Do I Spend Too Much Time Listening To Podcasts?

I listen to a lot of podcasts. And I do it all the time. This morning I couldn't sleep, so at 5 I started listening to some podcasts. I am sure that's bad at all sorts of levels, but I am addicted. So I thought I would share with you my current list of absolutely required podcasts to listen to, plus the new ones I am starting to get into.

First off, if you are relying on iTunes to get your podcasts, then wake up and discover Instacast. There is an iPhone and iPad version and they are fantastic. The only caveat with the two versions is while they claim to sync, they don't. But I still love them.

OK, so what are the required podcasts? Here we go, roughly in order of best to…well…not best.

The ones I listen to as soon as the new episode comes out

You Look Nice Today - I am so excited that "That's Babies" is no longer the most recent show. This is Merlin Mann, Lonely Sandwich, and the other guy at their best! Razzledazzle!

NPR Foreign Dispatch - This is my #1 source of news

Javascript Jabber - The most perfect show on Javascript. I keep re-listening to the one with Paul Irish.

Whisper Cities - Only 3 episodes with 2-4 months between each, but great stories about urban architecture. Escalate makes me want to discover the metro in my own city.

99% Invisible - I wish they did this more often. Similar to RadioLab in style and 100% perfect.

Roderick on the Line - Laugh out loud conversation with Merlin Mann and someone else.

The Javascript Show - Weekly rundown of the interesting projects in the javascript world

BBC World Update - This is my #2 source of news

The Moth Podcast - Some of the most amazing stories I have ever heard. 90% excellent

WNYC RadioLab - I don't think I have heard an episode on here that isn't spectacular. Loop the Loop was definitely my favorite!

Spotcast - I started at the beginning with the Lonely Sandwich episodes which were fantastic and they just get better. An interview show with filmmakers.

Founders Talk - Great interviews with interesting people

Six Pixels of Separation - Amazing marketing podcast that always keeps me interested

Marketing over Coffee - Right up there with 6 Pixels for the top two marketing podcasts to keep up with

Scruffy Thinking - Hard to describe, but the host has had a pretty interesting career

Love & Radio - Think 99% Invisible and RadioLab, then cover the kids' ears.

Iterate - More web dev along with mobile dev in there as well

Creatiplicity - Creative Development

Mac Power Users - There are some things they say that are annoying, but generally this is one of those top notch shows. The Workflows shows are my favorites and the absolute best episodes of any podcast I listen to are the Merlin Mann Workflow shows. OMG, rocked….my…..world!!!!

Triangulation - Great interviews with interesting people. The Capn Crunch episodes were some of the best, but they are all good

Foundation - Great interviews with entrepreneurs

Freakonomics Radio - Absolutely Fascinating annecdotes about the world we live in

Content, Structure, & Style - I have a few Squarespace sites and this podcasts talks about whats new in that world

The B&B Podcast - Interesting conversation between two interesting guys

Core Intuition - Life as an independent developer. I really wish Manton and Daniel would get back to it. I loved this one.

The Changelog - Weekly rundown of open source projects

Forrst Podcast - Seems to be on a hiatus, but hopefully it will come back. Great rundown of web dev & design news

The ones that are mostly good

The Critical Path - Horace Dediu usually comes up with some interesting analysis that makes me want to visit the site to learn more.

DigitalFilm.TV Digital Convergence - Great filmmakers podcast. Sometimes too much of a lovefest of Canon, but when they talk more generally it gets great.

This American Life - The NPR show. Its great, and I have nothing bad to say about it and it should be spectacular, but I find myself listening to the others at the top of this list first

Above & Beyond: Trance Around The World - Great stuff for those long Plane/Train/Automobile rides

iDeveloper Live - Mac dev focused

The ones I keep around just in case

Build & Analyze - Interesting, but I really wish they would edit it down

Back to Work - Like most 5x5 shows, this is just way too drawn out. But Merlin Mann is a godd and I will listen to anything with him (even though I get him mixed up with Ze Frank)

The VergeCast - This should be good, but I keep finding myself skipping forward searching for a good bit

The Bro Show - Like 5x5, many of the 70Decibels shows sound too similar. Pick one. I might drop this one soon.

The ones that I just heard about and have a lot of potential

512 Podcast

The Industry

Mikes on Mics - Mike Vardy's new thing so could be good

Inhatko Almanac

Shop Talk

Non Breaking Space - Listening to this now and its about to make it into the top list.

Is Mr.Reader Poised To Topple The Empire of Reeder?!?

I loved Reeder. I still use it on my Mac and on my iPhone, but I've pushed it aside on the iPad. Now my favorite RSS reader on the iPad is called Mr.Reader and oh my god, is it awesome or what. Its got all the features you need in an RSS app, but there are just a few that make it magically good and I am so happy that I found it.

Yes, I'll admit it, the look of the main screen is terrible. Its one of the ugliest main screens out there. But thankfully I don't stay on that screen long. I almost always just click the item at the top and get to switch to the article view which is just absolutely wonderful:

One of the things that annoys me the most about Reeder is that the controls are on the left side. They are always over there and I cannot change them. So to go to the next article I either have to do the awkward push up on the screen or cross the screen with my right hand to click the down arrow. Ugh. How can they solve this? Do what Mr.Reader is doing, let me choose where that control bar goes. In this screenshot I have it on the right, but using that button on the bottom, I can move it down or to the left. Perfect.

Plus those arrows to move up and down are just rough indicators. As long as I tap the arrow or above the arrow (but below the other buttons) it goes to the previous article. As long as I tap the down arrow or below, it goes to the next one. Perfect!

But even though that was one of the main features I got Mr.Reader for, I don't use it much. The reason is that they figured out an even better way to move around. If you put your thumb on the bezel and drag inward from the left or right, some other buttons drag in with the thumb, like the screenshot to the right. Let go and you go to the next article. Drag up to the button above and it goes to the previous. Wow, that is too cool!

There is one more feature however that makes this app such an important part of my workflow. Often I want to tweet about something I read. But I want that tweet to go out on a schedule so I use Buffer for that. Well, in Reeder, I could click the little services button to send an email. I could then choose the add to buffer email address and Buffer would add it to the queue. Not too tough, but having to type in that address was a bit of a pain.

Mr.Reader solves this by letting me creating a shortcut for the add to Buffer. Now I click that same services button but instead of having to fill out the details, I just choose email link to Buffer. As you can see, I have a few other choices as well and they are perfect for me. Like adding to my Pinboard account, adding to OmniFocus on my iPad, or emailing the whole article to my personal email. I don't actually use that last one much since whenever I star an item I get it emailed to me automatically. You know how to do that? Maybe in another post...

My one wish for Mr.Reader is that it did real integration with BufferApp.com. Now that Buffer has an API, it should definitely be added to the list. I also look forward to an iPhone version.

There are other great features in this app, but the thumb-pad and the email link to a specific account are probably the top two that made me switch. I think it's definitely worth checking it out and it's so cheap there really is no excuse not to look at it.

My Current iPad Home Screen

FYI, here are the apps I use most often these days:

My Favorite iPad Apps

My colleague, Lubor Ptacek posted an article on his blog about the 10 coolest and most useful iPad apps that he uses. I agree with some of his choices but not so much on others. So I decided to come up with my own list of most useful. But I had such a hard time with keeping the most useful list down to 10 that I made it my top 14. So here they are:

Top 14 Most Useful iPad Apps

OmniFocus - I have had such a hard time finding a good way to manage tasks. It was easier to do before when I was able to rely on Outlook. Tasks in Outlook worked pretty well most of the time. Sure, they weren't perfect, but they were good enough. And then I got this Mac. And I use the Mac all the time. Now Outlook 2011 syncs tasks, but due to the version of Exchange at my company, I have to stick with Entourage 2008 which does not sync tasks. Thats really the only issue I have with Entourage. So I started looking around for a better tasks app. I looked at all sorts of stuff, even online alternatives. I finally settled on OmniFocus. It may seem costly at first, but it would be a bargain at double the cost. Having the app on my iPad and my iPhone as well makes having a single list of tasks so much easier than ever before. Now if you are thinking you don't want to go that route because you are on a Blackberry, then let me tell you this. I didn't buy OmniFocus because I had an iPhone, I bought the iPhone because OmniFocus was helping so much and it didn't exist on Blackberry. The iPad version offers some features that aren't available elsewhere, making the 3 apps work really well together.

iThoughtsHD - I thought a mind-mapping app would be worthless on the iPad. While mind-mapping is great on a Tablet PC, the lack of a serious pen interface would be limiting (and don't even try to convince yourself that the styluses available provide a decent pen interface). After I spent a few minutes with iThoughtsHD, that opinion completely changed. Although its still better on a real tablet, the iPad interface for mind-mapping in iThoughtsHD is genius. I have been able to fill out so many ideas and lists using this app that have help me on a wide range of projects at work.

Reeder - I have been a big fan of news readers for a very long time, having been a paying customer for NewsGator when they still had paid customers. Reeder is the best of the news readers I have seen on the iPad for going through my top feeds. It doesn't present it in a newspaper or magazine format, but when I want that I use Zite which is also pretty amazing.

Instapaper - I often find stuff online that I want to read, but don't have time for right now. So I save it for later with Instapaper. Having this app on the iPad means I have that list of reading material where ever I am.

Teleprompt+ - This is a pretty specialized app, but when I record my videos, its truly invaluable. I no longer have to edit out the sound of rustling paper when I read from my script. I keep meaning to build a teleprompter mount, but even without, this is still magically useful

Notesy - I started with SimpleNote, but have moved on to Notesy. I can't remember why. It probably was something I heard Merlin Mann say. But I use Notesy, synched with DropBox for all my ongoing notes. I use the same app on the iPhone, plus Notational Velocity on the Mac, all looking at the same list of text files. I keep notes on things I said to people, books I read, gifts I bought, measurements of furniture I need to buy, future blog posts, translations of Dutch articles I am working on, instructions for apps, scripts I am working on, and more. Notesy handles it all without a problem.

LastPass Tab - I tried using 1Password to manage passwords, but since the app on iPad is so pathetically useless, I switched to LastPass. LastPass Tab is a tabbed browser for iPad that has access to my LastPass password store as well. I find I use it almost as much as Safari on the iPad

Squarespace - My personal blog is hosted at Squarespace. The Squarespace iPad app (and the iPhone app) means I have the quick ability to respond to comments, report spam, and see visitor stats.

Wordpress - My work-related blog is hosted by my employer and uses Wordpress. Everything I said for the Squarespace app applies to this Wordpress app as well.

Tweet Library - I have used Twitter for a long time. Well, for a long time in Twitter years. Tweet Library makes it easier for me to maintain a library of my tweets going back to almost the beginning. Because occasionally I say something good, and 6 months later I need to find that. Tweet Library makes it easy to find those little gems.

Tweetings - Tweetings is the ultimate iPad Twitter app for me. I have tried plenty of others, but I keep returning to Tweetings. It does the basics, like my timeline, mentions, and DMs. I can create buttons for my favorite searches (right now they are FCPX, Blender 3D, and Timelapse). The best part is the window for creating a new tweet, with quick access to recent hashtags, url shrink utils, scheduled tweets, lists of contacts, and more.

Sonos - I bought into Sonos before I moved to Europe 6 years ago. I thought it was braindead easy to use then and its still that way. Having the apps on my iPad and iPhone mean that I now have my remote with me all the time. The main beauty of Sonos for me is being able to hear my music everywhere in my apartment, without having to blast it from a single speaker in one room, annoying all my neighbors. Now the music plays from 5 different zones at a level you cannot hear through the walls, but it sounds perfect to me. And the apps work well.

Goodreader - This was the first PDF reader I found on the iPad and I see no reason to change. It syncs easily with specific subfolders on dropbox so I always have whats important and not the rest of the stuff I share in Dropbox. Goodreader has great features for annotations too.

DayOne - I have blogged now for a little over 15 years. It wasn't called blogging then and the tools were terrible, but its still the same idea. Ever since the beginning, I blogged because I wanted to record something that I would have forgotten otherwise. If others want to read it, great, but thats not really my goal. I have always known that everything on the Internet is NOT private, no matter what you do to secure it, so sharing more…um….intimate things was always off limits for blogging. DayOne is kind of a private blog for me, stored on my machine. It syncs to my Mac and my iPhone so I can always record what I did that day, who I met, etc. Its a beautiful app I really enjoy working with.

Maybe later I'll work up my list of coolest apps on the iPad. Do you have any favorites?

Is the iPad perfect?

Today a friend of mine asked me what I thought of the iPad. Well, I think I love it. It really is a cool device, as long as you understand what it can do and what it cannot. In the two or three weeks that I have had it, I have seen that most of the thoughts I had about the device were confirmed and there have been a couple of surprises as well. I am using it at work as well as for fun and it definitely has a place in both scenarios. And I am writing this blog entry on the iPad as well. It seems to be working out really well.

What makes this device special is that it's portable, has a great screen, and the battery life is spectacular considering what it is. I am using it as a notetaker, an RSS reader, a PDF reader, a magazine platform, a music maker, a remote control, a cookbook, a gaming platform, a timer, and a mail tool. So I think one of the really great features about this device isn't really a feature of the device but the fact that Apple has built such an incredible application marketplace which 3rd parties have joined.

But it's not all perfect. While it's battery life is amazing, it's battery life is one of it's biggest weaknesses. 10 hours on a charge means that the Kindle will always be with me for fiction, long reads, and newspapers. Plus reading on the Kindle is just a nicer experience for most things. Another major problem is that the USB cable only gets a slow trickle charge when plugged into the Mac. Although the power brick is tiny, it means another thing to pack (and accidentally leave behind in the hotel room). While the device is small, it's not quite thin and light enough to compete with the Kindle, which is another reason I won't be leaving the Kindle at home for any trips. And while it's overall design is gorgeous, the one mistake they made was not including a hardware switch for adjusting the brightness. I guess they could have skipped that had they made it sense the brightness in the room, but they forgot that too.

As I mentioned, I think it's the apps that make this thing really shine. So what are the apps that I am using? Obviously there is Safari and Mail. And unlike their counterparts on OSX, these don't suck. For some reason there is no ToDo list on the iPad, but IMExchange2 does a wonderful (free) job of showing me my tasks from Exchange. I love Manton Reece's Tweet Library to get a handle and search through all my Twitter traffic, although I often use Tweetdeck for more day to day usage. Reeder is my current RSS reader and it's integration with Instapaper (which is also installed) makes it even easier to skim through my feeds. GoodReader is an almost perfect PDF reader and it's integration with DropBox, GMail, and other cloud services makes it easy to get documents onto the device. In fact I think this app means I won't be carrying my Kindle DX anymore.

But wait, didn't I say that the iPad is not a replacement for the Kindle??? Well, yes I did. And it's not. I have two Kindles: a DX and the newer smaller device with 3G and WiFi. I get the New York Times on that smaller device and that will continue to be with me where ever I go. But the larger DX is something I thought I would still use for larger PDFs from work. Although the Kindle is great for longer reads, those work PDFs are more for reference. And searching them from the Kindle is a bit more painful than on the iPad.

So what else do I use? TeamViewer is a great way to access to my home machines remotely as well as the parental tech support duties I have. SimpleNote allows me to see the same notes on my iPad that I see in NotationalVelocity on the Mac and Notes on the PC. I now even have an app on the Blackberry that syncs with that system. And I am writing this blog in it too. The Sonos remote app is an absolutely incredible way to control my music at home. I hadn't used Zinio in years but it's now on the iPad and it's a beautiful way to read full color magazines. World Clock Pro HD is a wonderful multiple time zone clock app I use to figure out when i can call my manager in Seattle. And Digits Lite is a delightful free calculator app with a nice history on the left. Those are all the apps that I use almost every day and are on the home screen on device.

Other apps that I use a fair deal include Epicurious, USAToday, Marvel Comics, BubblesHD, Cut The Rope, iSequence, iElectribe, ThumbJam, and Kayak. And then a whole lot of others that are on there but not getting used everyday. In all, there are 100 apps and counting.

As for accessories, there is one that is absolutely required: a case that props the iPad up at an angle. I got the MacAlly Bookstand and it's perfect. Yesterday I couldn't have typed this out since I didn't have the case yet. I am amazed at how much different typing long texts can be when it's angled on a sturdy platform. The SD card adapter is also absolutely required for getting files off my card from the camera and audio recorder.

You might have noticed that I did not mention the iPod app. Well, that's because I haven't really used it for listening to music. My main music platform is still the Zune because the whole music ecosystem on the Zune is just so much better. I would love to see that change, but I am not holding my breath. That said, I have started using my iPod Touch recently because the Connect system in the new Nissan Qashqai that I got does a great integration with the iPod. Because of that I am making my way through all the back episodes of Core Intuition during my drives.

I really enjoy this iPad and am very glad that I picked one up. Unlike the Mac, this is something I can wholeheartedly recommend to anyone and everyone. Apart from the downsides I mentioned above, it's nearly perfect and I look forward to using it for the next few years.