Walk Around Chicagoland Speedway Before the Race from Murray Williams on Vimeo.

I brought my Flip camera to the July 11th Sprint Cup race at the Chicagoland Speedway to capture all the craziness that occurs outside the speedway before the races.

You Look Nice Today

Originally uploaded by rcarver

There is a podcast called You Look Nice Today. It is one of my favorites. It is put out by three guys who found each other through Twitter. Each found the others tweets interesting and more importantly, funny. They got in contact and decided, why not spread our mirth to a wider audience, a listening audience. The world would be a better place after all. Hey, and we all wear glasses, and we could always talk about that, though they never have.

The podcast normally consists of three lads: Merlin Mann, Scott Simpson, and Adam Lisagor. Also pictured here is Jonathan Coulton, you ought to Google him now…his music delights, and a man who we all know and have grown to love, sitting down in front is John Hodgman, but you may know him better as ‘PC’.

Apparently there is a brand-new You Look Nice Today podcast out or coming out soon that features all these fine fellows. I may not be able to sleep.

If you are of the Podcast persuasion, then get on over to iTunes and subscribe to You Look Nice Today…today. You will not be disappointed.

Here is how you do it.

1. As you are looking at the list of your email, find one that you want to delete.
2. Place both thumbs over that message and then spread them apart. Think of a reverse pinch.
3. A red ‘Delete’ button will appear.
4. Hit that button and voila, that email disappears!

That same action works in you podcast library, and I am sure in a lot more places.  Explore and let me know what other places it works.

In the meantime, Veronica Belmont has done a couple of guest appearances on the show, and did a great job. Veronica got her start on a CNET podcast, Buzz Out Loud with Tom Merritt and Molly Wood as the producer. Early on she chimed in sporadically, but over time she became more and more involved until she was for all intents and purposes the third host.

Jason Calacanis, ex-Weblogs, inc, ex-AOL, and present grand poobah at the human powered search engine Mahalo, snatched Belmont up to host a new video podcast called Mahalo Daily. Mahalo Daily had a predictably bumpy start but matured quickly to become a very enjoyable daily vidcast.

Recently on guest appearances Veronica has announced that she was moving on from Mahalo Daily to a new and secret project.

Mark my words, Veronica Belmont will be the next co-host on Tekzilla, making yet another addition to the now very formidable Revision3 team. She will be a great co-host because she is fun to watch and she almost always has interesting insights that add a much needed female influence on the show. I have missed Jessica Corben but I look forward to Veronica Belmont.

By the way. Now that Revision3 has matured, I officially no longer miss TechTV.

Leo LaPorte is finally completely off the TV airwaves. Sad day. But, it is also a happy day because I couldn’t get the show here in these United States, and it has freed him up to think outside of the box and start putting together an online network of video-taped podcasts. I am calling it that because as it stands right now it doesn’t sound like what he will be producing will look anything like what we see on tv.

Right now, he runs the TWiT Netcast Network which produces around 12 different shows per week that are available for download from his site. Now he is looking at how to bring an element of live tv to it. At this point it appears that he will still keep producing the same shows with maybe the addition of a few more, who knows, but he will have multiple cameras aimed at him and his guests so that there will now be a live, interactive element to it.

LaPorte has always said that he likes the idea of interactive which was one of the driving forces behind many of the decisions made at the now defunct network TechTV. His desire was to always find ways for the audience to participate. TechTV lead the charge in using webcams so that the audience could actually be on the shows and asks questions and leave comments. It was an openness that we haven’t seen since.

I believe this openness is what engendered such a tight following in his audience. We have always felt that we are a part of the action, and to be honest, it doesn’t matter where Leo goes, if he is producing content, his audience will find a way to consume it.

I am looking forward to the changes in the upcoming months to TWiT and I am excited that I don’t have to bittorrent his content in order to see it.

If you are looking for interesting, well-produced podcasts that have a bit of a tech angle, check out TWiT.tv.

This article talks about how according to a recent study of online habits, women prefer mainstream video online while men tend to prefer user-generated video. At least in my house, that is exactly right. On most nights, once the kiddos are in bed, Meg and I can be found in the front room of our house. She is watching something on the TV like “The Apprentice” while I am watching The Totally Rad Show on my iPod.

I find that more and more I find the TV less interesting. I would rather find shows that have a laser focus on my interests rather than hearing for the 27th time the Britney is in the hospital….sick o’ dat. In fact, other than some live events that I can’t miss, I could probably get rid of cable all together.

Here is my playlist of Favorite Podcasts:

• Diggnation
• The Totally Rad Show
• TWIT – This Week in Tech
• The Dawn and Drew Show
• CNET’s Buzz Out Loud
• Leo LaPorte – The Tech Guy
• MacBreak Weekly I listen to this even though I don’t own a Mac…go figure.
• The Merlin Show – Make a new one Merlin Mann!
• Mr. Deity
• Net@Night
• Onion News Network (Video)
• Pixel Perfect
• Revision3 Gazette
• Security Now!
• Systm
• Tech5
• Tekzilla
• This American Life – AWESOME
• This Week in Media
• This Week in Photography
• Tiki Bar TV
• The VFX show
• Windows Weekly

As you can see, I get a lot of content for free that is targeted right at my tastes. I pay nothing (other than my attention)!

If you haven’t checked out podcasting, do yourself a favor and open iTunes and go to the podcasting section and do some digging around. I am sure you will find some content that is interesting to you.

It is a collection of web curmudgeons who talk about the web landscape in an all but incoherent way. Most of the time I can’t make heads or tails of it and yet I listen to it religiously.

Dan (I am a moron for getting Steve mixed up with his brother…) Steve Gillmor killed the podcast for some reason a year ago, and now thankfully brought it back.

One of the best parts about the show is Jason Calacanis, the man behind weblogs inc. and more recently, the human powered search engine Mahalo who is one of the most enjoyable personalities blogosphere. He is a divisive force in the web-world who is either hated or loved. There are very few who know anything about him that are indifferent about him.

Calacanis was one of the most-hated guests on Leo LaPorte’s TWIT webcast. I thought he was great. I find his unabashed honesty incredibly entertaining.

I don’t know who would listen to this train wreck, but I can’t tear myself away. Catch it before it is prematurely canceled again.

Twit.tv, Leo’s podcasting network grew to the point that he was looking for a way to cut back. He told KFI that he was going to stop the radio show. KFI replied and said that they would help him syndicate the show nationwide.

This past weekend was the first week of the nationwide show and the podcast changed. It’s different now and I like it. I was a little skeptical when I saw the length of the show. It is quite long because the show is nearly 3 hours now. The reason is Leo has left all the back-channel chat during the breaks in the podcast. It is pretty cool.

Now, you get to hear all the conversations between Leo and the producers in the studio. It is a little like audio voyeurism. Go to the iTunes music store, click on podcasting and then search for Leo LaPorte. If you like tech talk, then you will like this show. He answers all sorts of questions and it is quite entertaining. You will especially like it if you were a TechTV fan.

Great change in the radio show Leo. I, for one, like the change. I have to go. Heroes is on. What a geek…

It is not immediately apparent how to subscribe to podcasts that aren’t listed in the iTunes library, but it is possible. Click on ‘Advanced’ and then ‘Subscribe to Podcast…’. That will open a dialog box where you can put in the RSS feed for the podcast.

The Roger and Jason Show on iTunes

Mad Props to the Roger and Jason Show… You guys are listed. If you go to the podcast listings in iTunes and do a search for “Roger Jason”, their show will pop up and you can subscribe. I am very jealous.

Download the new version and start listening to podcasts.

A Brand New Podcast

It isn’t released yet, but here is a super-secret podcast.

http://www.fellowshipnwa.org/rss/rssclp.asp

Copy and paste that URL in the iTunes the way I explain above, and you will be one of the very first subscribers to Fellowship Bible Church of Northwest Arkansas’ newest podcast, The Changed Life Project.

Have Fun!

MurDog OUT!!!

They are hitting it out of the park in design. Their products are just neat. I can’t afford them, but they are neat.

I got the opportunity to see the new OSX 10.4 operating system thanks to my good friend Jason of www.jasonandjaime.com. Jason was a PC head for a long time until just lately when he was using a PC at work and then cheating on the PC at night with his wife’s Powerbook. Now, he is a powerbook owner. I went to his house and saw how it works and I was very impressed. I want one, but I don’t have the money, and if I had the money, there are other bills that need to be paid before I drop the 1900 or 2500 dollars it takes to get a nice Apple.

Check Out the New Podcast

Jason also kicked off his podcast yesterday. You need to give it a listen. There is a link in his blog at www.jasonandjaime.com.

MurDog OUT!!!

PS I love you Mary Hadley and Wyatt. Mommy and Daddy will be home tomorrow!!!!!!!!!