UPDATE: Listen to Episode One
I track a bunch of philosophy journals in Google Reader. I was reading through them one day and putting stars next to the papers that looked interesting, but then I had to do something (I think it was cook dinner) and I had to stop reading. During these times, I’ve started listening to NPR podcasts.
I was thinking, it would be really great if someone would create a journal updates podcast. The idea is that they would sift through Google Reader and star everything the way I do, but then they would create a short podcast in which they read through the titles. They could also read through short abstracts, and maybe offer distilled versions of the lengthy/technical abstracts.
There are a lot of times throughout my day, when it’s not very convenient to read (e.g. driving, walking, cooking, or cleaning). When it comes to general news, I’m covered. There are a wide range of news podcasts. These are the moments when it would be awesome to have a brief news bulletin-esque update on what’s new in the philosophy journals.
So…that’s what I’m going to do. I’ve already recorded my first episode. I’ll be posting it soon.
Here’s the cool thing. It will be naturally integrated into my blog. If you’re already subscribed to the blog, the podcast integration will be seamless. When I post a new podcast episode, it will post here as a blog entry. The blog entry will have a media player and you can listen to the podcast from within my site. The entry will also include links to any journal articles I talk about in the podcast.
But there will also be a separate podcast feed. For those of you who regularly subscribe to podcasts, you’ll be able to subscribe to the podcast the way you normally subscribe to any other podcast.
Here is the Wide Scope Philosophy Podcast Feed.
More About the Podcast
For now, I’ll keep things simple. I’m just going to focus on briefly highlighting journal articles that strike me as interesting based on their titles and abstracts. My main interests are contemporary analytics M&E, Metaethics, Philosophy of Language, and Philosophy of Religion. That should give you some idea of the range of articles that might be highlighted.
Eventually, I may work in additional segments. For example, I might highlight some cool philosophy news or discussions in the blogosphere related to issues in the profession. But I don’t want to go too far down the rabbit hole just yet. I’ll start with highlighting journals (because that’s something I wouldn’t regret doing even if I found out that no one was listening).
Awesome!
Do you plan on submitting the feed for distribution through iTunes? I, and I imagine others, get their podcasts automatically through iTunes, and it’d be great to get yours automatically in this way too. If you can stomach working side by side with Apple, that is.
About five seconds after submitting that last comment, I realized that it can be done. Oops 🙂
Hi Boone,
I do plan on submitting the feed for distribution through iTunes. I’m using a plugin built for that, and I burned the through FeedBurner which also makes iTunes submission pretty easy.
Oh good. So you can already subscribe through iTunes then? Awesome.
Yeah – there’s an “add to iTunes” link on the Feedburner page. Still, you might get more listeners if it could be found through the iTunes store.
Cool. That’s a good idea. I’ll submit it to the store.
What a great idea! Thanks for doing this. I just downloaded an app for my iPhone that can download and manage podcasts. I added your podcast via the URL for the feed and it works!
Now I can download it and listen to it on the subway (no reception there). One can just use the Safari browser, browse to the feed, and stream it from there. (You can even add the feed to your home screen for quick access like an app.) But this app allows me to download the podcast and it even provides push notifications for when new episodes are available.
FYI iPhone users: The app I download had good ratings and was pretty cheap (only $2.99). It’s called “RSS Player Podcast Client” (it has a blue logo). Just go to the App Store, download it, open the app, and add the Wide Scope Philosophy Podcast feed via the URL Andy provides in the post of Episode 1.