Podcasts for geeks interested in everything

Podcasts keep me from walking into lamp-posts - without high-quality, information-dense listening material I have to resort to reading books while walking. Below is my carefully collated list of concussion-prevention material - if you're a like-minded geek you're sure to find something you'd enjoy in here.

Radio National

Radio National is one of the best things to come out of Australia. Nearly every program on this station is worth listening to, and, better yet, almost everything they do is podcast.

• Background Briefing Current affairs analysis program that focuses mostly on Australia.

• Big Ideas Broadcasts various lecture series by prominent personalities.

• By Design Design and visual arts program presented by the excellent Alan Saunders.

• Late Night Live A really fantastic current affairs program, presented by an avuncular and only occasionally irritating national treasure called Phillip Adams.

• National Interest Another program focusing on Australian current affairs. Excellent analysis, presented by one of the best interviewers in the Australian media.

• Philosopher's Zone Another superb Alan Saunders program, this time focusing on philosophy.

• Future Tense A new offering from Radio National, looking at cutting-edge issues. The jury is still out on whether this program will stay in my list.

• Encounter Occasionally interesting religious issues program.

• Counterpoint Superb program that tries to be the right-leaning antidote to the decidedly left-wing Late Night Live. Has a tendency to give airtime to border-line nutters, but always interesting.

Economics and Business

• Cato Institute Event Podcast Lecture and seminar podcast by the Cato Institute, a free-market oriented economic and social thinktank.

• EconTalk Great in-depth interviews from the Library of Economics and Liberty.

• London School of Economics: Public lectures and events Must-have LSE events podcast.

• Business Weekly General BBC business program.

• Wall Street Unspun with Peter Schiff Peter Schiff is worth keeping an eye on, especially in the current economic climate.

Tech

• IT Conversations Sadly this feed includes Joel Spolsky's StackOverflow. I swear, Spolsky is the Oprah of software engineering - vapid, shallow, smugly self-satisfied, and with hordes of equally irritating fans. Ugh. Jon Udell and Phil Windley's interviews are always interesting, though, and make this feed very much worth while.

• bsdtalk A nice little niche podcast focusing on the BSD community.

• The Web 2.0 Show Web2.0 dev podcast with occasional interesting content.

• Berkman Center for Internet and Society: Audio Fishbowl Very interesting lecture series and events podcasts.

• Center for Internet and Society Another lecture series and events podcast, from Stanford's CIS.

History and Society

• In Our Time With Melvyn Bragg Great history program from the BBC.

• Open Source Interesting stuff presented by Christopher Lydon. Sadly, he's one of the most irritating interviewers around, but his content is consistently fascinating.

• Start the Week with Andrew Marr Wonderful general current affairs and discussion from the BBC.

• Thinking Allowed Yet another great general discussion program from the BBC.

• This American Life Occasionally twee but usually interesting middle-class American schmaltz.

• UChannel Podcast A public affairs and lecture series podcast from institutions around the world. A must-have.

• Analysis BBC current affairs analysis.

• Media Talk Media analysis from the Guardian.

• On The Media Media-focused program from the NPR.

• Speakers' Forum Podcast Another good lecture series and events podcast.

Science

• Material World Good science reporting from the BBC.

• Nature Podcast Science from Nature Magazine. Interviews with scientists published in Nature.

• Point of Inquiry Really great podcast from the Center for Inquiry, a skeptical and rationalist advocacy organistaion.