viddyviddy

 Once upon a time, long, long ago, some nerds invented the Internet.  Since then the Internet has long been known to be the realm of nerds and their kin.  Some of the major uses of the Internet include:

1. Amusing videos involving either adorable animals or people visiting grievous harm upon themselves.
2. Purchasing items of extreme value.
3. Distractions from worth-while projects.

And that's about it, right?  I think I summed up the main points.

Anyways, it turns out in 2010 some nerds set up a podcast called, go figure, The Nerdist. 

Chris:  Both my parents are sports fanatics and I did not get that gene, I can't be into something if I can't  participate in it, I don't understand it.
Jonah:  I'm resentful towards sport growing up because my dad played football, and he never really forced me to get into sports, but society did because of my size.  Like, every time I'd go to a new school its always like "Okay, you're going to play basketball because you're tall, you're going to play football..."
Chris:  My dad didn't force me to get into it, he just withheld food and hugs until I said that I wanted to put on a uniform.
Jonah:  You know you can go two weeks without a hug?  Scientifically?

Relevant Links:
Main Site
The Podcast via iTunes
Podcast Archive
The Nerdist Book!  That's pretty cool.
Wikipedia Page
Nerdist Twitter 

The Nerdist podcasts covers subjects which are, go figure, tucked within the realm of all things nerdy.  There's mention of table-top gaming, technology, Firefly and whatever topic they wander into.  Hosted by Web Soup's Chris Hardwick and his accomplishes Matt Mira and Jonah Ray, a trifecta of entertaining banter is formed between them.  According to their wikipedia pages, they are all practiced comedians and that really shines through in this podcast.  The hosts nimbly toss jokes back and forth, lining one another up for punch lines and working to get a laugh.  The touch of professionalism gives The Nerdist an edge over some of the other "friendly banter around a mic" podcasts because they have their comedic timing down from the first episode.  

To be honest (because transparency is just one of the core values of this blog) I've only listened to a handful of episodes from The Nerdist's mighty backlog.  From what I can tell it looks like one of the main draws for this podcast is a veritable plethora of guests hosts.  Taking a gander at the episodes it appears to be a fine stable of comedians, which I believe Chris mentioned in one of the later episodes were all basically friends of his.

So you can expect a typical episode to provide about an hour of friends, who happen to be comedians, making jokes and talking about things they like for an hour?  C'mon, that is the only selling point we need, people! 

Music:  The Nerdist theme song is by Anamanaguchi!  It if fully of blips and beeps and I find it charming.

Average Episode Length:   A husky podcast that clocks in at no less than forty minutes and manages to breach the two hour mark on occasion. 

Content Rating:  Explicit.  Some vulgaaaaar stuff sneaks in there. 

Unintentionally Good Part:  Episode 90, about 1:12:10 into it (just nearly the end).  There is a spontaneous song that pleased me greatly.  



Unintentionally Bad Part:  As it is with anything that features a variable that constantly changes, the guest hosts can provide and issue with your listening enjoyment.  One of the first episodes I listened to had a guest host that I did not like, and I almost dropped the podcast then and there.  Shop around, riffle through the archives to find the guest hosts you like, and delete the episodes you dislike.  Easy solution!

Nerds, talking about nerd-type subjects and cracking jokes all the while.  Give it a chance, I think you'll like it.  Nerds!

Before we get down to the review, a caveat, dear reader.

The Savage Love Cast is by no means an all-audience podcast.  If you're familiar at all with Dan Savage's articles at The Stranger, you are already aware of this.  If you are not, allow me to give you a brief summary of the podcast's contents.

This is, in general, a sex advice podcast.  You should read this review if you are interested in learning about a podcast that discusses, in no vague terms, sex and sex-related... stuff.

You should not read this podcast review if you are:

1. Not interested in what goes on in other peoples' bedroom.
2. Grossed out by hearing about... shall we say atypical inter-personal relationship techniques.
3. My mother-in-law.  Or anyone related to me or who knows me in person.  Seriously.  I will not look you in the eyes until 2014.
4. If you are not interested in the following body parts being discussed:

Relevant Links:

Android Ap! This is a free download for Android-based phones. It offers access to Savage's articles, full podcast library and "exclusive text and video content.Savage Love Article
Dan Savage's Blog at The Stranger
Dan Savages' Wikipedia Page
Wikipedia's List of Episodes
It Gets Better Project From the site:  "In September 2010, syndicated columnist and author Dan Savage created a YouTube video with his partner Terry to inspire hope for young people facing harassment. In response to a number of students taking their own lives after being bullied in school, they wanted to create a personal way for supporters everywhere to tell LGBT youth that, yes, it does indeed get better."

It's got George Takei backing it, so you know it's a good thing.
  
Content Rating:  Excruciatingly obscene.  Not even joking.  In fact, to properly discuss this podcast, the rest of this review will be put behind a jump.  You know, to guard the childrens' eyes.

Gentle Reader,

The time has finally come when I am forced to realize that my podcast-listening habits have fallen into a rut. My listening device is currently packed with 24 podcast that make up my standard listening rotation and that's fine for me.

But that's bad for me as well. It is easy to fall into habit when it comes to things you like. I can listen to a single podcast several times over, and with a big enough backlog of episodes a single podcast can keep me sustained for a week. There is little motivation for me to seek out new podcasts.

Which is bad, because, y'know. This whole "podcast reviewer" shtick would end pretty quickly if I just reviewed the same podcast over and over again.

The Internet is a big place when it wants to be, and trying to discover new podcasts to listen to can become an infuriating game of hunt-and-peck. A lot of podcasts unfortunately fall into a "Quality, Regularity, Entertainment: Pick Two" category. If you manage to find something that is relevant to your interest there is a highly likely chance that they either only have 10 episodes, or it sounds like they were recorded on Xbox live headphones.

There's iTunes, yes, and you're sure to be able to find all of the top podcasts that are currently sweeping the headphones of the nation. Sticking to their most popular podcasts will most likely reward you with a slew of high-quality, highly entertaining podcasts.

But A quick Google-ing brings me to these directories:

Podcast Directory

NPR Podcast Directory

Podbean

Podseek - After clicking around for thirty seconds, my path brought me to a podcast about book making! Neat!

So I want to know, reader: where do you find your podcasts? Do you have some secret cache of forums that keeps you in the know? Word of mouth? Podcast review sites that aren't mine (you hussy). Give me some new hunting grounds so that I can find new and untamed podcasts to review for you. Let me know where you go!

Please?

So hey guess what I just discovered Paul and Storm.

Yeah, I know, 2005 called and they want their Internet back. Shut up.

What have I discovered so far is that I like this song, Paul and Storm occasionally open for Jonathan Coulton, they've been featured on The Bob and Tom Show several times and their podcast is called Paul and Storm Talk About Some Stuff for Five to Ten Minutes (On Average).

Storm: I made butter a couple of nights ago.
Paul: You made butter, is that a euphemism?

Relevant Links:
Main Site Here!
Go here to get the Podcast!
Featured sub-page: the rules to give you an intro to the podcast.
Getchu some music here!
Wikipedia entry!
Paul & Storm Twitter!
Podcast archives!
Store!

So the title for this podcast is pretttttty accurate. It's Paul and it's Storm and they're talking about things. I'm about five episodes and some of the featured topics have been:

Felicia Day
Kittens
Hoping Felicia Day Notices Them
Culture-Grown Meat
Vacations to the Grand Canyon
Eating Habits
Pining for Felicia Day

I think I'm safe when I categorize this in the "nerd banter" field of podcasts.

Content Rating: Explicit. Curse-type words, possibly naughty-type content contained within.

Average Episode Length: Not five or ten minutes. Browsing through their archives show that most of the episodes run about twenty to forty minutes! Looks like their intentions of being a quick listen got push aside pretty quickly, but hey, more content for the devoted listener amirite?

I wanted a status check: did you, in fact, fall into a crevasse and die?

Drinking Game: Hm, these are always tricky. Drink whenever Paul and/or Storm says something that seems to honestly surprise Storm and/or Paul.

Release Schedule: A weekly podcast recorded Monday, released ASAP which usually ends up being Monday or Tuesday.

Music: To quote from their FAQ:

• The intro music will always be “The By Cracky Beat” from Lowney’s Chocolates. (Find the song and more info here)
• The outro music will always be “Carry Me Back to Old Virginny” by the Tom-Terry Trio

Unintentionally Good Part: This podcast is a good "listen and" podcast. It doesn't require your entire attention, thus allowing you to listen and knit, listen and perform surgery, listen and toss sabers back and forth with a trusting friend, ect.

Unintentionally Bad Part: It is one more banter-style podcast on the Internet. There's a lot of them, and if you don't find a rapport with these two dudes you probably won't find this podcast interesting.

I'm still in the first stages of listening to this podcast, but I like it. Given time and a chance to learn Paul and Storm's personalities I bet it will be a podcast I stay subscribed to. I hope you'll give it a chance and check out their music as well!

[Huddle up, dear Reader. Get close.

Closer. Uncomfortably close. I want to be so far inside your personal space bubble I can tell what you had for lunch. Butterfly-kisses close.

Closer. I want to tell you a secret.

Closer.

Ok, that's close enough. Here's my secret:

I'm afraid to review Fear the Boot.

Don't laugh! It is one of, if not the very first, podcast I ever truly enjoyed to the point of downloading the entire archives. Not only that, but is has become some manner of leviathan among gaming podcasts. It's been running since 2006! Over 200 episodes! I don't have the attention span to even attempt to begin to attempt to describe all the myriad topics, host changes, events, charities, games, discussions, arguments, food and beer reviews or anything else they've ever brought up!

THIS PODCAST. IT'S FULL OF STARS.  OR NERDS. EITHER WAY, THERE'S STILL A LOT OF GAS INVOLVED (see episode 104, 57:29).

RELEVANT LINKS:
Main site is here!
Wikipedia page yonder!
Forums can be found thither!
RSS Feed!
Fear the Con! No, seriously, they have their own gaming convention. Did you think I was spouting hyperbole when I said this podcast was epic?


But no longer can I push away my duties as a podcast reviewer. I must review Fear the Boot or I shall surely perish. I'm like a podcast reviewing shark.

But I can't.

But I must! So in honor of the spirit of enhancing the RPG experience and bringing a higher level of understanding to the hobby so loved and thoroughly discussed by the Fear the Boot crew...

I've made some random encounter tables. Just follow along and soon you'll have created your very own, personalized Fear the Boot experience!]

CHOOSE YOUR HOST: There are 7 current hosts. Select a d8 and roll three times to determine who will be the main contributors to that episode's conversation (re-roll on an 8).

1 - Dan Repperger
2 - Chad Wattler
3 -Chris Hussey
4 - Pat Roper
5 - Wayne Cole
6 - John Grana
7 - Johann

All right! Now that we've got players on the field, so to speak, let's form the rest of the episode. Now, I understand that not everyone has a set of dice at home outside of the d6 that come with Monopoly, so let's figure out the rest of this with a diceless system, shall we?

THE EPISODE'S TOPICS: For this one head out to the closest grocery store to your house. Once at the grocery store, pretend that you are a ninja being hunted down by wary guards. When someone notices you lurking stealthily through an aisle, mark what section of the store you were in. Take the first 5 times someone notices you (or less, depending on if you get kicked out by security) and match them to the possible topics listed below:

Fresh Produce: Gamer health and etiquette.
Next to the Toothpaste: Danecture.
Aisle 7 - 12: Talking about Battle Tech.
Ethnic Food: Convention based. Can include podcasting about Fear the Con, recording from a convention, a recorded panel, or a review of a convention attended.
Pasta/Dried Beans: Actual, solid gaming advice.
Frozen Foods: If you're near the microwave meals, then it's a Bonus Episode. If you're closer to the Ice Cream/Novelties, then there will be a Gaming Story.
Spices/Baking Goods/Salad Dressings: Discussing how to properly build a character in regards to a game's mechanics.
Next to the Rotisserie Chickens: Discussing how to properly build a character in regards to role playing.
Beer/Wine: Mocking LARPers.

PICK A CONTENT RATING: Take a Ritz(r) cracker. Flip it.
Salted side up: Clean.
Salted side down: Mild swearing, with possible use of some pejoratives. Bonus episodes are particularly vulnerable to the hosts catching a case of the potty mouth.

DRINKING GAME: Not the drinking game per se, but here's an interesting blog article from one of the hosts. For a game that actually involves alcohol try this: drive around town until you find a liquor store that has at least one letter in its neon sign blown out, ala the infamous "BJ'S LIQUO STORE." Buy some manner of alcohol there, Schlafly preferable, and drink it during the podcast.

RELEASE SCHEDULE: One a week, mid-weekish.

UNINTENTIONALLY GOOD PART: Go to your local friendly gaming store, and spend an afternoon with your friends around the gaming table. That is how the banter will make you feel during this podcast. The hosts are welcoming and proud of the community that has grown from the podcast, and it shows through their attitudes on-mic.

UNINTENTIONALLY BAD PART: Take all of the dice you can find in your house. Go into your living room, put every die into your hand and throw them as hard as you can so they scatter around the room. Now go find them. The time and tedious effort it will take you to reclaim these dice represents how it feels when the hosts get on a topic that is not relevant to the main podcast. There are only so many times I can listen to Battle Tech stories.

And, voila! You have yourself the perfect, perfectly randomized Fear the Boot episode! Bask in the glory you yourself have crafted! Or just go listen to the dang podcast. I think you'll like it.

Webcomics! Know 'em, love 'em, love to hate 'em, hate 'em, who cares? If you're a social invalid like myself you've got at least a dozen of them that you check each day and you may have even have deigned to buy a t-shirt or book.

But what if you're a social invalid that wants to make their own webcomic, possibly devoting and developing the skill, talent, dedication and understanding so that you can make a living as a professional cartoonist? You might want a little bit of a guiding light to help you figure out the long road ahead. You might want Webcomics Weekly.

Hosted by a quartet of some of the finest webcartoonists avaliable to host a podcast about webcomics, Webcomics Weekly consist of cartoonist on the web talking about webcomics to those who want to make webcomics and want to know more about webcomicry so that they can succeed with their own webcomics (webcomics).

Webcomics Weekly is a gol' dang font of information. The topics cover the creative and business end alike when it comes to making webcomics. Topics have included:

• Rulers
• How to ship merchandise
• Hand lettering vs. digital lettering
• Do's and Don'ts of conventions
• Feedback
  

There are four hosts, which provides the listener with different points of view and a variety of methods for everything they talk about.

Let's meet them, Tiger Beat style, shall we?

The Heartthrob: Kris Straub. He enjoys writing both Starslip and Chainsawsuit, long walks on the beach and listening to you talk about the drama that goes on during 5th period geometry.
The Bad Boy: Scott Kurtz. Will your sign match up with this fiesty gemini? Scott keeps himself lean and mean by letting you know exactly what's on his mind! Turn ons: understanding gutter size. Turn offs: girls that wear too much body glitter!!!!
The Cute One: Dave Kellett. Put your pencils down from this multiple-choice test on heart-breakers! Dave Kellett may have two Masters degrees but that doesn't keep him from wanting to learn all about you!
The Sweet One: Brad Guigar. Here's what Brad has to say about what makes him a fan favorite:

"Throughout life the way you approach something like that, the way you are able to receive something like is different. For example, if you're ten years old and your dad says something about your mother in a way that indicates that they're actually two married people and it's like "Ew, gross!" you don't want to see your dad kiss your mom or anything like that, it's gross when your ten. But then it's twenty years old and he makes a comment and it's like "Yeah, these are two married people, of course he's going to kiss mom... uh, I don't why I'm doing the whole 'kissing mom' thing... "

... thanks Brad!

Relevant Links:
Get the most recent episodes here.
Find the archives (episodes 1-39) here.
Check out each host's webcomic. I can verify the fact that, if you're me, you'll enjoy all of them.

Hey Look, Another Site:
Webcomics.com, a "tremendous resource of practical information for webcartoonists." This site is outside of my purview, but from what I can tell it features in-depth articles/tips/tricks from some of the leaders in webcomicry. It is subscription only, but if you're an actual webcartoonist go ahead and give it a look.

Content Rating: Majority Clean. Explicit episodes are tagged appropriately.

Average Episode Length: Most episodes will cost you about an hour of your time, give or take ten minutes. The longest episode is a mere five seconds shy of 140 minutes. The shortest episode clocks in at an adorable 31 minutes. Cootchie-coo, little episode!

Scott Kurtz: No, dolls and mannequins will come to life and kill you. That's a fact.
Kris Straub: Yeah, that's a given.
Brad Guigar: Mannequins too?
Scott Kurtz: Oh, yes.
Kris Straub: Why not? Why not, Brad? They're instinct with hellish life! They don't like that they've been made in our image but they can't move. They can't enjoy life! They just have to watch and they're miserable.
Scott Kurtz: And they're waiting for you to drop you guard.

Drinking Game: Take a drink each time syndication is mentioned. Drain your glass if it sets off a rant.

Release Schedule: Weekly-ish. Their track record is a bit spotty when it comes to maintaining the "weekly" part of the podcast. Lucky for you there is a huge backlog of episodes to keep you busy if they skip a week or two! Or three.

Music: Your choices in music vary from that one song every podcast uses with the two guitars that goes:

bink-bink-bink
deedle-eedle-deedle-lee
bink-bink
deedle-deedle-eedle-eedle

OR the one that goes:

woan-de-now
wonna-na-da-de-now
dooooow-de-wonna-won-wow
w0nna-wan-won
bwon-bwon-bwon-bwon

OR ONE OF THE OTHER SONGS THAT EVERY FRIGGEN PODCAST USES. COME ON, GUYS! FOR THE LOVE OF ALL THAT IS HOLY JUST LICENSE SOMETHING ORIGINAL!

Unintentionally Good Part: Brad Guigar's laugh. It's like puppy dogs wrapped with rainbows.

Unintentionally Bad Part: To be fair, I can't peg down a "bad part" for this podcast. I listen to it for the personalities behind the mics. If you're an aspiring webcomic artist, I can't speak for whether or not the information and opinions offered are sound. This podcast serves a small audience; give it a try to see if it's worth your time.

As someone who has absolutely no investment in making a webcomic, I really enjoy this podcast for the personality of the hosts. Start at the beginning of their archive, give it a shot, maybe you'll enjoy it as well. Let me know in the comments!

Before I begin this review, let me draw your attention to one of the most important creative creations that human kind has ever created.

HALO.

Not just any Halo, but the Haloz. You've either played through one of its many iterations, been forced to watch as other people have played it or you are merely taking a break from playing it right now to rehydrate from screaming obscenities into your headset before you go back to playing it.

Some people have taken their fervor for this game to amazing heights, going so far as to recreate Master Chief's armor. A few have permanently marred themselves to show their devotion. At least one couple even got married by Master Chief.

Some people celebrate Halo as a part of their life. Some people build an empire on it. These some people be Rooster Teeth. Then these some people made a thing, which is also a podcast, which it called that Drunk Tank.
These some sentences no work too good. Halp!

Relevant Links:
Twitter
Main Site
Store!
Podcast!

After establishing themselves as the gods of machinima (a word that Firefox is unfamiliar with) they spread their digitally rendered wings and now they're all over the place with live action shorts, a comic based on their day-to-day hijinks, and forums just to name a few of their endeavors. Good thing they made this podcast because, seriously, what a bunch of slackers.

Burnie: "Have you ever in your life, Gus, ever had to figure out what the area under a parabola is?"
Gus: "No."
Burnie: "Has that come up once?"
Gus: "No, never."
Burnie: "So they're literally teaching us things that we don't need to know.
Gus: "Nope, no need for that."
Burnie: "Volume of a cylinder? Ever come up?"
Gus: "Uh-once. Once. And not too long ago."
Burnie: "What for, condoms?"

The Drunk Tank podcast consists of the main pillars of the Rooster Teeth Productions crew talking. And talking. And then yelling at each other before they go back to just talking. Burnie Burns, Matt Hullum, Joel Heyman, Geoff Ramsey, Griffon Ramsey and Gustavo Sorola serve as the main hosts. Occasionally an intern is thrown into the mix to give Gus someone to yell at. Discussion ranges from video games, recounting stories from life, movies, alcohol and anything else that comes to mind.

Drunk Tank broaches such topics as:

• Poisonous spiders and the recognition of them
• Those Lava Cake things you can get from Dominos
• Removing holy cards that had been buried in your yard
• Airlines and flying habits
  

Content Rating: Explicit. Swear words just flyin' around all over the place.

Average Episode Length: My highly scientific method of "squinting at iTunes" reveals that the average length is around an hour. There is a week long series of shorter episodes, so let's just exclude those shall we?

Drinking Game: It is a podcast called Drunk Tank. I trust you can come up with something, people.

Release Schedule: Weekly, with a new episode released each Wednesday! A delightful mid-week treat.

Music: This is where it gets interesting. What began as a contest to select a permanent theme song has morphed into a weekly showcase of fan-made opening songs. Some of the songs are exquisite and hilarious (see episodes 11, 34, 35 and 81) and many many many many many many songs are so bad I have to turn the volume all the way down until they're over. I'm always loathe to express my dislike of fan-created content, but honestly! There is a massive distance between "It has been confirmed by outside sources that I am capable of singing" and "A microphone came with my computer." I'm also throwing out this caveat: there is amateur rapping. Consider yourself warned.

Unintentionally Good Part: This podcast falls under the subcategory of "friends talking to each other" which means that there will be parts when no host can talk because they are paralyzed with laughter. It is safe to assume that you will suffer the same fate as well, so try to make sure you're sitting on the floor if you feel an impending rofl fit.

Unintentionally Bad Part: Other than the listener submitted opening songs? This podcast is banter, banter, banter and occasionally the topic will fall onto something you have absolutely NO interest in whatsoever. And then it will remain there for forty minutes.