sudanglo:I wouldn't worry too much about picking up bad habits from reading poor Esperanto.

I agree. You'll quickly get to the point where certain constructions strike you as "off". They may or may not be actual errors, but you'll develop your own preferences about how to use Esperanto, as you would in any other language.

You'll also find that some authors are more liberal about using neologisms than others. There's no point trying to avoid this, since it's part of the experience of reading and listening to Esperanto. In this respect, too, it's similar to other languages. Some people take liberties with their own language that others do not take.

Some people never develop an ear for which constructions are "off", in my experience. They speak faulty Esperanto fluently, and either don't notice or don't care that their own Esperanto is "off". So personally I wouldn't go to places like blogs to get a good sense of Esperanto grammar and style. But anything that generally gets edited -- like Wikipedia or an online magazine or news source -- should be fine.

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You can find some more Latin American Esperanto in the Panama Raporto podcast. It isn't kept up anymore and it's a few years old but you can still download the files.

A friendly hint - I know you like the sound of Latin American Esperanto but some Esperantists might consider it weird if you're a native English speaker and you speak Esperanto with a Spanish accent. In the Esperanto world, the preferred accent is generally as neutral as possible. That is, a person with the "best accent" is someone whose native language you aren't able to guess based on their Esperanto.

I encourage you to listen to Esperanto from all different places in the world, to get used to the various accents. When I was a beginner, I found Polish Radio to be difficult to understand, but Korean Esperanto recordings fairly easy. Slavic accents were difficult for me because I wasn't used to the way they palatalise certain letters. As an Esperanto speaker you will need to understand many different accents, and podcasts/radio news are a great way to practice that.

erinja:Some people never develop an ear for which constructions are "off", in my experience. They speak faulty Esperanto fluently, and either don't notice or don't care that their own Esperanto is "off".

This is what I'm talking about when I say picking up "bad" Esperanto. I believe in the saying, "garbage in garbage out." It's why I only want quality sources to listen to and read. Later on, after my Esperanto foundation has been firmly set, I can go out and explore the vast amounts of Esperanto out there online.

erinja: A friendly hint - I know you like the sound of Latin American Esperanto but some Esperantists might consider it weird if you're a native English speaker and you speak Esperanto with a Spanish accent. In the Esperanto world, the preferred accent is generally as neutral as possible. That is, a person with the "best accent" is someone whose native language you aren't able to guess based on their Esperanto.

I'm not sure I understand what's so bad about a native English speaker having a Spanish-like accent in Esperanto as long as I can be clearly understood?

Perhaps I was imaging it, but I could have swore I read somewhere that the most "accurate" accent to have in Esperanto is one similar to Spanish spoken in Latin America. (Or perhaps that was just someone's bias?)

Also, I want to speak Esperanto with a Spanish-like accent, not with a strictly or solely Spanish accent.

erinja:I encourage you to listen to Esperanto from all different places in the world, to get used to the various accents. When I was a beginner, I found Polish Radio to be difficult to understand, but Korean Esperanto recordings fairly easy. Slavic accents were difficult for me because I wasn't used to the way they palatalise certain letters. As an Esperanto speaker you will need to understand many different accents, and podcasts/radio news are a great way to practice that.

You're absolutely right! I have every intention of listening to a variety of speakers, just not in the beginning. I've decided to choose a specific style of accent, and will use that as my base. Once I've stabilized it and I'm completely comfortable speaking that way, I'll broaden my horizons if you will, and start listening to a variety of sources. I don't want to have an Esperanto accent that is an eclectic mix of accents that just sounds weird. That's why I want to focus on one right now.

yonosami:I'm not sure I understand what's so bad about a native English speaker having a Spanish-like accent in Esperanto as long as I can be clearly understood?

Would you think it weird if someone came from Russia but spoke English with a German accent? It would be like that.

Perhaps I was imaging it, but I could have swore I read somewhere that the most "accurate" accent to have in Esperanto is one similar to Spanish spoken in Latin America. (Or perhaps that was just someone's bias?)

It's someone's bias, or else you're imagining it, as super-griek said. He mentioned that some people think Croatians have the best accents. I have heard that Italians have the best, and I heard elsewhere that Hungarians have the best.

Let me repeat what I said about the 'best accent' - the most accurate accent, according to most Esperantists, is the most country-neutral. When people mention countries that have the "best accent", they aren't saying that the most perfect Esperanto pronunciation is the Spanish pronunciation, for example. They are saying that for Spanish speakers, it is easiest to generate the preferred neutral accent in Esperanto, due to similarities in phonemes found in Esperanto and Spanish. Or that it is easiest for Croatians to produce the preferred neutral accent. Or Hungarians, or Italians.

If you were reading a page about it in English, Spanish might have been cited as a source for a good accent because many English speakers have some familiarity with Spanish (it wouldn't help most English speakers very much to tell them that Croatian is a good model of pronunciation!)

I don't want to have an Esperanto accent that is an eclectic mix of accents that just sounds weird.

I find it very difficult to imagine that this could ever happen. I have never met a person for which this is the case. But if you are intentionally trying to put on what you think of as a "Spanish" accent, you may unwittingly do this to yourself!

3rdblade:
Modest T0dd, above, did not mention he has started doing a podcast too, brief and clear, all about beer. Do another one soon, Mister!

Modest or not, it's done! The link should still work. Episode 2 is up, with music.

Some more accents (or lack thereof):
interviews with Kore and with Jomo

...they're all French, but you can't tell by their accents. This is an achievement because the French (like English speakers) are known for their difficulty with achieving a neutral accent in Esperanto.

I can hear in the first video that the speaker has French as his mother tongue, but in the second video I couldn't hear anything at all to suggest likewise.

sudanglo:I can hear in the first video that the speaker has French as his mother tongue, but in the second video I couldn't hear anything at all to suggest likewise.

Actually isn't Jomo a native Occitan speaker?