Podcasts On Shuffle Messed Up

So yesterday I took advantage of the newer lower iPod Shuffle pricing. I wanted a Shuffle because I wanted something smaller to either listen to some random music, or to listen to podcasts download on my laptop without having to mess with adding them to my iPod which is synced to my desktop.

The way podcasts are handled on the Shuffle and iTunes is messed up. First, podcasts in playlists don’t automatically sync. WFT? If music can sync why not Podcasts? Not syncing isn’t too bad though. You just have to drag and drop and they are there. The thing that drove me nuts is you can’t control the order the podcasts are played, and the default order is backwards. You have to listen to the newest stuff first. I, like most people, like to listen to podcasts in the order that they are released. Why would I want to hear today’s episodes if I haven’t heard yesterdays yet?

There were a few workarounds, but they all seemed like a pain in the ass to me. My workaround was to use a different podcatcher. It’s crazy how iTunes is totally dominating the podcatching market. I remember when there were tons of podcatchers, and they were all better than iTunes. I settled on NetNewsWire. NetNewsWire downloads my podcasts and drops them right into iTunes old school style. I can now sync my Shuffle to a playlist that contains my newest podcasts.

Why can’t this be done in iTunes? It would be so simple. Hasn’t anybody at Apple ever tried to listen to podcasts on a Shuffle?