7 minutes
Best Data Science Podcasts
If I am not doing an Udemy course, testing a tutorial or doing any online course in any break I get to learn as much as I can about Python, Computer Science, Software Engineering, Statistics and Data Science, I am listening to a podcast. I usually do this when I am commuting either riding my bike, on the bus or driving. A good time to listen to a podcast is when I need a break from absorbing too much content by following a course.
Listening to a podcast, refresh the mind and help me to get new ideas and inspiration to the next project or skill to acquire.
These are probably the reasons I listen to podcasts. It inspires me to keep moving.
When I listen so much good stories of people that is in the same situation as me or it is a future version of myself gives me a lot os perspective.
Even before getting involved in data science I always liked podcasts in general. I probably started listening to it 6 years ago, but in the last 3 it has been more focused in Data Science content and here are my favorite podcasts.
- SuperDataScience
- Talk Python to me
- Artificial Intelligence
- Data Hackers- (Portuguese-br)
- Data Framed
Those above are my favourites that I highly recommend if you are into Data Science. There are others but I will go more in detail why I think they are my favorite and also will post link at the end to other podcasts that I listened but in the end did not stick to me.
Let’s start with the SuperDataScience podcast which is the one I think I listened to almost all episodes. At least from episode 1 to 200 I have listened to almost all, then I took a break to listed to others but ever now and then I binge listen to it. I am usually like this, if I like a podcast I just go crazy and go through all the content. It takes a while but because I spend a lot of time commuting I can listen around 10 episodes per week.
What I like about the SuperDataScience show is the presenter Kirill Eremenko who is super pumped up and enthusiastic guy. I owe him a lot as he is the one that made things in DS simple for me, and this is his personal mission. I first got in touch with Python in 2014 and tried to study data science theory for a month however I quickly realised then that it was just too hard and dropped my first attempt. It was then in 2017 that I tried again and just googling about online data science courses I came across Kirill’s course on Udemy about machine learning that’s when I also discovered the podcast.
The format of the podcast is a weekly long interview podcast with people in the field of data science. It can be from a student of DS to a “celebrity” very advanced professional and that is what I like about it. Anyone can be interviewed in the show and Kirill conduct is very well to extract very good content and as I already mentioned it is a very inspiring show. Kirill is not the only one pumped but I always get pumped when I listened to an episode and end up with lots of ideas, links to research and new skills to learn. Besides the weekly long interview podcast Kirill does a quick 5-10minutes weekly motivational or informative episode in case you do not have time for the long one. I like the intro musics he plays which set the tone of what is coming and again I will say again that it is really pumped up. There are now over 355 episodes available and it is hard to give the list of all the episodes I liked but I would recommend the episodes where he interviewed his now business partner Hadelin de Ponteves , 1, 2 and 3 which is an excellent educator and highly recommend his courses. Other good episodes are the recent interview with Hadley Wickham. Let me give another good one such as Jose Portilla which is my favorite Udemy instructor. This is already getting too long, so let me move to the next one.
Talk Python to me is my second if not as good as the SuperDataScience. The host is Michael Kennedy who is an excellent communicator and he knows Python a lot. This is more of a technical one focused in the Python language that will explore the language beyond only the Data Science aspect. Actually it is most of the time talking about other things than Data Science. Michael is a really good presenter and interviewer and I like that he always asks about how the person being interviewed got into programming and Python and at the end what is their favorite editor (IDE). Need one day to analyse the responses of that and tally. So the summary is this is more technical and help you have an understanding of the Python ecosystem and also to have a good idea of the main personalities behind Python. I recommend the following episodes to get started with Kenneth Reitz (Creator of Requests), Adrian Rosebrock My favorite Computer Vision Teacher), Armin Ronacher (Creator of Flask), Miguel Grinberg (Flask expert and creator of Flask Mega Tutorial ).
The next one is Artificial Intelligence which I got to know more recently. I think the show is kind of newish and it is in Ep. 87 as of today. What I like is the caliber of people he interviews in the AI space. To be 100% honest I think Alex is a very intelligent guy and the show is great but.. sometimes I do not like the way he asks questions. I think sometimes he over formulate the question, giving too much direction to the interviewee and looks like he is driving the person to give the answer he likes, maybe it is just my impression. I would like if he had just asked a more open ended question leaving to the person to develop it as he/she wishes. This does not happen all the time but I notice it sometimes. Episodes I would recommend are Elon Musk , Grant Sanderson , Andrew Ng , Michael Stevens and Yann LeCun .
Data Framed! This is such an excellent podcast and for a period of time it was my favorite one because the presenter is an excellent presenter and know a lot about Python. This is a good mix of Data Science, Python, Celebrity and Contributors in the Data Science space. I don’t know the reason he stopped the podcast. Maybe the Data Camp scandal but anyway the podcast is fantastic and it is still up and I highly recommend.
Hugo Bowne-Anderson is the host and here is a twitt about the end of the show.
To all you wonderful #DataFramed listeners, I'm sincerely sorry that I've stopped releasing episodes w/o notice. Know that I appreciate you deeply & that I also appreciate your patience during this challenging time. I plan to bring back the DataFramed podcast in the near future.
— Hugo Bowne-Anderson is podcasting again (@hugobowne) May 9, 2019
I am still waiting.
Here are good episodes recommendations Cathy O’Neil , Wes McKinney , Roger Peng , Sebastian Raschka, Randy Olson, Renee Teate, Allen Downey, Vicky Boykis, Cassie Kozyrkov and Angela Bassa.
Lastly but not the least, Data Hackers, a very good one but this is in Portuguese and sorry if you do not speak Portuguese. It is a very entertaining podcast and also very informative and good if you are starting or getting into the Data Science field and want to know lot of goes inside companies and the field in general. Highly recommended.
Also here are other good podcasts I listened to a few episodes but in reality none of them are my style and did not listened enough to recommend or give a more in depth opinion.