Asklemmy

Nobody recommended 99% Invisible yet?

That one is a must-listen about everyday (and not so everyday) design. Absolutely amazing!

Cautionary tales: stories of how things went wrong

Darknet diaries: stories from the dark web

intelligence squared: thought provoking debates about anything and everything

The numberphile podcast: interviews with mathematicians by Brady Haran. If you like the kinds of videos Brady makes, you’ll probably like this too. You know, stuff like sixty symbols, numberphile, perioedic table of videos etc.

You are not so smart: podcast about psychology

your undivided attention: discussion and interviews about social media. What it’s like to work for a social media company. How social media influences your business, or how it affects your life. How different parts of it are intentional and some are unintentional.

Love recommending podcasts!

• Like others have said, Behind the Bastards is great to find out about some of the worst people in history.
• In relation to that Cool People Who Did Cool Stuff is the opposite of Behind the Bastards. It's about people who did cool stuff who became cool.
• Also in lieu of that, Bad Gays, it's about bad gays in history. I think they've covered similar folks on BtB, but this is obviously from a queer perspective.
• Fad Camp and Maintenance Phase are great podcasts about dieting and wellness. Fad Camp is more about how damaging some of these diets can be, whereas Maintenance Phase is similar to You're Wrong About (which I also recommend)
• The Weekly Planet are these two Australian guys who talk about movies, tv, comics and video games. They also have a YouTube channel called Me Sunday Movies where they'll upload some of their podcasts. Like they have a running segment called "Caravan of Garbage" which is just sort of talking about a movie, tv show or game. Currently they've started going through the RoboCop movies.
• Also shameless plug, but Checkpoint is on the radio but they take their radio show and put it on a podcast. It's a podcast about giving a 1up to diversity in video games. Most of us are from the LGBTQIA+ community and that's where most of our perspectives come from, but it's also just folks from any marginalised group. Lovely bunch of folks (if I do say so myself).

Uh yeah, I have some more, but like that's politics or it's writing related or spicyness in or out of the bedroom. But these are the ones I always recc.

I mainly listen to things based around or by improv comedy, so if that's not your jam, keep on scrolling -

My Brother, My Brother, and Me (three brothers give often terrible advice to questions sent by listeners)

Hey Riddle Riddle (a riddle podcast by improv comedians who really really hate riddies and puzzies)

Dungeons and Daddies (the best D&D podcast by players who don't really know how to play D&D and it's not even close)

The Worst Idea of All time (originally the concept was two kiwi comedians watch the same film every week for a year and document and review that experience every week. Each season is a new movie and a new year. The films are always awful and they encourage you not to watch them)

Smartless (Will Arnet, Jason Bateman, and Sean Hayes interviewing other celebrities and famous figures. Only one of them each week know who they will be interviewing before they do so the questions are all improvised on the spot)

Quick Question with Soren Bowie and Daniel O'brien (two ex Cracked writers from the golden age of Internet comedy, who now write for Family Guy and John Oliver respectfully, ask each other questions)

Well, There's Your Problem, a podcast with slides about engineering disasters which is, itself, a disaster.

Darknet Diaries - Interesting stories or interviews with people from the darkweb, pen-testers, hackers, etc. A couple of notable episodes: Interview with a creator of the PirateBay. FFFD - Freedom for flash drives.

This podacast will kill you - Interesting ways to die and just regular ones. Like what happens when you die from x, y, or z. Notable episode Sweat is a superpower.

Sticky Notes - About classical music.

Stuff you should know - interesting stories

Stuff they don’t want you to know - interesting stories

The end of the worldwith Josh Clark - limited episodes about existential threats to humanity.

The Dollop - a comedy podcast about how messed up American history is.

Last Podcast On The Left - comedy podcast about horror, true crime, aliens and the paranormal.

The Greatest Generation - Star Trek podcast

Behind the Bastards - Podcast about the worst people in history.

Get Played - video game podcast with a comedic bent.

Ologies by Allie Ward!!

She basically interviews scientists about their job and asks all the dumb questions you wish you could ask. She has a huge number of episodes on everything from black holes and dark matter to squirrels to Emojis. And it's all from the perspective of "the study of".

One of my favorite episodes is "Ferro-equinology". The study of iron horses. Trains. I knew trains were cool, but had no idea how cool they really were until that episode.

Her energy is addictive too. Great personality. If you are a part of her patron (which I am) you'll get a heads up before her interviews and she give an opportunity for you to post questions that she'll ask the Ologist.

• You Are Not So Smart: You’ll marvel at both how flawed our reasoning can be and how well we make up for it by being collaborative creatures
• Behind the Bastards: Everything you don’t know about the worst people in all of history, including people you didn’t even know of
• Twenty Thousand Hertz: Stories of pretty much anything as long as it works well in an audio medium. Best sound design in the game; like candy for your ears
• Cautionary Tales (Tim Harford): Stories of people making huge mistakes or taking insane risks. Fun because sometimes the mistake was trusting their intuition instead of a rigorous process, but just as often it was ignoring their intuition in favor of a rigorous process
• Build for Tomorrow, formerly Pessimists Archive: History of people freaking out about new stuff that is totally benign today but they thought would ruin civilization. Like mirrors, bicycles, teddy bears, pinball machines
• Team Human: Kind of the opposite. All about how “progress” has harmed indigenous people, minorities, women, etc. and talking to people about how to address our modern problems with “anti-human” technology and economics

Edit: I somehow forgot to add Knifepoint Horror, but I just read that someone else recommended it and I’m very disappointed in myself because it’s such a good horror podcast that I literally physically got chills when I read its name. So good. Fuck, I would even put it at the top of this list if it weren’t dependent on being in the mood for spoopy stories.

Lateral is one of my go to podcasts. Is full of lateral thinking questions, hosted by Tom Scott with a variety of guests. Is really good fun.

Risky or Not?

Each short episode discusses one amusingly named food or situation (e.g. “ Unopened Carton of Heavy Cream Almost 3 Weeks Past It's Expiration Date”). Hosted by two food safety experts with good banter.

Knowledge fight

Behind the bastards

Ear hustle

Great Lectures - History of ancient egypt

60 songs that explain the 90s.

Voice mail dump truck (embrace the chaos), a more civilized age

A lot of my faves have been mentioned (BtB, wtyppod, Bad Gays), so here's a few I haven't seen lited here.

Discussion Podcasts

It's Not Just In Your Head: Therapists talking about the intersection of mental health, capitalism, and treatments (problems with how we go about it and what we could change).

The War on Cars: What it sounds like, urbanists talking about biking, transit, issues with car oriented development.

Tech Won't Save Us: Interviews with people, having critical conversations of different technologies. Discusses issues of tech, capitalism, surveillance, and more.

Total Liberation: Leftist podcast discussing a variety of topics about the decay of capitalism and how we can recreate and liberate ourselves.

Audio Dramas/Story Podcasts

The Punumbra Podcast: I listen to the Juno Steel series, it's about a private detective on Mars. Great story and characters, a bit more humorous but will also destroy you emotionally in the best way. Also very queer!

The Bright Sessions: People with super powers go to therapy. I really loved the world they created and how they relate the super powers and mental health.

Scare You to Sleep: Scary stories read in a calm voice. The stories are really good, I actually like the hosts original stories that she sometimes reads quite a lot.

Matt and Shane's secret podcast. They're funny if you have 15 year old boy humor like me.

Knifepoint Horror. No other horror podcast has ever come close to being as good for me

The film re roll. "We play through your favourite movies as roll playing games and totally ruin them".

Just an excellent podcast. Can't recommend it enough.

We Might Be Drunk is the podcast I listen to with the most consistency, and definitely worth a listen. Two of my favorite comedians (Mark Norman & Sam Morrill) who are hilarious while also getting into aspects of day to day life.

For Dutch folks: onbehaarde apen (nrc)

Mission To Zyxx

Uhh Yeah Dude - comedy. One of the oldest podcasts going since 2006!

Mike Duncan's History of Rome and Revolutions podcast series.

The Plastic Pleasiosaur Podcast is a really fun sceptic/science podcast run by an old man and a femboy archeologist.

Saw Bones is a highly entertaining and informative medical history podcast run by a cool, bisexual doctor and her adult-baby husband.

Bizarre Podcast: Dogs Must Die is an once in a lifetime find: a tiny man describes every episode of JoJo's Bizarre Adventure to his very smart friend.

The Soundtrack Show by David W. Collins! He talks about film scores, how they were made, and many other details. No music knowledge is required. Scroll through the episodes and pick any movie that looks interesting, but EVERY episode is so good!

Spout Lore!

You don't even have to know the mechanics of Dungeon World to enjoy the crazy, funny episodes of this long running podcast!

Spout Lore website

Overall my favorite is ABetterWay2A. It's a podcast about gun culture, with an aim (ha!) towards making it more inclusive for people that are not right wing, christian, etc. Most guests are left-leaning, the remainder are fairly far left. In the same vein, the Guns Guide to Liberals is a good podcast about gun owners trying to bridge the gap with traditional liberals ("liberals" in the US sense) that don't believe in an individual 2A right. It ended after two seasons, because the owners got too busy with their business to continue. The Tiger Bloc is an irregular podcast by Yellow Peril Tactical; yes, they know what Yellow Peril means, because they're all Asian. They're also definitely leftists. Practical Shooting After Dark is about getting better at shooting; it's largely a podcast about how to practice. It's mostly a-political from what I've heard so far. It's put on by Ben Stoeger who was a USPSA Grand Master

Mormon Stories. It's about deconstructing religion in general, and leaving the Mormon cult specifically. It's one of the longest-running podcasts; it's currently sitting at 1800 episodes, with most being in the 2.5-3 hour range.

FiveThirtyEight Politics. It's non-partisan politics; news, analysis, and polling.

Dan Carlin's Hardcore History. Deep dives on subjects. Supposedly he's not always accurate, but I also haven't heard specific criticisms. The podcast is wildly irregular - 6-11 month gaps between episodes - since episodes are pretty heavily researched, and typically run 5+ hours each.

Behind the Bastards. Do you want to be depressed about how the world is, and always will be shitty, and yet entertained at the same time? This is your podcast. I will say that the episode on Dr. Mengele was considerably less awful than I expected it to be; apparently some of the worst stories about Mengele were fabrications.

The Friendly Atheist. News and commentary about church-state separation. You'll either love Jess--the co-host--or hate her, there is no in-between. Hemant Mehta generally has pretty good critiques, and is usually very reasonable and measured in his approach. The ads are getting really jarring though.

For comedy:

Distractible - very funny guys. Start with the episode Bob’s Fridge

Hamish and Andy - higher profuction value and hilarious. Very much like a radio show because they used to be radio hosts and are also comedians

Another vote for The Weekly Planet here! Great Aussie banter if you like your comic book movies and tv shows or just current movie reviews.

Judge John Hodgman. It's about people with silly disputes, and John and his bailiff Jesse Thorn way in on them. What's great is even though the disputes are silly, they both come at the cases with such thoughtfulness and empathy, listening to the show will make you a better and kinder person. Also sometimes Jean Grae guests bailiff's and she is amazing too.

2.5admins, for tech stuff

Self-Hosted, for self hosted and tech stuff

Smashing security, for security and tech stuff (this one can be very funny too)

Security Now, for more security related tech stuff.

Paleocast. They interview guests to discuss all kinds of life that existed throughout the Earth's history. There's a lot of coverage of dinosaurs in pop culture but there's a huge diversity out there to explore.

Both my recommendations are over now, but I love the niche of conversational history podcasts, or, as someone once put it, people talking about history like other podcasts talk about bad movies:

The Lesser Bonapartes

Dead Ideas

Grey 17, a podcast about watching Babylon 5. Repeat viewers along with newbies.

Wolf and Owl - Two comedian friends show up completely unprepared and talk about anything, funny and wholesome.

Since it hasn't been mentioned, Dudesy.

It's Will Sasso and Chad Kultgen shittin around while an AI named Dudesy (trained by all their personal information, search histories, emails, social media accounts, etc.) produces the show.

Astonishing Legends - Two guys discussing all the weird stories of history - but not just discussing, they have a team of volunteer researchers and they discuss the justified in depth to see what progress or conclusions can be made. Very unique approach.

Smith and Sniff.

Podcasts I listen to every episode of is a small list nowadays: Five thirty eight and waveform. The first is for political and statistic wonkiness, the second is for consumer tech. They both have good banter between the presenters

The Jordan Harbinger Show

Lots of interviews with a varied list of guests.