Help me fill my RSS reader

May 30, 2008 9:41 AM

I've found myself with a little more time on my hands. I'd like to add a few useful, relevant blogs and podcasts to the ranks of my RSS reader. Any suggestions for me?

I very much prefer quality to quantity. I'd much rather read 5 low-volume, high-quality blogs than sift through a single feed with 50 posts/day to find the ones of interest.
Interests include:

• Some of my favorites are intelligent blogs without a true theme. Jason Kottke, I'm looking at you.
• I'll be going into the Peace Corps in the next year. There are over 4000 blogs about it. Do you have any favorites?
• I dig web design stuff, especially in the standards arena. Favorites: A List Apart, Freelance Switch, and Vitamin.
• I also love product and packaging design blogs. Favorites: Yanko Design, The Dieline.
• After the Peace Corps, I'll be going into graduate school in either justice and peace studies or some derivative of it (international development, conflict resolution, etc.) I read no related blogs. Suggestions?
• Personal development blogs are among my favorites, especially Zen Habits, Urban Monk, and Lifehacker.
• I love baseball and tend to be the sabermetric type. Baseball Prospectus, Roto Authority...?
• Green Daily is the only environmental blog that I read. I'd like a few more.
• I recently became a vegetarian. Any favorite veggie blogs?
• I love politics but have trouble keeping up with Talking Points Memo and The Huffington Post.

I also welcome podcast recommendations. I currently listen to Boagworld, The Rissington Podcast, and a handful of ESPN podcasts. Any others that you think that I may like?
Thanks in advance everyone!

posted by charmston to Computers & Internet (15 answers total)

Response by poster: Oh, I'd love a good indie-oriented music blog or two. Pitchfork is too pretentious for me, but I love Stereogum.
posted by charmston at 9:54 AM on May 30, 2008

Best answer: The Practical Environmentalist is a blog that tries to keep you updated with news and tips about the practical aspect of being green. Included is a rich list of environmental resources.
posted by netbros at 9:56 AM on May 30, 2008

Podcast recommendations:

The Daily Bugle -- Weekly satrical audio newspaper
Democracy Now -- Daily, sometimes you'll get a good interview, recent Gore Vidal one was particulary interesting
Diggnation -- Round up of the 'best' posts on Digg for that week
The Diner -- James Lileks awesome podcast, very unique.
Newspod -- BBC's daily half-hour+ news bulletin
This Week in Tech -- Random tech news, weekly
The Totally Rad Show -- Games, Movies, Comic reviews, weekly.
posted by Static Vagabond at 10:24 AM on May 30, 2008

Self-link: My company started up a web development blog you might find interesting.

For food in general, Tastespotting is great. Just pictures.

And for tech startups and stuff, TechCrunch is the standard.
posted by disillusioned at 10:31 AM on May 30, 2008

I'm hopelessly addicted to the Fresh Air podcast. This American Life is awesome too. If you go that way. I like Studio 360 and Radiolab also. Selected Shorts. New Yorker Fiction. They're all good.
posted by sully75 at 10:41 AM on May 30, 2008

Best answer: For general baseball stuff I think it's tough to beat Baseball Musings.
posted by drezdn at 10:45 AM on May 30, 2008

A few more for you:

tech: Gizmodo and Engadget
deals: Slickdeals.net
posted by twiggy at 11:07 AM on May 30, 2008

Oh yeah I forgot Mashable.com ... web 2.0-ish stuff.. (yeah, we hate buzzwords, but.. whatever)
posted by twiggy at 11:08 AM on May 30, 2008

I don't have the religion but I always enjoy the philosophical and thoughtful Speaking of Faith with Krista Tippett

As a sports fan you should give Only A Game a listen. Check out Sportsfilter yet?

A good discussion of current events, On Point with Tom Ashbrook

Podictionary is an exploration of etymology.

If you have time for humor, (and who doesn't?), then don't miss Keith and The Girl.

And, finally, the always enjoyable This American Life.
posted by geekyguy at 11:47 AM on May 30, 2008

Boing Boing seems right up your alley.

I'm a pretty big fan of Ironic Sans.

In terms of news commentary and analysis, Slate's pretty good (not really a blog, but close)

I absolutely love the Car Talk podcast. You can find podcasts of a lot of NPR's other programs too.
posted by General Malaise at 12:13 PM on May 30, 2008

What are some good blogs that are like kottke.org?

The latest BuzzFeed.
AAAA That's Five A's
Projectionist
For baseball, Stat of the Day.
posted by mattbucher at 12:21 PM on May 30, 2008

Herbivoracious is a good vegetarian blog that even I (an unrepentant omnivore) love to read. and he's got an extensive blogroll of other veggie blogs. Serious Eats is the best general food blog, in my opinion, with the various Chowhound blogs being a close but unfocused second.

music blogs: Chromewaves, LargeHearted Boy, and Stereogum will cover at least 95% of what other music blogs will cover eventually, so you really don't need to read more unless you are a diehard music fiend (and they will introduce you to good posts on other sites). my personal favorite site for mp3s is Said The Gramophone - I may not love everything they post, but I certainly want to hear everything they post.
posted by dropkick queen at 12:32 PM on May 30, 2008

Rodcorp publishes his daily reading list, and a lot of very fascinating stuff (very similar to Kottke.org's links) shows up in there.

I've read more fascinating stories about the early days of video game consoles from Dadhacker than I ever thought I'd enjoy.

Early-days Mozilla stafffer (founder?) JWZ is an internet staple.
posted by SpecialK at 2:20 PM on May 30, 2008

Radiolab is maybe the greatest radio show of all time. In my opinion anyway!

For indie music I really like Daytrotter.
posted by minicloud at 2:22 PM on May 30, 2008

Overcoming Bias is good. I'm also a fan of bibliodyssey, which collects beautiful graphics from old books, and of Strange Maps.
posted by Tlogmer at 9:34 AM on May 31, 2008