My local friend Dawn Foster has a podcast listening obsession and has followed up a list of her favorite podcasts with a request that some other people share their own lists.  I’ve never participated in one of these chains of blog posts where you tag me to write something about myself and then I tag other people – but this is a good one.  Making a list of clearly identifiable items already being produced by someone else?  No problem.

What is a podcast?  The term has been defined as serialized, shortform audio delivered by RSS – but they aren’t always short, they aren’t only audio (video podcasts are big) and a high percentage are viewed on web sites instead of by RSS anyway.  Serialized online media might be key concept.  It’s an unfortunate misconception that an iPod is required to consume podcasts.

To be honest I used to listen to far more podcasts before I got a good web enabled mobile phone, an EVDO card and the excellent services of the City of Noses dog walkers here in Portland.  All caveats aside, here’s my list and a SplashCast player so you can check out my favorites right away.

IT Conversations – not all episodes are of interest to me, but many of these interviews and tech conference talks are not to be missed.

Democracy Now – a daily audio and video show about current events that delivers some of the best investigative journalism and world news you’ll find anywhere.  This show is an international media phenomenon of mind-blowing proportions.  It’s broadcast on over 500 cable access and community radio stations in addition to being available as a podcast.

The Vloggies Show – Irina Slutsky’s comedy and commentary on the state of the video blogosphere is fun and informative.

Rabbit Bites – two sassy bunnies, with subtitles.  This one isn’t in the SplashCast player because something funky with the RSS feed prevents it from being included.

Textra – If you can get over the assumption that Natalie Del Conte is little more than Beauty Myth eye candy, you’ll find that she actually does some good research into the tech stories you might not have read closely over the week.

1938 Media – Loren Feldman is not a nice man but he’s smart and I can’t stop watching his show about people on the internet.

That’s about the extent of my current list of favorites.  Here are some shows I used to listen to a lot that you might enjoy as well.

The Gilmor Gang – Rest in Peace.  Ever since this weekly two-hour tech round table stopped publishing, podcasting has felt far less meaningful to me.  I mean that literally.

For Immediate Release – Another long show about online communication – PR especially.  Always timely, if a tad uninspired in its analysis (sorry guys).

Diary of a Shameless Self Promoter – Heidi Miller speaks at trade shows but also does a great podcast about promoting yourself as an independent professional.

Those are my favorites!  I’ll be putting this SplashCast player back in my redesigned blog sidebar here and adding individual videos I find and want to share in there as well.

What are your favorite podcasts?  New ones I like can be really hard to find so please let me know.  The practice of tagging people and asking them to blog about something in particular isn’t one I’ve ever been very comfortable with.  You’re reading this post – would you like to participate and list some of your favorite podcasts?  Go for it, link here or to Dawn’s post and we’ll all get to discover more content.