Lincoln’s Letters: The Private Man and the Warrior (Audiobook)

Lincoln’s Letters: The Private Man and the WarriorThis collection of Lincoln’s letters gives us a glimpse into the inner self of a great American president. After a brief autobiography, the letters appear chronologically, beginning with his courtship and early political life and continuing into the presidency. In these letters, Lincoln reveals his private side. His letter to Mrs. Orville Browning is a parody of his rejected proposal. In the letter to John T. Stuart, he reveals his depression at breaking his engagement with Mary Todd, with whom he is later reconciled and eventually marries. In letters to his friend, Joshua Speed, he laments the loss of resolve, the “chief gem” of his character. The letters to generals and statesmen give us insight into Lincoln as a commander and deepen our understanding of the Civil War. Beautifully performed by George Vail, this program provides a unique insight into the man, the times, and the making of this country.

Link to iTunes

Link to Audible.com

In Cambridge loft, Web junkies meet for coffee and the next big thing

CAMBRIDGE — With an Xbox that projects onto the wall, beer in the fridge, and a caffeinated techno soundtrack playing in the background as burgers sizzle on the grill outside, a dozen entrepreneurs are hard at work building Boston’s next Web start-ups in a Central Square loft dubbed Betahouse.

http://www.boston.com/business/technology/articles/2007/08/11/in_cambridge_loft_web_junkies_meet_for_coffee_and_the_next_big_thing/?page=full

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The Traneumentary

This is a fixed-episode-count podcast (they just put out the final episode) about John Coltrane and his music and his impact on jazz.

Most episodes are pretty short (~10 mins) and involve either interviews/commentary with experts on John Coltrane (or the quartet) or with people who played with him, such as McCoy Tyner, Jimmy Cobb, Charles Tolliver, Steve Kuhn.
A few episodes dive pretty deeply into the kinds of music things that Coltrane did that were so revolutionary. I found every episode to be extremely fascinating (and educational!).

Links: iTunes and the website at BlogSpot.

This Week in Tech (TWiT)

twit_podcast_1.jpgDavid Kaffine told me about the TWiT podcast a while back and it has become a lasting staple of mine.

It is one of the few “long” (~1 hour, give or take) podcasts I listen to, but it is very interesting.There is a regular crew of heavy-duty podcasters (Leo Laporte and John C. Dvorak and a handful of others) who have really been around a lot of technology, especially web stuff. Most of them are heavy bloggers and several have been involved in podcasts or Internet “TV/radio” broadcasting for a long time.

Sometimes they get carried away with some sort-of inside jokes, but there are always a few hot, new, interesting things to learn about. (Plus they are mostly big Mac fans. 🙂

Some recent things I’ve learned of from TWiT: Drupal, Twitter, Morgan Webb’s new WebbAlertMahalo.com, Revision3’s Tekzilla, and lots more.

iTunes Link for the podcast and the website is at twit.tv.