Category: Podcast

Back in the 2000s, when blogging was a thing, I was at a party and someone mentioned offhand that I had a blog. Someone else blurted out, “Oh, me too!” We left it at that. But a friend asked me why I didn’t let on that my blog got hundreds of thousands of visitors per month, or that millions of people had read me over the years. The point is that there were people who had blogs, and other people who had blogs.

I was reminded of that by this piece in Have We Hit Peak Podcast?. I first heard about podcasting in the middle of the 2000s. I started listening to podcasts around 2008 or so, on my old iPod shuffle. It wasn’t until 2016 that I actually started contributing to my own podcast (on genetics and evolution).

About ten months later we started the Browncast. I’ve now done 67 podcasts for The Insight. I’ve been on the majority of the 50+ podcasts for the Browncast.

So let me quote from The New York Times piece:

But six episodes in, when neither Casper mattresses nor MeUndies had come knocking, the friends quit. Today, Ms. Mandriota says the same D.I.Y. spirit that made having a podcast “alluring” is precisely what doomed the project. “You can talk about the trees outside as much as you want, but if you’re not going to serve listeners and do it in a way that’s engaging, your chances of going viral are low,” she said, calling her show “the most makeshift podcast, with mediocre advice.”

An advice podcast from randoms? On the Browncast you can listen to Shadi Hamid, one of the world’s “top 50 thinkers”, or a conversation with an Indian American getting an arranged marriage. You can listen to discussions about the internecine conflicts in American conservative politics, or a first-person recollection of partition.

The reason there are 50+ episodes of the Browncast is that we have something to say. It’s “peak podcast” for those who don’t have something to say.

Another BP Podcast is up. You can listen on Libsyn, iTunes, Spotify,  and Stitcher. Probably the easiest way to keep up the podcast since we don’t have a regular schedule is to subscribe at one of the links above.

You can also support the podcast as a patron. The primary benefit now is that you get the podcasts considerably earlier than everyone else. I am toying with the idea of doing a patron Youtube Livestream chat, if people are interested, in the next few weeks.

Would appreciate more positive reviews!

On this episode, I talk to my old friend Aziz Poonawalla. Aziz and I have been in the “blogosphere” for 17 years, and we talk about its rise and fall, and our thoughts about the Twitter world. Aziz and I also differ on a lot of issues. He is a liberal observant Muslim (Bohra Ismaili), and I am a conservative atheist. So we end up the conversation talking about politics, and Aziz’s roots in the Dean campaign of 2003.

Another BP Podcast is up. You can listen on Libsyn, iTunes, Spotify,  and Stitcher. Probably the easiest way to keep up the podcast since we don’t have a regular schedule is to subscribe at one of the links above.

You can also support the podcast as a patron. The primary benefit now is that you get the podcasts considerably earlier than everyone else. I am toying with the idea of doing a patron Youtube Livestream chat, if people are interested, in the next few weeks.

Would appreciate more positive reviews!

On this episode, we talk with Iona Italia about he experiences a returning Parsi (she was raised in Europe) to the Indian subcontinent. She is the host of Two for Tea podcast, an editor of Areo Magazine, and a contributor to Letter Wiki.

Another BP Podcast is up. You can listen on Libsyn, iTunes, Spotify,  and Stitcher. Probably the easiest way to keep up the podcast since we don’t have a regular schedule is to subscribe at one of the links above.

You can also support the podcast as a patron. The primary benefit now is that you get the podcasts considerably earlier than everyone else. I am toying with the idea of doing a patron Youtube Livestream chat, if people are interested, in the next few weeks.

Would appreciate more positive reviews!

On this episode, we talk about cosmopolitan conservatism with Sahil Handa, a writer at National Review. Sahil is a student at Harvard. As such, I had assumed he was American before he got on the call…but it turns out he is from the suburbs north of London! His father is a Punjabi from Kenya, while his mother is a Sindhi from Gujarat.

Another BP Podcast is up. You can listen on Libsyn, iTunes, Spotify,  and Stitcher. Probably the easiest way to keep up the podcast since we don’t have a regular schedule is to subscribe at one of the links above.

You can also support the podcast as a patron. The primary benefit now is that you get the podcasts considerably earlier than everyone else. I am toying with the idea of doing a patron Youtube Livestream chat, if people are interested, in the next few weeks.

Would appreciate more positive reviews!

Today I talk to my friend “Nan”, who is a Sri Lanka Tamil American. We talked a bit about his own background, growing up in a lower SES household in the American South, but mostly about why and how Sri Lankans think they are distinctive from “mainlanders.”

This is just the beginning of trying to understand this issue in my opinion. Ergo, “scratching the surface.”

Another BP Podcast is up. You can listen on Libsyn, iTunes, Spotify,  and Stitcher. Probably the easiest way to keep up the podcast since we don’t have a regular schedule is to subscribe at one of the links above.

You can also support the podcast as a patron (the primary benefit now is that you get the podcasts considerably earlier than everyone else…). Would appreciate more positive reviews.

This week Razib talks the end of Game of Thrones with geneticist and anthropologist Jennifer Raff and historian and podcaster Patrick Wyman.

Another BP Podcast is up. You can listen on Libsyn, Apple, Spotify, and Stitcher. Probably the easiest way to keep up the podcast since we don’t have a regular schedule is to subscribe at one of the links above.

You can also support the podcast as a patron (the primary benefit now is that you get the podcasts considerably earlier than everyone else…this podcast was posted a week ago).

If there is one person who combines keen attention to scientific methodology and toxic masculinity, it’s Jordan Anaya, a “data thug.”

A brutal realist who helped destroy the career of Brian Wansink, Anaya revels in is status as a one-man Occam’s Razor.

Another BP Podcast is up. You can listen on Libsyn, Apple, Spotify, and Stitcher. Probably the easiest way to keep up the podcast since we don’t have a regular schedule is to subscribe at one of the links above.

You can also support the podcast as a patron (the primary benefit now is that you get the podcasts considerably earlier than everyone else…this podcast was posted a week ago).

I chat the end of Game of Thrones with Adam Calhoun, a neuroscientist, and erstwhile provider of early leaked episodes to yours’ truly.

This is the first of two episodes on this topic. A follow-up with a geneticist and a historian to come.