One of the things that kind of surprises and even disappoints me a little bit about myself is that I don't like podcasts. Even though I love information and opinions, my default connection to news and ideas is still reading. However, almost everyone I know whose opinion I care about has over the last few years asked me if I listen to this or that podcast and I always say no. I've tried to follow a few, but after a while the sound of some people's voices start to grate my nerves and overpower the content itself. The chirpers and uptickers and throat-clearers and nasal voices are obviously annoying, but the most intolerable voices to me belong to people who know they have really nice voices. These folks will kill you with their handsome baritones, chrystalline Stepford pitches, and perfectly enunciated 's' sounds. (Full disclosure: I'm one of these people myself.) And while there are people on television who have similar quirks, the visual media has a way of balancing these kinds of sensory experiences. Audio media, on the other hand, is meant to be be heard while you're walking, shopping, driving, cooking, etc., so radio and podcast productions have a lot of voice resonance. I'm also just very sensitive to noise in my own space. Unless I'm drinking or hosting company, I don't play music. I don't keep the television streaming for mindless background noise. (Yet, I need noise like rainfall and ASMR vids to fall asleep.) Either way, today I feel like the guy at the party 20 years ago who doesn't read the Times or the glossies. The bore. So since podcasts are the way people share and build ideas with each other today, I'm asking everyone who likes them to share their top five podcasts with me. I don't want to become someone who is getting older and lives in an echo chamber of one. And because I'm really resistant when it comes to technology --I'm a lover of many things paper, so I'm always the last on the "new" boat -- that's a real risk. So in with the new. Thanks in advance.
No comments:
Post a Comment