Most of the podcasts I listen to are tech-heavy. Just a warning. I will list each one and give a short description of each an whether its an audio or video podcasts. I have 3 categories: Tech, Gaming, and Misc. I personally use a 30GB Zune (Brown) to listen  or watch my podcasts only because it was such a good deal. I purchased it for $85 on woot.com! The podcast list is shown after the break.

TECH SHOWS

SYSTM [Video]

SYSTM is a hand-on tech show created for the hardcore DIY Hardware crowd. It’s also hosted by Patrick Norton but the show was originally started by Kevin Rose back when he worked for TechTV and G4. You will learn such things as Building your own NAS, DIY WiFi Antennas, and DIY Power Packs.

Diggnation [Video]

Diggnation is a weekly tech/web culture show based on the top digg.com social bookmarking news stories. The hosts are Kevin Rose and Alex Albrecht who are both G4 Screensavers alumni. Kevin Rose started the Digg.com website as a news site where users “digg” or vote for the stories they like the most and the most popular hit the frontpage. Well Kevin and Alex review the top stories while drinking tasty beer beverages out of their houses which make for some colorful commentary. You can see why their show is so popular LoL. Recently they have been branching out of their California homes and starting going to areas around the country to meet their fans. Their show usually ranges from 30 minutes to 1 hour. They have a email answer segment at the end of the show and usually show fans in Digg shirts around the country.

GAMING

1UP Yours [Audio]

1UP Yours is the premier videogames podcast where hosts Garnett Lee, Shane Bettenhausen and John Davison report on the videogame industry and the community that surrounds it. This is a really long podcast and it can range from 1:30 hours to 2:30 hours. This is a casual gaming podcast and they stray sometimes from their own format to talking on a variety of subjects. The hosts are editors and game testers from some of the popular gaming publications like EGM, 1Up, GameVideos.com, etc. You will hear them talk about game current on the market as well as those still in production. One of the best segments is “What are you playing?” where the hosts and guests talk about what games they are into at the moment.

1UP Show [Video]

Each week, the editors of 1UP cover new titles and discuss the latest topics in gaming - all the while giving you a behind the scenes look at the on goings at the offices of 1UP, Electronic Gaming Monthly, and Games for Windows magazine. The show gives some great insight into the games they review by doing interviews with the staff of 1up while showing you game footage. They also have some great interviews with game developers as well. You can also see great field reporting from such places as E3, Quakecon, and Comicon.

MISC

The Totally Rad Show [Video or Audio]

The Totally Rad Show is the summer blockbuster of geek news shows. Every week, hosts Alex Albrecht, Dan Trachtenberg, and Jeff Cannata rip into the world of movies, video games, tv, comics, and more and pull out what’s rad. Most shows last 1 to 1:30 hours. They have either a audio or video feed. They have a quirky and fun approach to their reviews. Every show is started with the guys recreating a scene from one of their favorite movies of the past.

NPR Fresh Air [Audio]

Fresh Air with Terry Gross, the Peabody Award-winning weekday magazine of contemporary arts and issues, is one of public radio’s most popular programs. The show gives interviews as much time as needed, and complements them with comments from well-known critics and commentators.

This American Life [Audio]

The radio and TV shows follow the same format. There’s a theme to each episode, and a variety of stories on that theme. It’s mostly true stories of everyday people, though not always. There’s lots more to the show, but it’s sort of hard to describe. Ten Commandents was the last program I listened to and Ira Glass goes over the real ten commandents by personal interviews with each person’s account of one of the ten.

Here are additional links to Google Code Pages that show the a behind the scenes making of and even an interactive 3D viewer model of some of the effects.

Check out my other story on Radiohead about “Scotch Mist” a video which was released on New Year’s Eve this year and it features every song from In Rainbows to coincide with the “official” release of the album.

Too funny!

Digg Link

Animoto is a brand new video slideshow creation website created by techies and tv/film producers. The technology behind the site is based on “Cinematic Artificial Intelligence” that thinks like an actual director and editor. It analyzes and combines user-selected images and music with the same sophisticated post-production skills & techniques that are used in television and film. The end result has the visual energy of a music video and the emotional impact of a movie trailer.

Animoto is still in beta so you have to signup to use the site. You basically select between a 30 second video or full length video. The 30 second videos are free. Full length videos cost $3 per video or you can pay $30/year unlimited videos. I chose the 30 second video.The site tells you that you need 12-15 pictures for a 30 second video. I chose a mixture of pictures from friends and family.

You then pick the music that plays with the slideshow and you have to the choice of their collection of Creative Commons license music or from your own collection. It does make you verify that you have permission from the artist to use the audio. I just chose from their library to make it easy.

The last step is to give your video a name and description. You then click create video and wait. It takes a few minutes to create so they give you want they call “distractions” which are basically trailers while you wait. It took about 5-10 minutes to complete the process. Once it is done processing, you are left with a slick video you can embed in your own website, email to friends and also post to YouTube all on the same screen. Here is a link to my finished product on YouTube. Here are some screenshots showing you the process I went through on the site:

Below is my embedded video as well:

The artist can choose to steam only, sell, or allow free downloads of their music. The artist gets instant gratification if people like their music. I know because I showed this to a coworker that posted his music yesterday morning and he was on the front page in a couple of hours. His band is called “All Found Out,” here is a link to his music on the site: http://www.thesixtyone.com/allfoundout/

Just like digg, you can click on a listener’s account and see what he/she is liking and even she their Top 3 and more. Here is my listener account to see what I mean: http://www.thesixtyone.com/bryansays/

The site is still new and needs a little more polishing but I can see this site taking off. My friend from All Found Out had some initial issues with double-posting of songs and comments but he spoke with the site owners and the problems were resolved.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ukythkK4EPQ