[Each week at ProfHacker, George Williams hosts an open thread discussion devoted to a particular topic, often one suggested by one of our readers. The Commenting and Community Guidelines still apply. And remember that you can always suggest topics or ask us questions via email: ProfHackerCHE@gmail.com. —Ed.]
You can listen to them in the car. You can listen while you’re at the gym. You can listen while walking the dog. In fact, you can listen to podcasts pretty much anywhere and at any time that you choose (and you don’t need to use an iPod to do so, although the “pod” prefix suffix is taken from that device). After tv shows consumed via DVR, podcasts are perhaps the most common method of time-shifting that we practice. Ethan wrote a couple of posts about creating podcasts. This week, we’d like you to share your thoughts about listening to podcasts.
Let’s hear from you in the comments!
What are your favorite podcasts? How did you find them? When (and why) do you listen to them?
[Creative Commons-licensed flickr photo by melter]
Follow Profhacker through your favorite RSS reader: 
26 Responses to Open Thread: What Are Your Favorite Podcasts?
asl295 - October 27, 2010 at 11:52 am
NPR provides my daily podcast fix: On the Media, This American Life, RadioLab, LatinoUSA, and All Songs Considered.
rschewe - October 27, 2010 at 12:12 pm
Planet Money, RadioLab, This American Life, The Moth, Stuff You Should Know, Stuff You Should Have Learned in History Class
sadamsdelaney - October 27, 2010 at 12:14 pm
BBC4′s Friday Night Comedy, OTM, Wait Wait Don’t Tell Me, Car Talk
ianthomas - October 27, 2010 at 12:17 pm
To these good suggestions, let me add The New Yorker Fiction podcast.
digilib - October 27, 2010 at 12:30 pm
Creative Screenwriting Magazine; More or Less: Behind the Stats;NPR Fresh Air; MSNBC Hardball; The Moth
teacherhax - October 27, 2010 at 12:37 pm
Hardcore History with Dan Carlin, You Look Nice Today, Buzz out Loud, TED Talks, Tech News Today, Answer Me This, Best of the Left, This American Life, The Bugle, Wait, Wait, Don’t Tell Me, Real Time with Bill Maher, RadioLab, Things We Did Before Reality.
csdanforth - October 27, 2010 at 1:02 pm
Being (was Speaking of Faith), The Story, The Moth, Car Talk, Fresh Air, Philosophy Bites, To The Best of Our Knowledge, Real Time with Bill Maher, Savage Love, Slate’s Political and Cultural Gabfests, Slate’s Poetry Gabfest, The Sporkful, TEDTalks, This American Life, Radiolab, Studio 360
derekbruff - October 27, 2010 at 1:34 pm
The World’s Technology Podcast with Clark Boyd, from BBC, PRI, and WGBH. Over and over again, I hear or see an interesting technology story on NPR or Wired–that was covered by Clark Boyd months earlier on his podcast. He also often focuses on low-cost but very creative uses of technology in developing countries. Great stuff.
nor700 - October 27, 2010 at 1:38 pm
For tech news I like both This Week in Google and This Week in Tech from the TWIT network. For politics and culture, Slate’s Political and Cultural Gabfests. And for humor, you can’t beat The Bugle.
amanda_watson - October 27, 2010 at 2:28 pm
Spark (a CBC radio show and podcast), the UVA Scholars’ Lab podcast, Selected Shorts, This American Life, Studio 360, The Moth, and, for science fiction and fantasy, Escape Pod and StarShipSofa.
jp1980 - October 27, 2010 at 2:42 pm
Too Beautiful To Live with Luke Burbank. I am addicted to this quirky podcast. I also love PRI’s The World in Words.
lkcoleman - October 27, 2010 at 4:05 pm
Skeptoid.com’s Brian Dunning gives short, well-researched, well-presented podcasts on specific topics. Also, Buddhist Geeks, although I’m not Buddhist: enjoyable to listen to and informative.
frankfessenden - October 27, 2010 at 4:39 pm
All Songs Considered from NPR; Paleo Solution Podcast from Robb Wolf
techwatcher - October 27, 2010 at 9:48 pm
Grammar Girl, iPad Today, Learning in Hand, LearningTimes Green Room, MathTrain.tv, Vox Tablet, Web Video Secrets, TED Talks
heatherwhitney - October 28, 2010 at 10:29 am
I love Dinner Party Download and Good Food.
george_h_williams - October 28, 2010 at 10:51 am
Wow, what a great list of podcasts! I was already familiar with a few of these, but most of them are new to me. Keep ‘em coming, please!
micahvandegrift - October 28, 2010 at 11:02 am
I prefer my podcasts to be mostly for enjoyment rather than “work,” although that overlaps more than I’d like to admit. Lately: APM Marketplace Tech Report, NPR Culturetopia (especially pop culture happy hour), NPR Technology, NYT Tech Talk, PRI: The Sound of Young America, Slate Culture Gabfest, and WNYC Radiolab. I’ve tried to get into more academic podcasts from time to time, but I think many of them suffer from being too long and singular topic focused. If a podcast is more than 30 min. I often won’t listen to it. I also often will listen to one 15 min. segment on the way to work, and another 15 min. on the way home. The journalistic based podcasts seem to have that formula down to a science. Great topic, and great suggestions!
matt_l - October 28, 2010 at 11:07 am
I try to brush up my German and Hungarian by listening to foreign language programing like: DW – Deutsche im Alltag; ORF -Magyarok Burgenland; and Oe3: Nachrichten (all three are available in the iTunes)
Oh yeah and NPR’s Wait, Wait, Don’t Tell me for when I am working on a home repair project out in the garage or in the basement.
csgirl - October 28, 2010 at 4:21 pm
The Brian Lehrer Show, from WNYC. Its a call-in show for intellectuals. I am totally addicted.
aaro4017 - October 28, 2010 at 10:14 pm
Nate DiMeo’s The Memory Palace! Carefully crafted, short audio segments about quirky/long-forgotten/anomalous historical tidbits. Many are almost like little audio poems.
kelle - October 31, 2010 at 11:34 pm
It’s over now, but I really enjoy A History of the World in 100 Objects. It’s timeless so you can just go back through the archives anytime…I’ll probably listen to it again. I think I heard about it on the endorsements segment of a Slate Culture Gabfest.
Also not mentioned above is Marketplace Money (the weekly cousin of Marketplace). Great for improving your financial acumen.
+1 for On the Media, Planet Money, Slate Political Gabfest