tecznotes

Maciej's Audioblogging Manifesto notwithstanding, this comment on the recent New York Times article "Podcasting Hits Mainstream" is on the money:

Here's a success story for you: I'm now enjoying podcasts so much that I've begun taking the bus to work instead of driving to work, which adds about 45 minutes of communting and listening time into my day. Podcasts reduced my dependence on foreign oil. :-)

(from 37s)

My dad just read Kunstler's Long Emergency, and is all fired up about peak oil. I think there may be an interesting confluence between efficient information-foraging behavior and environmental harmony. Kunstler's main argument seems to boil down to one of human reaction time: given that oil is a finite resource (the only real point of debate is when it will run out), the most important variable is the speed and intent of civilization's rection. If we wait for the market to respond to decreasing supply, we will have waited too long. The book argues that peak oil is a manageable situation if we work to eliminate suburban patterns of living now - move to the city, or become a gentleman farmer.

Meanwhile, the mechanics of attention and connectivity are reaching a point where it's possible to live a rapid transit urban lifestyle, and have more leisure time to read & learn. I do almost all of my reading on public transit, and podcasting only makes sense to me in a context where I'm away from my usual speedreading environment.