varn.dev

I spend most of my driving time or when I’m outside doing yardwork listening to podcasts, so I thought it might be worth sharing what is on my weekly rotation. I use Pocket Casts to listen, as I paid for it years ago to get the browser player version, and despite trying some other apps, keep coming back to it as my go to just put something on and listen. On to the podcasts!

• 404 Media Podcast - A journalist founded and run independent tech podcast, they break stories every week about surveillance, cyber security, tech and politics and much more. As a paying member of 404 Media, I enjoy their summaries and behind the scenes stories on the stories they publish.

• Lore - One of the original podcasts to break through, the “Lore” comes from folklore, and every week is a new episode about something historical related to folklore from around the world. Often with a creepy bent (think ghosts, witches, hauntings, etc) it never delves into horror territory but is always a fun listen, especially since they alternate between stories based on history and stories based on legends.

• Pod Save America - Look, I’m unabashedly liberal, being highly progressive about just about everything in the US political sphere, and PSA gives good breakdowns and highly opinionated takes on the shit show that is the US political system right now 3x a week. They can be a bit “bro” ish and obviously when the world is on fire, the topics can be depressing, but I still try to listen as much as I can to keep up my media diet.

• Shop Talk Show - Run by Chris Coyier and Dave Rupert, two legends in the front end developer sphere, this one is hit or miss for me in terms of if I listen to it every week or not. It’s not that they aren’t engaging or interesting, it just that some episodes veer into deeper programming content than I enjoy listening to, and their slanting slightly towards AI is also not great when I’m actively trying to avoid it as much as possible. Still, worth a listen to if you are in front end development or web development in general!

• Smartless - A weekly celebrity interview, hosted by Jason Bateman, Will Arnett and Sean Hayes, it’s actually not only entertaining but funny and for three “not smart” celebrities, they ask interesting questions and if you keep up with movies or tv, have some of the best guests around. This one is also a maybe-skip, just depending on the guest.

• The Solid Verbal - My first love, sports wise, is college football and Dan and Ty have been doing this podcast since 2007, and I’ve been a listener for almost that long. Just two friends who love the sport, they break down the games every week, do deep dives into teams and offer a smart and enjoyable way to listen to people talk about college football, especially away from ESPN or any bigger outlets. If you’re a CFB fan, highly recommend, and they are actually the only podcast I am a paying subscriber to, so I’m happy to support them.

• Unexplainable - A Vox podcasts, a rotating crop of hosts talk to scientists and academics 2x a week about, well, the unexplainable things to science in our world. They bring questions like any normal person would, like “What does silence actually sound like?” or “How do birds know how to migrate and why is it because of the Earth’s magnetic field?” that are educational without being too academic

• Welcome To Nightvale - This is one of the hardest podcasts to explain, even though it’s probably one of the oldest and still running podcasts. It’s essentially a “radio” program where the DJ discusses all of the weird and strange things happening in a small desert town called Nightvale, such demonic librarians, dangerous dog parks, the Woman with No Face, Deb the sentient patch of haze and so so much more. The show is essentially one really long running story dating back over 15 years at this point, but you can jump in at any point and still enjoy it. Always make sure to listen to “the weather”, where every week they feature a song from an unknown indie band.

• Version History - From The Verge, each week they look at one gadget and delve into the history of it, what makes it good (or bad), and whether it affected tech and gadgets enough to make it into their (totally arbitrary) “Hall of Fame”. Who knew a deep dive about Furby could be so entertaining?

• You Must Remember This - Currently on hiatus, if you love the history of movies (think pre-2000) and old Hollywood, the scandals and the rise and fall of some of Hollywood’s most legendary stars, I can’t recommend this podcast enough. Each “season” breaks down a topic, such as the Hollywood Blacklist, or Sex in the 90s, or Dead Blondes (famous blonde actresses who met an untimely depth) in deeply researched and deeply discussed topics by host/creator Karina Longworth. And since it’s all history, you can jump in with any season and just enjoy the ride. A new season starts in September and given how much work goes into making each of them, I can’t wait to listen!