4 ms·

I have an almost-four year old child and not a lot of downtime. I used to listen to podcasts when I was doing dishes, cleaning the house, walking the dog, etc.

I have an almost-four year old child and not a lot of downtime. I used to listen to podcasts when I was doing dishes, cleaning the house, walking the dog, etc. I've mostly abandoned podcasts in favor of audiobooks. It didn't feel like they were benefiting me in any meaningful way—almost like they were just empty calories for my ears. I finally made it all the way through The Power Broker recently, which I've wanted to read for years, and am now on Jennifer Pahlka's really insightful Recoding America, which features heavily in the chapter "Govern" in Ezra Klein and Derek Thompson's Abundance. The three are actually quite interesting to read back to back. Audiobooks are definitely slower to get through than just reading, but I find that I can stick with them in a way that books just haven't allowed me to do in years.

kaashif 3mo ago
I only even heard about Jennifer Pahlka from Tyler Cowen's podcast, I think there are still some podcasts worth listening to. Your point is well taken and very reasonable though.
coffeefirst 3mo ago
I got a Libro.fm sub when my son was born last year and am finding the same. I actually think this is about quality. Podcasts that take real effort (Hardcore History, Fall of Civilizations, Gastropod) are absolutely worth my time, but they're basically mini-audiobooks in their own right.
- theoreticalmal 3mo ago
  Hardcore History is phenomenal. It’s a bummer the release cadence is so slow, but I understand why
password4321 3mo ago
I would audiobook 24/7 with the open ear headphones (Shokz etc) but I don't think I could afford to pay for that much that was worth listening too / low maintenance.
- singpolyma3 3mo ago
  Use the library
  - j45 3mo ago
    Libraries certainly have great apps for borrowing ebooks, audio books and more.
- dqv 3mo ago
  https://www.openculture.com/freeaudiobooks https://www.openculture.com/freeaudiobooks As others have pointed out, libraries often have Libby access which can have pretty huge selections of audiobooks. There's a discovery feature that lets you search by vibe, which I am finding useful.
freefaler 3mo ago
There is also another benefit to books, on average they are much better than a random 3 hour podcast. If you care about what you read, you'd be getting something that the author has spend a lot of time, skill and energy to write, the editor would have spend a lot of time and skill to improve with the author. I have a measure for all content I consume, quality/hr of reading/listening. If it's just a long video that has 2-3 questions that has caught my attention I'd be listening only those. If it's a long text that I might find something interesting I'll ask the LLM to summarize the main ideas as a filter before I decide to dive in. Books, and their audiobooks version have on average much more bang per hour than random podcasts, because they're structured, authors had spend more time on them and you can cherry pick from a structure. I also have caught myself using sloppy content as excuse not working on planned tasks with excuses like "this might be useful", or watching "productivity porn" videos. I think LLMs are good as a pre-filter for that.
- WalterBright 3mo ago
  I gave up on podcasts because of the excessive insertion of commercials, and the execrable user interface of the iphone podcast app.
  - elAhmo 3mo ago
    There are other apps too, such as Overcast, and ads on podcasts are really easy to skip.
    - WalterBright 3mo ago
      Yeah, I can skip forward 30 sec, then back up, blech. It's just not worth it when you constantly have to interact with the podcast app. Scott Adams' podcasts were different. He inserted very few commericials, and they were short enough there was no reason to skip forward. I tried many other podcasts after he passed away, and they all were largely long, boring commercials. Yuck. I now listen to Pandora or Soma FM instead.
      - 3mo ago
jppope 3mo ago
Audiobooks are just a different medium. I don't think people should pretend that an audiobook is a book. You process the two in completely different ways. This doesn't imply one is better than the other either. For me I don't like audiobooks because its very slow and spoken stories should have a different cadence, velocity, set of dynamics, and diction than a book should (check out "the moth" to see what I'm talking about). I hold nothing against people who don't like to read or people who like audiobooks, or people who like slow things - Suum cuique.
- nephihaha 3mo ago
  Audiobooks are heavily dependent on the reader. In one case, I had an audiobook where the translator was the reader. She is an excellent translator but a poor reader. Many authors are poor readers of their own work. They are certainly good while you are on a long drive etc, because they entertain you while doing some another task which you wouldn't be able to do while reading. During lockdown, I could not read due to the constant stress and fear mongering, but I had to walk a lot every day and the audiobooks were a good way to accompany that.
  - estetlinus 3mo ago
    +1 The best audiobook I’ve ever listened to is Stephen Kings On Writing: A memoir of the Craft, read by the author. One of our times best storytellers, both when it comes to writing them and telling them.
    - nephihaha 3mo ago
      I've a soft spot for that book because it saved me from two days of very long and dreary jury service. (They kept us sitting around all that time.) I think I read at least a third of it in there. The only court stuff I heard was for about ten minutes and incredibly unexciting.
  - boznz 3mo ago
    When I write a character, I picture not just the character but the voice, same with reading, and going from a paper or eBook to an audio book usually breaks both. Books I write rarely include characters from Manchester (UK), so reading voices with my strong accent would definitely break a lot of my books. It is also the reason I sometimes don't enjoy movies if I have read the book. It is not a one way street though, some really good narrators can improve the experience a lot, same with good directors.
j45 3mo ago
Agreed, there's no one medium fits all in all stages of their life and a lot of the takes rooted in such a perspective can lead people to seek convenience (scrolling) instead of engaging. Reading does force you to slow down to let more enter your brain. Audiobooks can do the same in a different way. Either way, longer form content helps the brain unpack and retain bigger/longer picture things which is the kind of focus that many want to improve. Reading also helps one be more articulate. Articulation is a helpful skill in using AI.
mcv 3mo ago
After a long reading hiatus, audiobooks helped me pick up speed. I read faster with audiobook than without. For a few books, I combined regular and audiobook, so the audiobook forces me to keep reading, and hearing what I'm reading gives me something to hold on to, and helps a bit to prevent my thoughts from distracting me. But I don't have an audiobook for all the books I want to read.
kelvinjps10 3mo ago
For me audiobooks are okay for non fiction but for fiction I need to read it to be able to immerse in the story and imagine the characters. Also no all non fiction it's okay either, for philosophy that's a little complicated I need to read it too.
- deleted 3mo ago
  [deleted]
- dredmorbius 3mo ago
  Fiction read by a skilled actor (voice or performance) can be a real insight. My reading voice is quite distinct from what such an actor can bring to a work. Not all narrators are actors, and depending on the narration you may or may not gain from this. For a good set of examples, I'd recommend Selected Shorts (Symphony Space), which is a set of podcasts and broadcasts voiced by stage and screen actors. They're usually at least good, and often excellent. <https://symphonyspace.org/selected-shorts https://symphonyspace.org/selected-shorts> Recent episodes: <https://www.symphonyspace.org/selected-shorts/episodes https://www.symphonyspace.org/selected-shorts/episodes> Two personal all-time faves: - "The Appropriation of Cultures", by Percival Everett, read by Ruben Santiago Hudson. - "The Smoker", by David Schickler, read by Robert Sean Leonard: <https://inv.nadeko.net/watch?v=5XbSI5swx1E https://inv.nadeko.net/watch?v=5XbSI5swx1E>.
cubefox 3mo ago
> Avoid even audiobooks. Big corporations want to grab your attention by trying to market audiobooks as books for busy people, but don’t fall for the trap. A book is just boring black text on a white page because that’s how it’s meant to be consumed, and it requires your entire attention. Listening to audio while cooking or cleaning or whatever you do is not the same thing; you are not 100% concentrated on the content. Also, reading is faster than listening, so use your time wisely.
brandall10 3mo ago
Wow, listening to the Power Broker now, about 1/3 of the way through. Audiobooks completely changed things for me... in the past 2 years, 'read' about 40 books, almost entirely listened to on my daily runs. The prior 2 years? Only 3 or so.
- hombre_fatal 3mo ago
  Same. Though for me I just can’t and don’t want to sit for hours. I still read 15-30min to go to bed, but with an audiobook I can listen for hours to amazing content while doing everything else I want to do in life like exercise and cook. Now it’s at the point where I can’t wait to go for a run or do the dishes because it means I’ll get farther in a great book. Finally a real life hack.
orochimaaru 3mo ago
I used to do that when my children were little. However, in another 3 years your child will not require you as much anymore and your downtime duration will improve. My problem has been that once I started doing the audiobooks/podcasts, it has been really hard to reclaim my focus to read. I used to be able to power through books. Now, there always seems to be a distraction at hand.
technothrasher 3mo ago
I cannot ever manage audiobooks, because I tend to wander while I'm reading, thinking about what I just read, processing it, mulling it over, or exploring it in some other way. With a book, I just go back to where I stopped reading when ready and carry on. But with an audiobook, it keeps going while I'm thinking and not listening, and I miss it and have to rewind an unknown amount, over and over.
Balgair 3mo ago
I'll echo this too. I've liddles in the house and books are a no go right now. If they even let me the minutes to read, that would be great. But I know from repeated experience that books are too fragile for them to have around, let alone the stains and stickiness that young children affect on every surface. Audiobooks have been a god send and then the Libby app manna from upon high. Free, high quality, adult-level infotainment?! I'll never go back. One thing if do is up the reading speed. It takes time but I'm comfortable at 2.6x these days, even on the fragmented sleep a teething toddler grants you. For really in depth stuff I'll slow it down a lot, but a Stephen King dime store novel or John Grisham thriller? Oh yeah, speed it up no worries
crossroadsguy 3mo ago
Audiobooks are great if one likes the sound, tone, speed, etc, etc of the narrator. Not very easy to land at this combination.
beloch 3mo ago
"Avoid even audiobooks. Big corporations want to grab your attention by trying to market audiobooks as books for busy people, but don’t fall for the trap. A book is just boring black text on a white page because that’s how it’s meant to be consumed, and it requires your entire attention. Listening to audio while cooking or cleaning or whatever you do is not the same thing; you are not 100% concentrated on the content. " ---- I disagree with the author of this post. Audiobooks are fantastic in certain settings. e.g. Driving, or any form of transit if you're prone to motion sickness. Yes, listening is different from reading, but you're still getting information into your brain. There are definitely books that don't work as audiobooks (e.g. Anything with equations), but there are also books that are, perhaps, best consumed as audiobooks. Homer was passed down orally for generations before being written down. Anyone who poopoo's an audiobook of Homer deserves to be ridiculed.

kaashif 3mo ago

I only even heard about Jennifer Pahlka from Tyler Cowen's podcast, I think there are still some podcasts worth listening to. Your point is well taken and very reasonable though.

coffeefirst 3mo ago

I got a Libro.fm sub when my son was born last year and am finding the same. I actually think this is about quality. Podcasts that take real effort (Hardcore History, Fall of Civilizations, Gastropod) are absolutely worth my time, but they're basically mini-audiobooks in their own right.

theoreticalmal 3mo ago
Hardcore History is phenomenal. It’s a bummer the release cadence is so slow, but I understand why

password4321 3mo ago

I would audiobook 24/7 with the open ear headphones (Shokz etc) but I don't think I could afford to pay for that much that was worth listening too / low maintenance.

singpolyma3 3mo ago
Use the library
- j45 3mo ago
  Libraries certainly have great apps for borrowing ebooks, audio books and more.
dqv 3mo ago
https://www.openculture.com/freeaudiobooks https://www.openculture.com/freeaudiobooks As others have pointed out, libraries often have Libby access which can have pretty huge selections of audiobooks. There's a discovery feature that lets you search by vibe, which I am finding useful.

freefaler 3mo ago

There is also another benefit to books, on average they are much better than a random 3 hour podcast. If you care about what you read, you'd be getting something that the author has spend a lot of time, skill and energy to write, the editor would have spend a lot of time and skill to improve with the author. I have a measure for all content I consume, quality/hr of reading/listening. If it's just a long video that has 2-3 questions that has caught my attention I'd be listening only those. If it's a long text that I might find something interesting I'll ask the LLM to summarize the main ideas as a filter before I decide to dive in. Books, and their audiobooks version have on average much more bang per hour than random podcasts, because they're structured, authors had spend more time on them and you can cherry pick from a structure. I also have caught myself using sloppy content as excuse not working on planned tasks with excuses like "this might be useful", or watching "productivity porn" videos. I think LLMs are good as a pre-filter for that.

WalterBright 3mo ago
I gave up on podcasts because of the excessive insertion of commercials, and the execrable user interface of the iphone podcast app.
- elAhmo 3mo ago
  There are other apps too, such as Overcast, and ads on podcasts are really easy to skip.
  - WalterBright 3mo ago
    Yeah, I can skip forward 30 sec, then back up, blech. It's just not worth it when you constantly have to interact with the podcast app. Scott Adams' podcasts were different. He inserted very few commericials, and they were short enough there was no reason to skip forward. I tried many other podcasts after he passed away, and they all were largely long, boring commercials. Yuck. I now listen to Pandora or Soma FM instead.
    - 3mo ago

jppope 3mo ago

Audiobooks are just a different medium. I don't think people should pretend that an audiobook is a book. You process the two in completely different ways. This doesn't imply one is better than the other either. For me I don't like audiobooks because its very slow and spoken stories should have a different cadence, velocity, set of dynamics, and diction than a book should (check out "the moth" to see what I'm talking about). I hold nothing against people who don't like to read or people who like audiobooks, or people who like slow things - Suum cuique.

nephihaha 3mo ago
Audiobooks are heavily dependent on the reader. In one case, I had an audiobook where the translator was the reader. She is an excellent translator but a poor reader. Many authors are poor readers of their own work. They are certainly good while you are on a long drive etc, because they entertain you while doing some another task which you wouldn't be able to do while reading. During lockdown, I could not read due to the constant stress and fear mongering, but I had to walk a lot every day and the audiobooks were a good way to accompany that.
- estetlinus 3mo ago
  +1 The best audiobook I’ve ever listened to is Stephen Kings On Writing: A memoir of the Craft, read by the author. One of our times best storytellers, both when it comes to writing them and telling them.
  - nephihaha 3mo ago
    I've a soft spot for that book because it saved me from two days of very long and dreary jury service. (They kept us sitting around all that time.) I think I read at least a third of it in there. The only court stuff I heard was for about ten minutes and incredibly unexciting.
- boznz 3mo ago
  When I write a character, I picture not just the character but the voice, same with reading, and going from a paper or eBook to an audio book usually breaks both. Books I write rarely include characters from Manchester (UK), so reading voices with my strong accent would definitely break a lot of my books. It is also the reason I sometimes don't enjoy movies if I have read the book. It is not a one way street though, some really good narrators can improve the experience a lot, same with good directors.

j45 3mo ago

Agreed, there's no one medium fits all in all stages of their life and a lot of the takes rooted in such a perspective can lead people to seek convenience (scrolling) instead of engaging. Reading does force you to slow down to let more enter your brain. Audiobooks can do the same in a different way. Either way, longer form content helps the brain unpack and retain bigger/longer picture things which is the kind of focus that many want to improve. Reading also helps one be more articulate. Articulation is a helpful skill in using AI.

mcv 3mo ago

After a long reading hiatus, audiobooks helped me pick up speed. I read faster with audiobook than without. For a few books, I combined regular and audiobook, so the audiobook forces me to keep reading, and hearing what I'm reading gives me something to hold on to, and helps a bit to prevent my thoughts from distracting me. But I don't have an audiobook for all the books I want to read.

kelvinjps10 3mo ago

For me audiobooks are okay for non fiction but for fiction I need to read it to be able to immerse in the story and imagine the characters. Also no all non fiction it's okay either, for philosophy that's a little complicated I need to read it too.

deleted 3mo ago
[deleted]
dredmorbius 3mo ago
Fiction read by a skilled actor (voice or performance) can be a real insight. My reading voice is quite distinct from what such an actor can bring to a work. Not all narrators are actors, and depending on the narration you may or may not gain from this. For a good set of examples, I'd recommend Selected Shorts (Symphony Space), which is a set of podcasts and broadcasts voiced by stage and screen actors. They're usually at least good, and often excellent. <https://symphonyspace.org/selected-shorts https://symphonyspace.org/selected-shorts> Recent episodes: <https://www.symphonyspace.org/selected-shorts/episodes https://www.symphonyspace.org/selected-shorts/episodes> Two personal all-time faves: - "The Appropriation of Cultures", by Percival Everett, read by Ruben Santiago Hudson. - "The Smoker", by David Schickler, read by Robert Sean Leonard: <https://inv.nadeko.net/watch?v=5XbSI5swx1E https://inv.nadeko.net/watch?v=5XbSI5swx1E>.

cubefox 3mo ago

> Avoid even audiobooks. Big corporations want to grab your attention by trying to market audiobooks as books for busy people, but don’t fall for the trap. A book is just boring black text on a white page because that’s how it’s meant to be consumed, and it requires your entire attention. Listening to audio while cooking or cleaning or whatever you do is not the same thing; you are not 100% concentrated on the content. Also, reading is faster than listening, so use your time wisely.

brandall10 3mo ago

Wow, listening to the Power Broker now, about 1/3 of the way through. Audiobooks completely changed things for me... in the past 2 years, 'read' about 40 books, almost entirely listened to on my daily runs. The prior 2 years? Only 3 or so.

hombre_fatal 3mo ago
Same. Though for me I just can’t and don’t want to sit for hours. I still read 15-30min to go to bed, but with an audiobook I can listen for hours to amazing content while doing everything else I want to do in life like exercise and cook. Now it’s at the point where I can’t wait to go for a run or do the dishes because it means I’ll get farther in a great book. Finally a real life hack.

orochimaaru 3mo ago

I used to do that when my children were little. However, in another 3 years your child will not require you as much anymore and your downtime duration will improve. My problem has been that once I started doing the audiobooks/podcasts, it has been really hard to reclaim my focus to read. I used to be able to power through books. Now, there always seems to be a distraction at hand.

technothrasher 3mo ago

I cannot ever manage audiobooks, because I tend to wander while I'm reading, thinking about what I just read, processing it, mulling it over, or exploring it in some other way. With a book, I just go back to where I stopped reading when ready and carry on. But with an audiobook, it keeps going while I'm thinking and not listening, and I miss it and have to rewind an unknown amount, over and over.

Balgair 3mo ago

I'll echo this too. I've liddles in the house and books are a no go right now. If they even let me the minutes to read, that would be great. But I know from repeated experience that books are too fragile for them to have around, let alone the stains and stickiness that young children affect on every surface. Audiobooks have been a god send and then the Libby app manna from upon high. Free, high quality, adult-level infotainment?! I'll never go back. One thing if do is up the reading speed. It takes time but I'm comfortable at 2.6x these days, even on the fragmented sleep a teething toddler grants you. For really in depth stuff I'll slow it down a lot, but a Stephen King dime store novel or John Grisham thriller? Oh yeah, speed it up no worries

crossroadsguy 3mo ago

Audiobooks are great if one likes the sound, tone, speed, etc, etc of the narrator. Not very easy to land at this combination.

beloch 3mo ago

"Avoid even audiobooks. Big corporations want to grab your attention by trying to market audiobooks as books for busy people, but don’t fall for the trap. A book is just boring black text on a white page because that’s how it’s meant to be consumed, and it requires your entire attention. Listening to audio while cooking or cleaning or whatever you do is not the same thing; you are not 100% concentrated on the content. " ---- I disagree with the author of this post. Audiobooks are fantastic in certain settings. e.g. Driving, or any form of transit if you're prone to motion sickness. Yes, listening is different from reading, but you're still getting information into your brain. There are definitely books that don't work as audiobooks (e.g. Anything with equations), but there are also books that are, perhaps, best consumed as audiobooks. Homer was passed down orally for generations before being written down. Anyone who poopoo's an audiobook of Homer deserves to be ridiculed.