Listening Chronicles #23

Documenting thoughts on the podcasts that I listen to and those I would recommend.

Hi,

It seems like this is becoming a recurring habit (a bad one), where I promise I’ll write consistently and then I disappear. I had set my theme for the year to be one of creation. I haven’t really been ‘creating’.

I’m going back to what I’m the most familiar with - which is the Listening Chronicles.

You may remember, this is the series where I recommend podcast episodes I’ve been listening to and share some thoughts around them.

I do have a bunch of things lined up for the coming weeks. To start with, after this edition - you’ll be receiving a couple of book/manga reviews. Things which I’ve read and re-read recently. Stay tuned for those.

But let’s get started with today’s long list of podcast episodes.

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Podcasts I Listened To

More Perfect | The Supreme Court v. Peynote

I was extremely excited when Radiolab announced that More Perfect will be back this year. Have been looking forward to it for over 4 years (when they stopped production).

Whenever someone asks me about podcast recommendations, I inevitable suggest More Perfect. I was in law school when I started listening to this series. I’ve written about it in a lot more detail here, which will get you started on the series. The crux is this, More Perfect is a series about the human stories at the centre of some of the most important US Supreme Court decisions. It’s beautifully crafted and you care about each person involved.

The first episode is really niche. It’s about the Native American’s freedom of practicing their religion, and what the Supreme Court thought about it. Sitting in India, I think this episode is a parallel worth thinking about (and listening to) - where does the court draw the line when it comes to interfering with our freedom to exercise religion.

On Being| Ada Limon - To Be Made Whole

Over the last few months I’ve come across a bunch of Ada Limon poetry. It’s wonderful. She writes with such patience and attention. I deeply resonate with some of her poems.

This conversation with Krista Tippett also allows you the great opportunity to listen to her talk through how some of the poetry was written, but more importantly what it means to be human during these unprecedented times.

The entire conversation is lovely and refreshing. I urge you to listen to it. Especially if you feel like pushing away from the noise. Below is one of my favourite bits from the episode:

"Yeah. It’s [Poetry's] got breath, it’s got all those spaces. The caesura and the line breaks, it’s breath. And then that’s also the space for us to sort of walk in as a reader being like, “What’s happening here? Why are all these blank spaces?” It has silence built all around it. Silence, which we don’t get enough of. When you open the page, there’s already silence. And we think, “Well, what are we supposed to do with that silence?” And we read naturally for meaning. I mean, that’s how we read. We read for sense. And poetry doesn’t really allow you to do that because it’s working in the smallest units of sound and syllable and clause and line break and then the sentence. So you get to have this experience with language that feels somewhat disjointed, and in that way almost feels like, “Oh, this makes more sense as the language for our human experience than, let’s say, a news report.”

Radiolab | Library of Alexandra

I wouldn’t have survived law school if not for Sci-Hub. I have a lot of gratitude towards Sci-Hub for allowing me to learn more, read about and explore my curiosity into different and random avenues for research.

As someone who’s studied copyright law, the way in which is Sci-Hub makes millions of academic articles available for free around the world is beautiful to witness and I’m all for it.

This Radiolab episode traces the journey of the founder of Sci-Hub and its implications on the world. It’s brilliant and features conversations with the founder herself !

ELI: ... the more requests there were pouring in. Until eventually she kind of gets to thinking, "Hey, why—why do I need to sit here and do this manually? I could probably write some code that automates all of this." So just to get technical for a minute here ...

ALEXANDRA ELBAKYAN: It was more clever to have sub-program that you can ...

ELI: ... she really just paired two ideas. One was something called a proxy server which just makes it look like her computer is at the university or something. And then number two is she set up this rotating list of logins that had access to all the library databases she needed. These logins are the subject of much controversy: where does she get them? How does she maintain them? How do they not get shut down? She told me she just buys them on this website.

ELI: Are they expensive?

ALEXANDRA ELBAKYAN: It depends on the university. Some—some cost for example, like $7 or $12 US.

ELI: Anyway, she wrote some code that would take a link for the paper, make it look like a student at the university was requesting it, and then send it off to the user who'd asked for it.

ELI: And did it work?

ALEXANDRA ELBAKYAN: To my surprise, yes, it did work.

ELI: Boom! Sci-Hub is born.

I urge you to listen to this.

Side Note: You should also check out this documentary about Aaron Schwartz. It is sad, but I think everyone should know his story.

Cost to Company | Gen Z on what Gen Z wants

Cost to Company is a podcast about everything related to the workplace and careers. While I haven’t heard a lot of their episodes, the ones I have were really enjoyable. They are well produced and tightly knit together, so you won’t get bored easily.

Since I graduated in 2021, I have been moving around career paths, trying to figure out what I want from my career - which is so difficult. This episode hosted by Shreevar, does a great job of exploring that peculiar anxiety, I think everyone of my age group is going through. The guests are thoughtful, and you’ll leave with a bunch of questions to think about at the end of this episode.

Listen if you’re struggling with your career, you’ll find out that you’re not alone.

The Editing Podcast | How Pixar Changed Storytelling Forever

I don’t edit or make videos but I consume a lot of them. A lot. The Editing Podcast, hosted by Hayden Hillier-Smith and Jordan Orme, quite literally breakdowns specific cuts/edits made in a movie, tv show or YouTube videos. I think it is fascinating to see how choices of music, pacing, clips and so many other decisions are made by an editor.

These are some brilliant videos on their channel, but I think this one about Pixar and their editors blew my mind. I have loved Pixar movies for more than a decade, and it is only in recent past that I’ve come to realise just how much thought and care goes into every single frame that you see. This episode is illustrates that beautifully.

If you like even one Pixar movie, then definitely check it out.

Colin and Samir | How Andrew Schulz took over YouTube

Andrew Schulz is sort of everywhere on YouTube shorts or Instagram reels. Well, at least in my case since I follow a bunch of comedians. He’s hilarious. An interesting part about his journey is that he was one of the first comedians to adopt YouTube as a way to distribute his comedy. He uploaded sets online, and eventually built an audience which would sell 1000+ seater venues consistently on his tours.

That journey is amazing.

Colin and Samir sit down with him and understand the stories behind specific decisions he took - like starting the Flagrant Podcast, or releasing his special entirely on YouTube - and how he thinks about comedy these days.

It’s a fun conversation, entertaining and there’s a lot to learn.

Dear Hank and John | The Roman Mars episode with John Green

You may know, that I’m a big fan of the vlogbrothers. Occasionally, I listen to their podcast Dear Hank & John, where they answer fan-questions and give dubious advice. It’s entertaining, light and wholesome.

This time, one of my other favourite podcast hosts - Roman Mars joined John Green for an edition of Dear John and Roman. What ensued was one of the most entertaining one hour I’ve spent listening to this show. There are some casual philosophical quotes dropped like this:

What he said was, “You know, it really is true that the unexamined life isn’t worth living. But the overexamined life isn’t much better.” It’s so true. Why do I over examine life? Why does that horse over examine life? It’s going to be fine. Your girlfriend’s coming back, man. Why do I over examine life? The overexamined life also isn’t that great. Where’s all the attention for the overexamined life?

This sequence below is how I think about my life too. I love when people are excited about things. I absolutely enjoy listening to people nerd out about their random and favourite things. I want to remain curious in life. I don’t want to get jaded and be open to listening to people talk about their passions. Roman and John Green are great examples of this.

Roman Mars: I love people who love things so much that I could watch someone expressing their love for a thing all day long. I love it. 

John Green: Yeah. Yeah. And it doesn’t really matter that much what it is. I mean, as long as it’s not, like, something horrible. For me, there’s not a huge differentiation between people who are extremely passionate about yarn and people who are extremely passionate about fourth-tier English football. It’s just the passion. It’s the love. It’s the fascination. It’s the “Oh, I forgot to tell you something else that’s really, really important about the world’s largest ball of twine.”

Roman Mars: Yeah. 

John Green: That feeling–it’s magical. 

Roman Mars: It really is. It really is. I mean, that’s my favorite part of my job–talking to those folks who really light up when they talk about, you know, the simplest things that excite them. It’s just so, so, so, so good. Yeah, I can totally enjoy a cheese class even though I am not a stinky cheese guy at all. 

Longform | Clint Smith

I have read a bunch of Clint Smith poems and read some of his articles and essays. Hope to read his books someday. This Longform conversation is fascinating. Clint Smith shares how he got into poetry, what kind of stories he wants to share and his journey of writing a book.

“I've been to a lot of places that carry a history of death and slaughter and murder. I've been on plantations. I've been in execution chambers. I've sat on electric chairs. I've been on death row. But I have never experienced anything like what I experienced walking through the gas chamber in Dachau. I mean, there's reading books about the Holocaust, and then there's that. And that is something that I hope to continue doing for the rest of my life: putting my body where these things happen. Because it completely transforms your understanding of what it was like.”

Acquired | Nintendo’s Origins

Nintendo is the source of some of my favourite childhood memories. Acquired has usual, does a brilliant job of telling the story of Nintendo and how it became the gaming juggernaut it is today. I loved every bit of this episode (there’s a part II as well). One of my favourite parts was an interesting nugget on how Mario actually got his name.

Ben: By the way, I should say, I was shocked that Donkey Kong predated Mario. His name is not on the cover art in the very first game he appears in. Of course, he doesn't have a name.

David: The legend goes that as they're debating this, the landlord of their warehouse in Tukwila, either shows up or sends a letter. It's unclear.

Ben: Shows up because they were way behind on rent, because this freaking company didn't make any money.

David: Demands the rent because they're late.

Ben: The way I know he shows up is because he starts jumping around, ranting, raving, and waving his arms in the air. He's super animated, they can see him there, and he's got this big bushy mustache.

David: He's this Italian guy named Mario Segale. This is how Super Mario gets his name.

Ben: Amazing.

David: Totally amazing. They named the girlfriend Pauline. I think she was either the wife or girlfriend of one of the guys working at the company at Nintendo of America at the time.

Ben: They named her Pauline because the warehouse manager who was taking a lot of the heat from Mario Segale, directing it away from the Nintendo guys, and taking the hits for them, his wife was named Polly, so they named the character Pauline after her as a thank you to him.

Reader’s Cast

This is the section where I share some suggestions from friends (feel free to let me know any podcasts you want to recommend). Today though, Sandesh is the one giving recommendations.

The Seen and the Unseen | Murali Neelakantan Looks at the World

This is a really long episode (I’m going to get started soon), and for Sandesh it gets intense with each passing hour. He recommends listening to this on 1.5x speed though.

This one is all about e-commerce in India. I think if anyone is interested even remotely in the space, you have a stalwart like Kishore Biyani and some other important founders in this ecosystem breaking down what this industry looks like and where it is heading. It’s a freewheeling conversation and definitely worth a try.

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That was it for this edition.

Let me know what you thought about these episodes if you end up listening to them.

See you next week.

Take care !

Happy Listening,

Nirmal Bhansali