Feed Your Brain: The Easy Way

Sounds great but how do you underline and take notes now? That would be the hard part for me. I read about 2 books a week, but I am what they call an aggressive reader and all of my books are marked up.

Great idea though.

I discovered audiobooks ten years ago, back when they were all on tape. My husband had a 2 hour a day commute in sloowww traffic, and ‘gripe radio’ made him grumpy. So I kept him supplied from the library, first with all the classics he’d never had a chance to read, then on to whatever the nearest three libraries had. It improved his quality of life more than I can say. Sometimes I would read what he was listening to, then we would discuss. Or a really good one would give him something to talk to me about as soon as he came in the door.
I use them to exercise with, and also while working on tedious projects like illustrations and CAD detail. And we have now graduated to mp3 format.

Dave,

I’ve downloaded Einstein, too. I can’t wait to read it. I’m just finishing up Wikinomics, so I’ll start soon. It looks great.

Thanks,

Mike

Leslie,

In a word, “yes.” For example, I sync everything from my ITunes library to my video iPod. But nothing automatically syncs to my iPod Shuffle. You can set it to automatically fill and randomly fille the Shuffle from your main library or—and this is what I do—I manually drag what I want from the library to the Shuffle.

Thanks,

Mike

Sorry, Mike, nothing replaces the feel of a book in my hands. The smell of them, the touch. And every time I try to listen to a book, the person reading doesn’t sound like the characters in my head. I have the same trouble with movies. If I read a book first, the movie never lives up to it.

I read probably 2-4 books a week. All fiction though. This might work for non fiction (and obviously does for you) but I’ll never give up my books for something digital. Ebooks would go broke on me. LOL

First I want to give you a quote Mike.
“The mind is not a vessel to be filled but a fire to be kindled.” Plutarch

Now, I want to says thanks about the audible idea. My college son wants to read more, but can’t find the time. He just got a new ipod. Ding!

Willie,

All of the audiobooks on iTunes come from Audible.com. However, iTunes doesn’t include everything that Audible carries. (At least, that was true last I heard.) In addition, Audible offers some promotional programs that iTunes doesn’t. Regardless, it is seamless. If you download a book from Audible.com, it immediately goes into iTunes.

And, yes, in the end, I think audiobooks will sell more print books.

Thanks,

Mike

This is very interesting note.
I joined audible Germany about an year ago and I still have fun listening to the books. It is a very time efficient method to “read” books you probably never read because of the lack of time or because you need the time to read job related literature.
I spend each day about an hour driving to/from work and with my iPod nano, an FM transmitter I can listen to my own radio station – preferred audiobooks.
The iPod is a really cool device, unfortunately it is not possible to set custom bookmarks, like marking an interesting passage, so you can go back to it later. But If you use a Windows-PDA and install the audible player, you can set your custom bookmarks an label them.

Here a recommendation to listen:

The world is flat – Thomas L. Friedman
The Lexus and the olive tree – Thomas L. Friedman
There Must Be a Pony in Here Somewhere – Kara Swisher and Lisa Dickey
The Coffee Trader – David Liss
E=mc2 – David Bodanis
Tuesdays with Morrie (Unabridged)- Mitch Albom
How to Win Friends & Influence People – Dale Carnegie
A Short History of Nearly Everything – Bill Bryson
Steve Jobs – Jeffrey Young
The Google Story – David A. Vise, Mark Malseed

Paulo

Pete,

I listen to podcasts of sermons primarily because I can access them so easily; however, Maximum Impact just released their new podcast so you might want to check that out as well.

Dave

For those not as fixated on professional quality or new titles, http://www.librivox.org aims to offer all books in the public domain (classics) in unabridged audio formats. It’s a volunteer organization and the sound quality and readings vary from recording to recording, but they are always improving.

And if you’re not subscribed to the Mars Hill Audio Journal (www.MarsHillAudio.org), you should be. They now offer the Journal and other audio products as MP3 downloads for slightly less than the CD and tape editions.

My 2GB iPod Nano is filled with Mars Hill Audio products at the moment. Time spent with Ken Meyers and guests is time very well spent indeed.

As a long time user of Audible.com, there are a couple of inside secrets you might find useful. Firstly, to be able to “read” more books at a faster rate, but very much understandable. And as well, to quicken-up a slow sermon, book, etc. My minister friend uses this tactic to breeze through all the audio files a modern day minister needs to hear. Also, to enable one to slow down a book. Remember, all this works on any audio file:

Slow down, speed up audio on an iPod:

You can play Audible programming at speeds of around 25 percent faster or slower than normal without significantly changing the pitch of the audio. To set the playing speed, press the Select button three times to view the Playback Speed screen. To make the audio play faster, move your finger clockwise around the click wheel. To make the audio play slower, simply move your finger counter-clockwise around the click wheel.

Alternatively, you can select Settings > Audiobooks from the Main Menu screen. Accelerated playback is also available on the iPod mini with firmware update version 1.2 (released Nov. 15, 2004) or greater.

This feature could allow you to listen to an eight-hour audiobook in six hours; or to listen to The New York Times in just 35 minutes. Slowing down the audio can be helpful for programs with narrators who talk fast or for those who speak English as a second language.

Cheers, Steve

http://www.healthyexpat.com
http://www.eslspider.com

I use Audio Hi-Jack Pro to record any audio coming into my Apple computer. Having an addiction to a few radio programs, the odd sports game and even a few movies as well. I have successfully recorded them all and enjoyed the recording in my car, on a plane and while exercising at the gym. Audio Hi-Jack has a built in timer feature which automatically records the show of your selection. Much like a recorder for TV, like a VCR for example.

The reason I posted all three of these tips in three separate postings is that they are three differing topics.

Cheers, Steve

I don’t know what I would do without my shuffle! Gonna have to check out audible. What podcasts, if any, do you listen to?