For a while now I have been listening to podcasts. For those that don’t know a podcast is an audio file that you can download and listen to, usually about a topic you are interested in. The topics that interest me are obviously Star Trek, Science and Technology and IT stuff. I mainly listen to them in the car when I am driving, but sometimes it will be at home when doing jobs around the house.

I think the first podcast I listened to was Trekmate. Trekmate as the name suggests is about Star Trek, it’s a few guys talking about Star Trek. It’s very similar to those conversations you have in the pub with your mates. Trekmate do lots of podcasts, one for almost every flavour of Star Trek out there, I don’t keep up with all of them, but the ones I listen to I really enjoy.

My favourite podcast that is work related is RunAs Radio. If you are a SysAdmin or have an interest in servers or IT you should listen to this. The host Richard Campbell interviews IT experts about a particular piece of technology, one week it will be Exchange, the next Security, and then SQL Server. Often I will learn something that I will want to try out, some weeks I won’t learn something specific but will give be an insight into which way IT for businesses is going. I think it was probably only after listening to RunAs Radio that are started having more of a long term plan for my IT infrastructure at work.

As I have blogged about before I am learning Development so obviously I listen to .NET Rocks. This is hosted by Carl Franklin and Richard Campbell (yes the same guy that does RunAs Radio) who talk to developers about code, learning and IT from a more Developer point of view. This is released 3 times a week so is a bit hit and miss sometimes, but most weeks there will be something relevant to me or worth listening to.

A few days ago I am did something for the first time, I was a guest on one of the Trekmate pods, TenForward. I reviewed 5 Star Trek episodes. This was a bit of a leap for me as an introvert I don’t like to be the center of attention and I certainly don’t like how my voice sounds recorded. Hopefully when released people will like it and I will do lots more of these in the future. Once it has been released I will put a link up here so you can all have a listen.