A weekly roundup of America by two American Americans," Seth Romatelli and Jonathan Larroquette. Energy drinks. The week in Florida. Readings from Craigslist. Prescription drug side effects. Hip hop vs. country. Men behaving badly. Why Robin Williams is not funny. Encounters with borderline celebrities in Los Angeles. Sobriety. Veganism. The Dallas Cowboy cheerleaders, and more. Frequency: Weekly. Run time: About an hour.

    • "You Look Nice Today," which is billed as "A Journal of Emotional Hygiene." A dadaist conversation between lonelysandwich (Adam Lisager), hotdogsladies (a k a Merlin Mann of 43 Folders), and scottsimpson (Scott Simpson). With voice chapter headings by the guy who plays the PC in Mac ads. Frequency: Fortnightly or so. Length: 30 minutes.

    What they have in common: Guys who genuinely like each other talking about topics they love, with echoes of long ago bull sessions and late nights in bars. The best of them -- "U.Y.D.," "Smodcast" and "You Look Nice Today" -- have been known to provoke chuckles and guffaws. Maybe even some chortling. Update: On Oct. 29, I started posting some impressions of the latest episodes of these and other podcasts that have interested me for a while.