![]() And via the “news from friends of friends” option, I usually discover some tech, film or gaming related articles I would have otherwise missed. There’s no faster way to see what’s trending among my Twitter friends. The app aggregates and lists the most linked to articles in your Twitter feed, ordered by popularity. It sizes down effectively for the iPhone (and other mobile devices) so I can scan both sites easily. Another plug for my self-built news site that lists top stories from Designer News and Hacker News. It deserves special praise for its handling of image galleries and videos, both of which pop up frequently on Reddit threads. Thankfully, Alien Blue handles the browsing component well. I never comment, happy to scan a handful of design and gaming subreddits for links and general information. ![]() My Reddit usage pales in comparison to other social media and news sources. Many are well known within tech circles, but there’s a few lesser known apps that are also worth your time. As we wrap up 2014, I wanted to highlight my “must-haves”. They stand the test of time for months, if not years, of usage. Most apps I try are completely disposable within a few days I delete them or relegate them to a folder off the home screen, for use only on rare occasions. My personal favorite podcasts include: AllAboutAndroid, AndroidPolice, Daily Knowledge Podcast, Freakonomics Radio, BBC Health Check, NPR Technology, NPR TED Radio Hour, Phones Show Chat, The PocketNow Weekly, RadioLab, NPR Science, 361 Degrees, TED Talks Video, The Voicemail, This American Life, The People’s Pharmacy, and NPR Your Health.My iPhone app usage aligns with the 80-20 rule. There’s more authenticity and a lot more personality in a voice than in a few words on a page, and this is what appeals to me in podcasts. Better than reading posts, podcasts are personal and will give you a peek behind the curtain of most of your favorite writers and blogs. You’ll often unsubscribe and look again until you find shows you enjoy listening to. However, you have to take your time and pick topics that interest you, subscribe to some shows and give them a listen. Another benefit of podcasts is that you can listen while driving, exercising, doing chores, walking around the mall, and so on. And they’re varied, from general knowledge to technology, comedy, music, science, etc. They’re subscription-based, so you always get notified when a new episode of your show is available. Podcasts are like radio shows, except they’re on-demand since you can listen to them whenever you want and skip the parts you are not interested in. Fast forward a year, and I’m a podcast addict. Since I couldn’t read while driving, audio was my only solution and Podcasts seemed like a “good enough” thing to try. Those 90 minutes felt like lost time and I had to gain them back somehow. What pushed me to give podcasts a try was an average daily commute time of 90 minutes and the local radio stations playing more ads and rubbish competitions than music. ![]() I was, however, not yet sold on the benefit of listening vs reading. Our own Steve Litchfield had been clamoring podcasts for years, I even appeared as a guest on some of his Phones Show Chat episodes, and I knew many blogs had a weekly show. A year ago, almost to the day, I decided to start listening to podcasts. Here, I’ll explain to you why I use it at least 2 to 3 hours everyday. For me, it’s Pocket Casts, a podcast client. What’s the most used application on your phone? For some, it’s WhatsApp or an alternative messaging application, for others, it’s Twitter or Facebook, it might also be the browser or music player, Gmail or YouTube, or whatever game you’re addicted to. ![]()
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