I'm happy to see Naval mentioned a bunch, bummed that no one has mentioned the 'After On' podcast by Rob Reid [1]. Rob Reid interviews Naval, ep. 44 & 45, the 2 part interview/discussion focuses on X-Risks, whether the long-term is going to exist for our species, automated assassination markets, drone swarms ending commercial air travel as we know it, fucking awesome. My dad is a 71 year old doctor, a little aspy, loved the podcast so much he shamed me into supporting it on Patreon. The podcast is on a hiatus at the moment, the back catalog is well worth exploring. The Fermi's Paradox episode with Stephen Webb, the Aubrey de Grey episode, and Rick Doblin (of MAPS) episodes are magic. I also highly recommend Rob Reids sci-fi book named 'After On', particularly if you work in tech in the bay area.
Ask HN: What were your most impactful podcast episodes from 2019?
101–110 of 206 posts
Re: Ask HN: What were your most impactful podcast episodes from 2019?
#102Episodes which I think will stick with me, because they helped me to better understand the motivations and histories behind political perspectives that I disagree with:
- "Citations Needed" ep. 96: The Christian Cinema-GOP Persecution Complex. (CN is maybe my fave podcast of the year overall, too.) -- Why does the American religious right align itself with politicians who seem to go against core 'Christian' values?
- "Behind the Bastards"' serialization of Robert Evans' audiobook "The War on Everyone," which started with the episode "Part One: The Eternal Fascist," released August 13th 2019. -- How did Neo-Nazism get started in America, how does it work, why are people attracted to it? How does the behaviour of current far-right pundits and terrorists connect to earlier history of that movement?
Episodes which, similarly, let me see the world through the eyes of a different community:
- All of "Crackdown," but particularly episodes 1-3. -- What is life like for illicit drug addicts, particularly in Vancouver's Downtown East Side? What are their needs, what political moves could help them (what political moves have failed them)?
- "Canadaland" ep. 396, "Two Centuries of Blackface" -- What can Trudeau's scandal teach us about the history and current experience of racism in Canada?
Podcasts I just enjoyed a lot:
- "99% Invisible" episode 376, "Great Bitter Lake Association" -- a little bit of Suez Crisis history, and some sailors who got bored enough to start a post office.
- "S-Town" (seven episode series) -- an incredible piece of journalistic storytelling about an unhappy man, his small Alabama town, and an apparently consequence-free murder.
- "No Such Thing as a Fish" (weekly) -- the best comedy-and-trivia show I know.
Re: Ask HN: What were your most impactful podcast episodes from 2019?
#103Digital Minimalism with computer scientist Cal Newport was one of my favorite episodes of all time.
https://www.richroll.com/podcast/cal-newport-447/
Re: Ask HN: What were your most impactful podcast episodes from 2019?
#104Invest Like The Best Podcast. “The search for the truth with the anonymous master - Jesse Livermore”
https://open.spotify.com/episode/2POal0mOwBPtLQoeJGa0oL?cont...
Jesse talks at length about making decisions with intuition vs analysis. He breaks down when and why each of these work. It seems simple but it feels groundbreaking.
They also dig into an alternate valuation model for the stock market which I found interesting.
Re: Ask HN: What were your most impactful podcast episodes from 2019?
#105If you're a history geek you should definitly check out Dan Carlin's Hardcore History. This year he only made 2 episodes. 'Supernova in the east' II & III. At a whopping 4 hours each these feel more like an audiobook crammed with history rather than a Podcast. But I can definitly recommend them both & the complete works of him of course.
I have these downloaded and ready to go, but I know it's quite involved and I haven't yet set aside enough time to concentrate and enjoy it.
I listen to an episode of In Our Time every day though. It's fantastic.
https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b006qykl/episodes/downloads
Re: Ask HN: What were your most impactful podcast episodes from 2019?
#106As a guy trying to build something while still in Uni I'd have to name most episodes of the indiehackers podcast. It's incredibly valuable for me to listen to established "normal" founders telling their story. It feels like I'm at a table with them.
One of the best ones was the one with the hotjar founder David Darmanin: https://www.indiehackers.com/podcast/036-david-darmanin-of-h...
It proves that failing at previous projects doesn't mean that you are a failure yourself.
I'm from southern Germany and the startup scene here is basically non-existent. So listening to indiehackers is sort of like a replacement for other meetups.
Re: Ask HN: What were your most impactful podcast episodes from 2019?
#107This is entirely off-topic, but if you're going through and downvoting people for posting their favorite podcasts in a thread like this, you should take a break from here, or the internet for a while, it's not that serious.
That's one way to view it, certainly. The other way is that downvotes are a great tool for ensuring high quality discussion, and if the thread is about podcast episodes, then downvoting full podcasts helps keep the thread organized. Downvotes aren't necessarily bad, they may just mean - hey, this doesn't belong as much in this thread, so I'm voting on it to help organize the thread for other readers.
Although they wrote "episodes" in their title, the OP then listed two podcasts as examples to start the discussion ( Invest Like the Best https://investlikethebest.libsyn.com/ , and FYI https://open.spotify.com/show/0xOdWuktBQKWCv2mlVjizn ). As such, it seems quite a stretch to conclude they want us to limit our responses to specific episodes of podcasts.
Re: Ask HN: What were your most impactful podcast episodes from 2019?
#108Basically all of The Anthropocene Reviewed: https://www.wnycstudios.org/podcasts/anthropocene-reviewed Beautiful essays by John Green. I only started listening at the end of December. -- I've also been checking out the Political Philosophy Podcast, and I've liked what I've heard till now: https://www.politicalphilosophypodcast.com/ -- Again, I can't choose specific episodes, but Heavyweight is pretty amazing too: htt…
I discovered The Anthropocene Reviewed last year. My favorite review is Tetris: “Tetris is a game about time and space. Time is always speeding up, with blocks falling faster and faster, and space is always filling in. There is no winning, Tetris always ends the same way, no matter how expertly you place the blocks. You play until you die. It takes five minutes to learn Tetris. It’s not grand or ambitious. It’s merely perfect.” — https://www.wnycstudios.org/podcasts/anthropocene-reviewed/e...
Special mention for the Kauaʻi ʻōʻō: https://www.wnycstudios.org/podcasts/anthropocene-reviewed/e...
Re: Ask HN: What were your most impactful podcast episodes from 2019?
#109Earlier quoted context omitted.
That's one way to view it, certainly. The other way is that downvotes are a great tool for ensuring high quality discussion, and if the thread is about podcast episodes, then downvoting full podcasts helps keep the thread organized. Downvotes aren't necessarily bad, they may just mean - hey, this doesn't belong as much in this thread, so I'm voting on it to help organize the thread for other readers.
Agreed. I wish everyone who posted an entire podcast would have at least recommended a single impactful episode, especially as a place to start for those of us who haven't listened to the podcast at all. "What's your favorite podcast" is a vastly less interesting and different question to answer. Impactful episodes can even appear in podcasts you generally dislike or don't agree with.
The OP lists two examples of podcasts (not episodes) to open the thread. I think you misunderstood their intention.
Re: Ask HN: What were your most impactful podcast episodes from 2019?
#110There's two FoundMyFitness podcasts that positively impacted my life. I've been telling everyone I know to try a broccoli sprout smoothie because of the outstanding effect it's been having on my health. I suspect a fair number of HN readers might also benefit from giving it a try. Since this is still an active research topic I think it prudent to remind readers to take all health or medical claims with a grain of sal…
Can you provide the link to the broccoli sprout smoothie?