This is the very first Apple product I’ve ever owned. People sometimes mistake me for a techy but I’m really not. I go through MP3 players pretty quickly as I listen to audiobooks every day and every night. On the bus to work. If I have to run an errand. On the train home. Cutting the grass. Going to sleep. The headphone budget is through the freaking roof.
My approach thus far was to thieve, frankly. I downloaded non-fiction audiobooks and lectures from some online library or other that I was supposed to delete by a certain date and maybe I got around to it. I burned library CDs-- it’s not like I was going to travel back in time to buy a Discman. If I was really hard up I’d sneak into night classes with a mini recorder.
Anyway, I installed iTunes, and geez, what a lot to steal, I mean, learn. I have seven LIVE from the NYPL things queued up, hopefully they won’t suck. A lot of audiobooks do, you know. Ockerish (“down home” for yanks) accents in a narrative about Tobruk, say, or a vast slum of self-help tomes, mp3-ready and cut into tiny pieces for the busy middle-management lifer. Or, god help me if I see another one I might explode into bits of disinterest, yet another History of Ye Olde British Empire.
So, now that I’ve mildly annoyed about 9/10 of the people who opened this thread, read this far, and could possibly help, how can you, Mr or Ms 1 of 10, help me identify the choice freebies available that I might be interested in-- come to think of it, I’d rather not hear any more about Greece at the mo-- and separate it from the drool?
Well, I’m not sure how much help I can be with identifying the freebies you’d like, but here’s how to search for free Audible downloads. You’ll need an app for the both the iPod and computer ends but it’s worth the trouble, especially if you want to expand beyond thieving at some point.
LibriVox hosts recordings of a public-domain books read by volunteers. Quality, as you might expect, varies widely.
There is, of course, the Moby Dick Big Read. The fractured nature of the downloading/performance may turn you off a bit but it’s so, so worth it. The last two chapters were read by David Attenborough and Tilda Swinton. If that doesn’t persuade you, I don’t know what will.
If books aren’t entirely your concern so much as interesting knowledge, the BBC’s In Our Time program is frakking amazing. Most episodes are about 45 minutes long and they have academics in to talk about their pet subjects - it’ll be Ada Lovelace one week and Zoroastrianism the next. I spent weeks torrenting their entire archive a couple of years ago and then last year they decided to make the whole thing available on the interwebs.:smack:
(Did you actually want specific recommendations or just how/where to find things?)
Also, if someone could tell me why I’m not allowed to listen to the files I just copied onto my new iPod Nano yet it still can tell me the correct time, thank you in advance.
iTunes specific recommendations in particular. I swore off Audible last year and have already enjoyed several classics read by random people on behalf of LibriVox. Interested in that big Moby read and the BBC thing you mentioned, though, thanks.
Sounds like some form of digital rights management. Were the files specifically downloaded to/for another device?
No, these were the NY Public Library files. I’m syncing them now. Seems needlessly annoying but hey, new stuff.
The BBC Podcast page has dozens and dozens of their radio shows available for free download.
Are you only interested in Audiobooks or are you interested in audio stories? If the latter, sign up for the This American Life podcast (narrative journalism on unusual subjects) and The Moth podcast (real stories told live without notes) – both are excellent for just plain interesting/amusing things to listen to. TAL is an hour, Moth is about 20 minutes, and they send you one free a week.
Everybody seems to hate Itunes (although i personally don’t mind it). One thing it is very good for however is finding and updating podcasts.
If you want to be entertained there are thousands of hours worth of free podcasts on every subject under the sun.
To get you started try “Decoder ring theatre” where you’ll find the Black Jack Justice and Tales of the Red Pands stories which i highly recommend.
Just search cafe society for podcast recommendation threads, you’ll find loads.
For example Post your favorite Podcasts! - Cafe Society - Straight Dope Message Board