Podcasts

I’ve started listening to more and more podcasts. I don’t know quite why this has happened now – podcasts have been around for a while, and I’ve known about them for years – but I’ve gotten into the habit of regularly syncing my iPod, and listening to the shows on the daily train to and from work.

I’m interested in whether other people have started to integrate listening to podcasts into their daily lives much, and which ones they’re listening to. The hype around podcasting has definitely died down now, so has it emerged as a fairly mainstream medium of entertainment, or has interest and listenership waned?

Here are the podcasts I’m listening to regularly:

• Adam and Joe (clips from their 6music show, which I also listen to)
• BBC Backstage (occasional discussion-based format)
• Collings and Herrin (chatter from Andrew Collings and Richard Herring)
• In Our Time (the ‘history of ideas’ – Melvin Bragg’s Radio 4 show)
• iPM (‘interactive’ version of the PM Radio 4 show)
• Pods and Blogs (radio show on 5Live)
• Podgrams (the excellent dulcet ramblings of Stephen Fry)
• Ricky Gervais podcast (I can’t quite work out which ‘series’ this is, but it’s only occasionally updates, although is free)
• The Russell Howard and Jon Richardson podcast (from their 6Music show)

I’ve also dipped in and out of other podcasts discovered on iTunes, and subscribe to the BBC’s NewsPod service, but only listen to that when I’ve got a lot of time to spare and haven’t caught up with the news recently.

Are there any really decent podcasts that I’m missing? Let me know in the comments.

All this listening to podcasts also makes me want to revive my long-procrastinated plan to record a podcast of my own. I’ve thought of a good name for it, which is surely a good start, but I probably shouldn’t commit to starting any new projects right at the very moment. I may come back to the idea in a couple of months though…