Slate's Podcasting Guide

Load Slate onto your phone or MP3 player.

We'll start with a complete list of Slate's regular podcasts, and the links you'll need to download, play, or subscribe to them. If you'd like a more comprehensive podcasting tutorial, scroll down.

You'll find all of our podcast feeds collected here, on Slate's iTunes home page. Or you can subscribe to our individual feeds:

Slate's Daily Podcast: All of Slate's regular podcasts along with special features.

∙ RSS Feed ∙ Play Now


Slate's Political Gabfest: A weekly discussion of politics with Emily Bazelon, John Dickerson, and David Plotz (posts on Fridays).

∙ RSS Feed ∙ Gabfest Show Page ∙ Play Now


Slate's Culture Gabfest: A weekly debate over culture both high and low with Stephen Metcalf, Dana Stevens, and Julia Turner (posts on Wednesdays).
∙ RSS Feed ∙ Culturefest Show Page ∙ Play Now


Slate's Hang Up and Listen: A weekly sports podcast with Stefan Fatsis, Josh Levin, and Mike Pesca (posts on Mondays).

∙ RSS Feed ∙ HUAL Show Page ∙ Play Now


Manners for the Digital Age: Farhad Manjoo and Emily Yoffe navigate the intersection of etiquette and technology (posts on Mondays).

∙ RSS Feed ∙ Digital Manners Show Page ∙ Play Now


Slate's Spoiler Specials: Dana Stevens and her guests discuss plot twists, surprise endings, and everything else you can't reveal in a movie review (several times a month).
∙ RSS Feed ∙ Play Now


Slate's Audio Book Club: A monthly discussion of current and classic books.


∙ RSS Feed ∙ ABC Show Page ∙ Play Now


DoubleX Podcasts: A discussion of issues affecting women, featuring the editors of Slate's DoubleX section (posts most Thursdays).

∙ RSS Feed ∙ Play Now


Slate Poetry Podcast: A weekly poem, usually read by the author.

∙ RSS Feed ∙ Play Now


The Root Podcasts: Regular podcasts from Slate's sister site The Root.

∙ RSS Feed ∙ Play Now


Slate V's Video Podcast: Videos from Slate.com.

∙ RSS Feed ∙ Slate V home page ∙ Play Now

.

Tutorial:

Simply put, podcasting allows you to receive prerecorded audio programs on your mobile device, computer, or MP3 player automatically. You decide which programs you'd like to get—they range from amateur audioblogs to professional radio programs—and then "subscribe" (for free) to those feeds. Your podcasting software will check periodically for any new audio files that become available and download those files to your device. You can then carry hours of your favorite audio programming in your pocket to help you through your commute, your work-out, your errands, or your downtime.

(NOTE: Podcasting is designed for use with broadband Internet connections. Dial-up connections are too slow to download the large audio files.)

Here's a step-by-step guide:

Step 1: Choose Your Podcasting Software
If you already use Apple's free iTunes software (for Windows or Mac, Version 4.9 or later), just look for the podcasts section of the iTunes Music Store. The software now supports one-click subscriptions to a growing number of free podcasts (here are the iTunes links for Slate's podcast home page, and our Daily Podcast).

You can also download and/or stream podcasts directly to your mobile device without having to sync it with a computer. These apps generally allow you to choose shows from a directory or import your own shows using RSS feeds. For starters, Slate podcasts are available in our iPhone and iPad apps. Other iPhone podcasting apps include Podcaster, AudioPress, and Stitcher (which also makes Android and BlackBerry versions and allows you to stream audio files over a standard cellphone connection).

For Android phones, many people use Google Listen and BeyondPod. And BlackBerry has its own podcasting app, as well as many third-party choices.

You can also use the RSS feeds for any of the podcasts listed above to have the latest episodes sent directly to your favorite RSS reader or other RSS-compatible software.

Step 2: Choose Your Feeds
The apps and programs mentioned above include directories of podcasts, and the lists get longer by the day. One helpful list for discovering new podcasts is the iTunes Top 200 Podcasts. Here are some podcasters you might like: American Public Media, the BBC, Grammar Girl, the Guardian, KCRW, Maximum Fun, The Moth, the New York Times, The New Yorker, NPR, On Point, On the Media, PRI, TEDTalks, WBEZ, WNYC.

Step 3: Subscribe
Again, if you're using iTunes, you can find all of Slate's podcasts here (or search for "Slate" within the iTunes Music Store), and then simply click "Subscribe." You can also manually paste a podcast feed's URL—also called the RSS or XML feed—into most programs (in iTunes, just open the "Subscribe to Podcast" section of the "Advanced" menu). For example, here's Slate's Daily Podcast: http://feeds.feedburner.com/SlateMagazineDailyPodcast.

And after you've given podcasting a try, send your thoughts or comments to . (E-mail you send may be quoted unless the writer stipulates otherwise.)

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• Slate's Podcasting Guide
  Load Slate onto your phone or MP3 player.
  May 20, 2011
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