This weekend I came across a website that offered links to university podcast, and always interested in knowing more, I started browsing. One of the most intresting things I found was a complete course at Berkely !

This podcastscalled Foundations of American Cyberculture given by Greg Niemeyer and Joe McKay to the firsts years students at Berkley goes in 30 lessons of 45 minutes trough all the main issues of culture and (new) media.
Here a short review of how it is to listen

Subjects
The complex interactions between new media and perceptions and performances of embodiment, agency, citizenship, collective action, individual identity, time and spatiality. (that is a quote actually)

Pros
-Greg has a clear and warm voice which is pleasant to listen to
-The subjects are filled with nice examples and anecdotes so never a dull moment
-Its all for free
-Because of some spontaneity of the class you actually get the feeling of being there.

Cons
-The audio listener isn’t taken that seriously all the time, comments from students aren’t hearable, nor are the movies that are played (movies on a podcast?)
-There is a lot of useless information about when homework has to be hand in, and what the assignments for next week are.
-Files aren’t named accurately 20 have numbers and no names, and 8 have names and no numbers and two files are doubled and two are missing.

Conclusion
Although some lectures could have some extra after-editing, my overall feeling is very positive, all the things I already knew, and more, are presented in a logical way filled with extra examples and anecdotes from the teacher’s own experience. If Berkley would put some extra attention into recording, and did some cutting I think I would actually be prepared to pay for this content.

When do I listen to this you ask? Well when I’m biking to the train station, and off course when I’m shopping for food.