Each year, the New Oxford American Dictionary chooses a "Word of the Year" to celebrate the year's most important word. In 2005, it was "podcast" — an online audio broadcast that can be downloaded at any time. In 2005, podcasts were a relatively new phenomenon. Nowadays, however, podcasts have become incredibly popular, with more than half of the U.S. population above the age of 12 regularly listening to a podcast. And as the chart to the right shows, they are getting more and more popular each year among people of all ages.

The beauty of podcasts is that people can fit them into their lives whenever it's most convenient—while traveling to work, doing chores, or exercising. And with over 850,000 podcasts currently active, the number of subjects covered is truly vast. Basically, if something is interesting, there is probably a podcast about it. Furthermore, many podcasts have episodes that last for several hours each. As a result, for many, listening to a podcast is like having a long conversation with your friends about your favorite subject of interest. It's a return to the old art of slow-paced, interesting conversation that many in this fast-paced modern world had thought was a thing of the past.

新牛津美語字典每年都會選出「年度代表字」，來歡慶當年度最重要的字彙。2005年的代表字是「podcast」（播客）──這是一種可隨時下載收聽網路廣播的軟體。播客在2005年可說是相對新穎的一種現象。不過，現今播客受歡迎的程度更是不可思議。超過半數的12歲以上美國人口都在固定收聽播客。而且如右圖所示，播客在所有年齡層裡，逐年越來越受歡迎。

播客的美好，在於方便大家隨時可將播客節目融入自己的生活中，例如上班途中、做家事或運動。目前播客上播放超過85萬個節目，節目主題亦包羅萬象。基本上，只要是有趣的事物，大概都會有討論該話題的播客。再者，許多播客還有分集內容，每一集均有數小時之久。因此，對很多人而言，收聽播客就像是和朋友暢聊自己最感興趣的主題。就像回到過去那段步調緩慢、談笑風生的時光。而在此節奏快速的現代世界裡，許多人原本以為這樣的舊日清談之風已成往昔。