Friday, December 28, 2012

Geological Podcasts - Listening to your Geology

Updated 4-24-14: I have an updated version located on its own page. You can access that using the banner to the left under "Pages" or by clicking HERE.

Lately I have working on getting some stuff set up and I have been looking and listening to all of the Geology Podcasts that I could find. These are the results of my searches my thoughts on them. The number of episodes are as of the posting of this post. If there are any podcasts that I missed, please let me know in the comments.

Updated: 1/9/2013 - I rearranged the podcasts and added some new ones that were listed by Andrew Alden on geology.about.com (Thanks Ron for the info). You can head on over there for more podcasts that I do not list.

------------------------------Currently Active Podcasts*--------------------------------

The PalaeoCast

Website: http://www.palaeocast.com/
Number of Episodes: 8
Format: Bimonthly

Thoughts: This is a young podcast that I have been listening to for a couple of months. The set up is that the hosts interview different scientists each episode about various paleontological topics, with one show limited to one interview with a little bit of commentary. There does not seem to be a set pattern to the topics but I could be wrong about that. Not bad so far.

This Week in Science

Website: http://www.twis.org/category/geology/
Number of Episodes: >360 (not quite sure)
Format: Weekly

This podcast is about science in general but has a heavy dose of geology related news. The show describes the latest news in science and then discusses them among it's hosts and what the possible implications could be. This is the type of podcast I feel should be made. It is entertaining by people who enjoy what they do. There are no monotonous voices droning on about this or that, AND it's informative.


The USGS CoreCast

Website: http://www.usgs.gov/corecast/
Number of Episodes: 182
Format: I'm not really sure. They seem to come out randomly.

The CoreCast is a podcast/videocast where the episodes are short (4-10 minutes) but deal with a specific topic at the time. iTunes seems rather funny about it because when I look for older episodes they don't appear under my subscription feed but I can get some of them through the Store.

KY GeoCast

Website: http://www.uky.edu/KGS/kygeocast/
Number of Episodes: 6
Format: Unknown

I would have listed this with the defunct podcasts but it seems to have 2 of the 6 episodes come out in 2012. So it will sit here for the time. This is a podcast describing the geology of various sites across Kentucky. The episodes are short (3-10 minutes) are are very informative. The only problem is the older podcasts seem a bit dull, although the 2012 ones seem to have upped their game a bit and present something more entertaining to listen to.

------------------------------Defunct (Archived) Podcasts--------------------------------

The podClast

Website: http://www.goodschist.com/category/podclast/
Number of Episodes: 17
Last episode: 2/27/2011

The podClast was a geological news podcast that discussed recent geological events discussing ramifications and how they could have happened. Only episodes 7, and 9-17 appear to be currently on iTunes.

Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution Podcast

Website: http://www.whoi.edu/services/graphics/WHOIPodcast.xml
Number of Episodes: ~34
Last episode: 5/13/2010

Although listed as a podcast this is primarily available as a video podcast. Some of the earlier episodes though were released in both video and audio format. This is a highly produced podcast (at least the later episodes were) that is informative and rather entertaining. It focuses on marine biology and geology and is interesting for anyone interested in a short (3-10 minute) little science snippet.

------------------------------Misleading Podcasts*--------------------------------

The Geologic Podcast

Website: http://www.geologicpodcast.com/
Number of Episodes: 292
Format: Weekly

Thoughts: Although it contains a title of "The Geologic Podcast" the latest episode I listened to (#292) had no geology in it and about 3-4 minutes of scientific content in general. It is more set up as a comedy show. As pointed out by Callan in the comments, the name comes from the shows host (George) who is into logic, hence Geo-Logic. I'm sure I am not the only one who has found this podcast by mistake.

*Currently active indicates a new podcast within the last calender year.

4 comments:

  1. The "geo-logic" podcast is named for its host, George Hrab, who's into logic. (He's a skeptic.) It's meant as a pun, unfortunately....

    ReplyDelete
  2. Thanks for the clear up. This will likely mislead many a geologist.

    ReplyDelete
  3. http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/p00547hl

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Thanks for the information! I will include it when I update this list again.

      Delete

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