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It's Friday , the 19th of April 2024

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.

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The last word in podcasting news

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. This is the Pod News

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Weekly Review with James Cridland

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and Sam Sethi .

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I'm James Cridland , the editor of Pod News

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.

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And I'm Sam Sethi , the CEO of True Fans .

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In the chapters . Today , the longest running newsletter

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about podcasting is taking a hiatus

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. Your Substack podcast

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is now available on Spotify . Also , the

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Podcast Standards Project announced

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more than two and a half million podcast

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transcripts . Spotify

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says the audiobooks are a big success

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and there are also audio booming

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numbers too . Plus .

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Hi , I'm Jeremy King , ceo of the M&M

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Global Awards , and I will be on later

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to talk about our brand

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new podcast category , with which we've teamed

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up with a wonderful Acast .

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Hi , my name is Sean Howard . I am the

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CEO and founder of Flight Path and also

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been an avid podcaster in the

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fiction space for a very , very long

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time , and later on we're

1:00

going to be talking about Flight Path , or

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so .

1:03

I'm told they will . This podcast

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is sponsored by Buzzsprout . Podcast hosting

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made easy With easy and powerful

1:09

tools , free learning materials , remarkable

1:11

customer support and a new iOS

1:14

app .

1:14

From your daily newsletter , the

1:16

Pod News Weekly Review .

1:19

Two and a half million

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transcripts that sounds like

1:23

an amazing number . The

1:26

Podcast Standards Project announced that this

1:28

week . What's this one about ?

1:30

What's the Podcast Standards Project about Sam

1:32

?

1:33

It's there to promote open standards across

1:35

podcasting , and this is an

1:37

interesting one . Actually , the

1:39

podcast transcript has been

1:41

part of the 1.0 certification

1:44

. Apple themselves are

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using it allegedly , but

1:49

the good news is that not just Apple

1:51

, but Podcast Addict , fountain , podcast Guru

1:53

and

1:55

many other apps are using it , and in the aggregate , it looks like

1:57

there's over 2.5 million podcast

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episodes now using Transcript , which

2:01

is a big win , I think .

2:03

Yeah , I think so . And I

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mean you say allegedly they are using it . They're

2:07

using it very well , but they're using it as a fallback

2:09

for their own service

2:12

. If you want things like speaker

2:14

names , for example , then the only

2:17

way that you can do that is to submit

2:19

your own transcript , and

2:21

you have to go . If you haven't already done this , you have to go into Apple . You haven't already

2:23

done this . You have to go into Apple Podcasts Connect and

2:25

say I would like you to use my transcripts please

2:28

. But that's all a fine and dandy

2:30

thing and , as you say , they

2:32

also appear in all kinds of other places as well . So

2:34

that's really good . Some really good

2:36

announcements over

2:39

the last week about podcast hosts

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using transcripts OSHA

2:43

our friends at OSHA have now

2:46

added transcripts and transcript

2:48

generation and Castapod

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as well , also adding support

2:52

for transcripts too . So all

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of that is pretty good , I think .

2:56

Yeah , and I think we're going to be seeing a few more

2:58

companies announcing in the next couple of weeks

3:00

as well , because I've been doing the ring round

3:03

, as they say , and , yeah , it's exciting

3:05

to hear people are actually , you know , pushing

3:07

hard now to add more and more tags to

3:09

their platforms . The other

3:12

one , though , was Superchapters

3:14

. James . There's over 30,000 podcasts

3:17

that have Superchapters . What are Superchapters

3:19

?

3:19

Yes , well , superchapters . I think Superchaptersiel

3:22

j lewis's name for them , but they're chapters

3:24

which are no , no , no that's

3:26

uh davidas oh , davidas , is

3:28

it ? oh well , there you go . So

3:30

, uh , davidas's name for them , but

3:32

anyway , they are . Um , the

3:35

way that podcast transcripts used to work

3:37

is that you used to put the information

3:39

about a chapter into

3:42

your audio file , um

3:44

, and so that meant that you couldn't do anything

3:46

clever with the browser , because your browser couldn't

3:48

actually see those special tags . Also

3:52

, it meant that if you wanted to edit what the chapter

3:54

said , perhaps to put more information

3:56

in them , then you had to re-upload the audio . So

3:59

, not a fantastic plan . So

4:01

the benefit of super chapters is

4:03

that they are a separate JSON file

4:05

which is linked to from the RSS

4:07

, and the really

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good news is that Pocket Casts have just rolled

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out full support for those . So

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if you're using Pocket

4:17

Casts , as many many people do , then

4:20

Pocket Casts will now support those

4:22

super chapters , as does Buzzsprout

4:25

, by the way . So , yeah , so I think that

4:27

all of that is very good , seeing

4:29

both podcast transcripts and seeing

4:31

super chapters being supported .

4:34

Yeah , the PSP 1.1 certification

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, which has been agreed by most people

4:39

now , is going to include

4:41

support for chapters , so

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I'm hoping that before June we'll

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be able to make some big announcements on that one as well

4:48

.

4:48

Yeah , no , I think all of that is very

4:51

good , and plenty of people who are supporting

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chapters already RSS Blue

4:55

, of course , since you mentioned Dovid

4:57

Asp , but also Blueberry PowerPress

5:00

as well , podhome , you

5:03

know , casterpod , justcast , and so the list

5:05

goes on , and Transistor , of course . So

5:07

yeah , so a bunch of people supporting it . So

5:10

all good news , I think .

5:11

Stories better told , stories

5:13

better found .

5:15

Welcome to a new era in media

5:17

.

5:28

Pave Podcast founder Max Cutler has announced the launch of a new media company called Pave Studios .

5:30

They say that they are positioned across video

5:32

, audio books and entertainment

5:34

. The press release I noticed

5:37

didn't use the word podcast at all anywhere

5:39

, although the video does mention

5:41

that they will be involved in podcasts

5:44

. So Max Cutler ? He

5:46

calls himself a multi-hyphenate entrepreneur

5:48

. Yes , what is that ? It basically

5:50

means that you've got lots of . You know

5:52

, you're a writer , editor , coder

5:55

, all of the hyphens in

5:57

between there . That's what multi-hyphenate means

6:00

. Oh , OK , yeah

6:02

, I know .

6:03

But anyway he founded Parcast Studios

6:05

.

6:06

He's clearly been working on something because he's

6:08

engaged a PR company to promote

6:11

the fact every time he writes a LinkedIn

6:13

essay . Then

6:16

, weirdly , I was getting emails

6:18

from somebody at a PR company saying

6:20

you might want to know that Max Cutler

6:22

, the founder of Parcast , has

6:24

just posted something on LinkedIn . Oh , I

6:26

want one of those . Yes , I'm

6:29

not quite sure the point of

6:31

all of that , but anyway , and

6:33

yeah , so this is another one of

6:35

these large companies

6:39

that think that they've got a

6:41

plan very similar to the conversation

6:43

with Stephen Bartlett last

6:45

week or the week before . Pave Studios

6:48

is apparently paving the way see

6:50

what they did there for a new era in media

6:53

, and they

6:55

are wanting to if

6:57

I can quote from the press release create

6:59

fandoms through written , audio

7:02

and video content . Yes

7:05

, so , anyway , so that's what

7:07

Pave Studios is doing

7:09

. I'm not quite sure , frankly

7:12

, what Pave Studios is doing , but they seem to have , you

7:14

know , signed up a bunch of people , so that all

7:16

seems good .

7:17

The thing that did jump out at me was

7:19

the fact that , okay , they didn't mention podcasts

7:22

, but they did talk about audio

7:24

books and they did talk about other forms

7:26

of content . I'm assuming that's all in

7:28

RSS and I think that's

7:30

the only thing that I thought was quite

7:32

interesting about the whole story , because

7:35

I'm hoping more

7:37

hosts will jump on board to support the medium

7:39

tag and then start to support medium equals

7:42

music , medium equals film

7:44

, courses , audiobooks , etc . Because

7:47

that's really where I think RSS has

7:49

to go . We have to broaden beyond . Yes

7:51

, podcasting is going to be 80-90%

7:53

of RSS , that's not going to change

7:56

, but I think there is an opportunity

7:58

to extend the reach of podcasting

8:01

or RSS with more medium tag support , the reach of podcasting or RSS with more

8:03

medium tag support , but

8:05

so far , I have to say , james

8:07

, not a lot of interest from hosts

8:09

.

8:10

No , and I think this is going to be a chicken and an egg

8:12

thing of you know . Are

8:14

there enough podcast players that

8:16

are decent enough that are dealing with this

8:18

stuff , and can you also

8:20

see a business plan there ? The business

8:22

plan around an audio book is really easy

8:25

you pay for the audio book and then you can listen

8:27

to it . There's

8:33

no business plan necessarily for the whole value for value concept , although you

8:35

know I mean clearly you would argue , well , you know there absolutely is , but

8:37

it's a very different business plan that needs a lot

8:39

more convincing than going in and

8:41

buying something . So I suspect

8:44

that you know it'll be slow . But

8:46

yeah , I think you're

8:49

possibly assuming too much that all

8:51

of this will be done at the end of an RSS feed

8:53

. I think this is probably

8:55

a little bit closer

8:57

to the kind of standard

9:00

thing that a talent agency would

9:02

have done in the past looking

9:04

after a bunch of , you know , creators

9:08

, helping them develop

9:10

original content , but original content

9:12

across a whole range of different

9:14

things . I mean it does seem that the word

9:16

community is the thing that they

9:18

are most keen about , so

9:21

talking about video , books , live experiences

9:23

, merchandise , all of that kind of thing

9:26

. So , yeah , I'm not sure necessarily

9:28

that it'll all be done through RSS

9:31

, and heavens you know , an ex

9:33

senior manager of

9:35

Spotify doesn't

9:38

bode well in terms of what he thinks about

9:40

RSS .

9:41

Anyway , yes , open standards . Anyway

9:45

, moving on then , hotpod

9:47

, one of the longest running newsletters about podcasting

9:49

, is suspending publication

9:52

. The leading reporter

9:54

, ariel Shapiro , has announced that her last

9:56

week with its owner , the Verge , will be next

9:58

week . I assume that's this week . What's

10:00

this one about , james ?

10:02

Yes , I mean , hotpod has been going for years . It's

10:04

been going since 2014 . Nick Quire used

10:06

to write it and then it was sold

10:09

to the Verge or to Vox

10:11

Media that owns the Verge and Ashley

10:13

Carman then wrote for

10:15

it for a long time . Ariel

10:19

Shapiro has been writing for it for

10:21

the last few years three

10:23

or four years or so , few

10:31

years , three or four years or so and , yes , so she is finishing up with the Verge and it looks

10:33

as if , well , jake Castronegas , who is the deputy

10:35

editor of the Verge , said

10:38

something like we won't have a new writer in

10:40

place , so we're planning to put

10:42

Hot Pod on hiatus while we

10:44

figure out next steps . But I'll

10:46

tell you one of those next steps that

10:48

has been to refund every single

10:50

paid subscriber to Hotpod

10:53

. All of those

10:55

people have got their money back . That's

10:57

not necessarily something that I would expect

10:59

a company which is on

11:01

hiatus working out next steps to

11:04

have done , and they've

11:06

clearly , from my reading

11:08

of that , they've clearly said well , we're not

11:10

going to run this particular service

11:13

, or if we are going to run it , it's just going to be a

11:15

paid for . It's just going to be a free service

11:17

rather than a paid for service .

11:19

Don't they do a really big New

11:21

York live event every year as

11:23

well ?

11:24

Well , it

11:26

looks as if they do , but no

11:28

, the really big New York

11:31

event is On Air Fest , which

11:33

is a big event that is run every

11:35

single year by a different company

11:37

. Nick Kwa was kind of signed

11:39

up as one of the people

11:43

who would host a day

11:45

and make that day a bit more of a business

11:48

day , and

11:50

obviously Ariel Shapiro

11:52

has been looking after that for the last couple

11:54

of years . On Airfest continues

11:57

, but the question is , of course , what will happen

11:59

to the Hot Pod Summit , which was the name

12:01

of the thing , and

12:03

I don't know . I mean , I think that

12:05

the Pod News Summit has a certain ring to

12:07

it , but perhaps I should get in touch

12:09

with the folk at the

12:12

organisation what before

12:14

announcing it . Yes and

12:16

see whether or not they

12:19

have a different plan , which

12:21

I would rather suspect that they do . But

12:24

yes , so it wasn't their event

12:27

, but it was one of those events where they lent

12:29

their name to it and I think

12:31

you can see real benefit , you know , in doing

12:33

that .

12:34

Oh well , watch this space . Now audio

12:37

boom is booming . It seems it's Q1

12:39

, 24 financial results . The

12:42

figures show an 11% increase in growth

12:44

and they see an

12:46

increased continued growth for their

12:48

EBITDA profit . James sounds

12:50

all very good from Audioboom . They've always had

12:52

some good numbers , even though

12:54

they had a big dip in the middle of 23

12:57

, I think , but they recovered

12:59

for Christmas 23 . It looks like

13:01

they're really growing now again .

13:03

So , yes , so the figures that

13:05

are in their release are , of course , very , very

13:07

positive 11% year-on-year growth

13:09

in revenue , continued EBITDA

13:12

profit although they're not actually making what I would

13:14

call real profit , but they're making EBITDA profit

13:16

and revenue per 1,000

13:19

listens , which is a very interesting number . That

13:22

number five years ago was $23

13:25

. So for every thousand listens they were earning

13:27

$23 in

13:30

revenue . Now they're earning almost

13:33

twice that Well , more than twice that $52.17

13:38

. Advertising

13:48

not working . Well , this company seems to have doubled the amount of money

13:50

that they're making from podcast advertising within

13:53

five years . So I think

13:55

there's some pretty good numbers really .

13:57

Maybe we need to get them on and find out what their secret

13:59

sauce is . But yes

14:01

, congratulations to Audioboom . Maybe we should

14:04

Now Flightpath

14:06

, not a company . I've heard a lot about James

14:08

, so tell me more .

14:08

Yes . Well , so this is an advertising

14:11

software company and

14:13

, in case you're wondering , a flight is

14:15

the name advertisers give to individual

14:17

campaigns that they run . And

14:20

Flightpath is a

14:22

really clever piece of software , and

14:24

one of the reasons why I was interested in it is

14:26

that they spotted the Apple

14:28

iOS 17 changes pretty much

14:30

as soon as they happened , and so they

14:32

were able to actually

14:34

cut any particular

14:36

pain that publishers using FlightPath

14:39

would have had . Because they were able

14:41

to actually spot that . I

14:44

thought I would learn a little bit more . So

14:46

I spoke to the CEO

14:48

, sean Howard , all the way

14:51

from sunny Canada and I asked

14:53

him what is Flightpath ?

14:54

Flightpath- is the predictive analytics

14:57

platform for the podcasting space

14:59

. So if you were in

15:01

the enterprise business world

15:03

, you would know of SAS

15:05

or IBM Watson

15:07

or a few other predictive analytics

15:10

tools , and there's really nothing

15:12

like that in the podcasting space

15:14

for publishers that are looking

15:16

to scale and want to identify

15:18

opportunities to grow their business

15:20

sell more inventory . Leave less unsold

15:23

inventory on the table . Free up their

15:25

ad ops team to focus on improving

15:27

customer service instead of putting out fires

15:29

all the time .

15:30

So where did the idea come from ? Was this

15:32

an internal tool that you

15:34

ended up building a while back

15:37

?

15:37

So I was a buyer in the space , buying

15:39

podcast ads for podcasts

15:41

. Working with Dan Meisner , I

15:44

was running Fable and Folly

15:46

, which is an independent , one

15:48

of the larger independent fiction publishers

15:50

. I was building tools

15:52

to help us scale the

15:55

publishing side of the business with a tiny

15:57

team . And on

16:00

the buy side , it was frustrating

16:02

how hard it was to

16:05

give people money in this space . It

16:08

becomes quickly apparent when you're a buyer

16:10

that people have no

16:12

idea what they have to sell , and

16:14

I've never been in an industry where that's the

16:16

case , where you don't know what

16:18

you have to sell or when . And

16:21

it was frustrating to always be

16:23

, as the buyer , to be the one

16:25

finding every problem . And so

16:28

Flight Path was also the

16:30

other side of it , which was on the publishing side

16:32

. We were , you know , managing a lot of demands

16:34

right from different buyers and

16:37

from brands to DM , you know , across

16:39

the board , and there

16:41

were no tools to tell us what

16:43

we had to sell or or to

16:46

predict performance and delivery and

16:48

to get us ahead of the curve . Where we were

16:50

, we knew everything was good and everything

16:52

was going to run Right . So so

16:55

, yeah , it sort of just came out of that . And then it was actually

16:57

Brian Barletta who saw it one day

16:59

and I did a tweet and he

17:01

called me and I know , brian , he

17:03

was like you got to show me this . And

17:05

when I showed it to him , he basically said you're

17:09

an idiot , you've got to get this on the market . So

17:11

he started developing it for real .

17:14

In terms of because I'm curious

17:16

, one of the tools that you have in

17:18

Flight Path is flighting alerts

17:21

, which I guess tells

17:23

you , as you are in the middle of a campaign

17:25

, whether or not you will actually deliver that campaign

17:27

. What sort of shows work

17:29

best with that ? I guess if you've got a

17:31

weekly always on show

17:33

, it's easier to predict where you're going

17:35

to be going than if you've got a limited

17:38

series , for example .

17:39

Yeah , so we basically have the first

17:41

alert system that I'm aware of that works

17:43

across order management systems and

17:46

multiple DAI platforms and

17:48

it works at every stage . So we

17:51

will alert teams to orders that haven't even

17:53

started yet . Right , problems . But

17:55

, to answer your question , it's a really good one . Uh , we started

17:58

developing our , our algorithms

18:00

, um , working with fiction

18:02

, which was you know , there's nothing

18:04

always on . You know very little that's

18:07

always on . It's all seasonal , right

18:09

, it's the . The dates are always shifting for

18:11

launch . So there are nice things

18:13

about like an always on show , but

18:15

there's challenges to that as well , right

18:17

, how do you identify a sudden

18:19

spike of of tire

18:21

kickers from actual , continuing

18:24

listeners ? And so

18:26

there's stuff on both sides , and so , yeah , our

18:28

alert system is around all

18:31

the things that can go wrong . If your sales team

18:33

in the order management platform has sold

18:35

a pixel and there's no pixel on the order

18:37

three days out , we alert the ad

18:40

ops team . If there's a change

18:42

in performance , predicted performance in the

18:44

future , we'll alert the ops team . It

18:46

just goes on and on . If DAI

18:48

starts delivering over cap , like you

18:51

say I only want to deliver 200,000 impressions

18:53

and some platforms will deliver half

18:55

a million we will

18:57

alert and stop that order . Just a lot

18:59

of alerts around that .

19:01

I'm guessing your tool must have spotted the

19:03

changes in Apple podcasts

19:06

that happened towards the end of last

19:08

year and I'm guessing that your tools

19:10

were one of the first sort of you

19:12

know . Your customers actually realized that

19:14

there was something odd going on here .

19:16

We were one of the four companies that were at

19:19

the table , discovering that we

19:21

spent our time basically

19:23

determining the exposure of every one of

19:25

our clients , our time basically

19:27

determining the exposure of every one of our clients . Yeah , our tool was critical in being able to

19:29

pace that down as it was happening , because once

19:31

we all were like , yeah , you , this is happening

19:34

, but for the longest time Apple

19:36

was saying we're not going to do anything , right , we're not going

19:38

to change anything . And then when

19:40

that started to feel like Apple , might

19:42

you know you , just we

19:45

didn't know when right , it was really

19:47

neat watching how we

19:49

could correct , on an hour by hour basis

19:51

, the quotes going out from

19:54

the sales team . But

19:56

the problem is , you know , it

19:58

takes two to three to four weeks sometimes to

20:00

close an IO . So so you know then

20:02

, you know our , our , our tools

20:04

help you reassess . But you know , now

20:06

you're , now you're about to sign

20:08

and you don't want to go back and say , oh , we got to drop

20:10

it by 30 points or 20 points or whatever we're

20:12

dropping down to right . Some people were

20:14

really hit hard and

20:17

so , yeah , it was neat to see how

20:19

we could help these customers

20:21

both lower their impact

20:23

, the impact to them , but also helping

20:26

their teams . We have a white glove service , so

20:28

we are in there helping teams figure out

20:30

how to fix these campaigns

20:32

right .

20:32

If there's anything that shows the

20:34

benefit of a piece of software

20:37

like Flight Path , it

20:39

strikes me that it's those things

20:41

that nobody was really expecting and

20:44

all of a sudden you were

20:47

able to catch that quite early and

20:49

really help people .

20:50

I think , coming out of it , it was

20:52

neat , not neat , it was horrible

20:54

. It was a horrifying experience for everyone

20:57

, right . But from a math

20:59

and data science point of view , it's

21:02

fascinating to see the

21:04

shape of that curve and realize

21:07

that it's very similar to another black

21:09

swan event that we have in our data set

21:11

, and not quite as extreme . And

21:14

so that leads us now to think it

21:17

would have been nice , going through it

21:19

, to have been able to predict the

21:21

exit . You know where's the cushion , where's the soft

21:23

landing for this , where's

21:28

the cushion , where's the soft landing for this ? And so it was really

21:30

. I guess the silver lining is , I think it's possible for us , in a future event , to

21:32

add another level , which is to give that idea

21:34

of . This is going to be over in December

21:36

, but yeah , it

21:38

was a tough time for

21:41

everyone .

21:41

You work with a lot of podcast ad

21:43

platforms and technologies . What

21:46

have you learned about podcast advertising

21:48

from it ?

21:49

I think those of us that are in podcasting it feels

21:51

old , but what

21:53

I've learned is it's still the Wild West , we

21:56

are still figuring it out right on

21:58

how to scale businesses in this space . That

22:01

is just new . You know , we've

22:03

you know , we saw a flurry of consolidations or shows being

22:05

bought . You know , we've , you know we saw a flurry of consolidations or shows being bought

22:07

. You know , we've seen a lot of experiments . But

22:10

I think the idea of a

22:12

few people who met in their you know , in

22:14

their kitchen and started a show and pulled

22:17

a few shows together and built a network they're now

22:19

running multi million dollar publishing

22:21

businesses , right , and so

22:24

those amazing

22:26

content creators now looking to

22:28

scale and grow from podcasting

22:30

into other places is really

22:32

neat . And it's I than that in podcasting

22:34

, oh yeah most definitely , most definitely

22:37

.

22:37

So I think it is

22:50

still a new thing for most people

22:52

Are the mistakes that people

22:54

are making that you see

22:56

time and time again that your software can help

22:58

with .

22:59

Yeah , we all have to stop

23:01

pacing on actuals . Our whole industry

23:03

is built on pace on actuals right . So you , there

23:07

is no predictive right In our space

23:09

like that you can trust . And

23:11

so you're paying . Every

23:13

company is paying their

23:15

teams and it

23:18

gets worse as they scale to

23:20

basically copy and paste data every

23:22

day into Excel spreadsheets , in

23:24

a crazy number of Excel spreadsheets all

23:27

around , trying to pace on actuals . Meaning

23:29

you know you divide the length

23:31

of the run , it's 30 days and

23:33

you know you just divide by how much

23:35

you know you've done versus how much you left . And you , you

23:38

, you try to hedge it . You're trying to do all these

23:40

things , but it it basically

23:42

everyone is spending all their time basically

23:45

monitoring spreadsheets

23:48

and not the business . If

23:51

those are the tools you have right , then those

23:53

are the tools that your team has learned

23:55

to be successful with , and

23:57

they have . I have seen

24:00

some epic solutions out there

24:02

, right , just hodgepodge

24:04

together at all levels

24:06

. Out

24:10

there , right , just hodgepodge together at all levels . But I think when

24:12

we start to see these companies invest in tools and software

24:14

for the business and predictive , we start to

24:16

see this amazing opportunity

24:18

to free those people up to delivering

24:22

a level of service that's unmatched , right

24:25

Like actually being responsive

24:27

, actually finding problems and contacting

24:29

buyers months before their campaign

24:32

starts to fix something . Like that's

24:34

unheard of in our industry , um

24:36

, and it's not in other industries , and

24:38

so I I but but that

24:40

that idea of investing

24:43

in the business and buying enterprise software

24:45

is also alien , right

24:48

To many of us in the space , myself included

24:50

originally . So

24:52

I think it's that if

24:55

there's anything , it's like , what point do

24:57

we realize this is a

24:59

really good business and

25:01

I can scale this , and

25:03

what tools do I need to do that ? Something

25:06

really amazing happens when we start to

25:08

move into the world , away from Pace on Actuals

25:11

into Predictive , where your

25:13

teams can start to be working on June

25:15

, july and you

25:18

can start to look at campaign

25:20

performance rolled up in the future . And you

25:22

can actually start to look at your year in

25:24

a financial model , not like

25:27

in most QuickBooks or software , where

25:29

it's like year to date compared to last year

25:31

, right Like you can actually look at your full

25:33

year of everything booked and be like how

25:36

are we pacing right as a

25:38

company in our projected

25:40

financial performance this year and

25:42

what's that look like now ? And

25:46

that's a really fun

25:48

corner to watch clients take

25:50

right that change in mindset and

25:52

what that opens up for a business

25:54

, because I think

25:56

one thing that really annoys

25:58

me is is that you

26:01

don't see it like you don't , it doesn't happen anywhere

26:03

, like around you or any of your publications

26:06

. But but you know , there's still this belief

26:08

, I think , in the larger media

26:11

world , that podcasting is a backwater

26:13

or young or , you know , it hasn't figured itself

26:15

out yet , and that that

26:17

there aren't real businesses . You know what I mean there

26:19

and and that is not true

26:21

, there is , as you and I know , there's such diversity

26:24

and amazing new voices and content

26:26

and amazing companies coming out of this space

26:28

. But we are , we're

26:31

young , right , and we're still

26:33

finding our way , and I think it's . I'm so

26:35

fascinated to see what happens when , instead

26:38

of , you know , tv and film

26:40

trying to come into podcasting , it's

26:42

podcasting moving into those realms

26:45

, right , as these kinds of companies

26:47

stepping forward and saying we

26:49

have an audience , we know what that audience wants

26:51

more than other people do .

26:54

Where can people go to find out more

26:56

? Sean , they can go to flightpathfm .

26:57

I used to have a Twitter

27:00

but I sort of walked away from that . But

27:02

yeah , flightpathfm is probably the best place .

27:05

Sean Howard , thank you so much for your time . I really appreciate

27:07

it .

27:07

Oh , anytime man Appreciate you having me on .

27:09

From your daily newsletter , the

27:11

Pod News Weekly Review .

27:14

Right , James , time to zip around the world

27:16

. The UK media

27:18

regulator , Ofcom , has released data

27:21

on audio listening in the UK . What

27:24

came out of it wasn't great news

27:26

, James .

27:27

Well , it wasn't really great news . It was that

27:29

podcast listening isn't growing , apparently

27:32

, according to this data

27:34

. Having said that , the data

27:37

does show an incredible jump in

27:39

younger audiences . So younger

27:41

audiences spending much longer

27:43

with podcasts than before

27:46

is spending much longer with podcasts than before . So , from that point of view

27:48

, that

27:51

was some really good numbers that actually came out of it . There's

27:53

a ton of detail and I think one of

27:55

the most interesting parts

27:58

of the data

28:00

is just actually seeing

28:03

, firstly , that they published

28:05

the entire data , all

28:08

of the tables and stuff , online , which meant that people like Adam

28:11

Bowie , who enjoys

28:13

playing around with numbers for fun , he

28:15

ended up chewing through the

28:18

numbers and has pulled a ton of detail

28:20

out of it . So that's a good start

28:22

. But also , you know , yeah

28:25

, just having a look at some of the

28:27

data , the most popular

28:29

podcast genres in the UK entertainment

28:31

, followed by news and current affairs , followed

28:33

by comedy . Talking about exciting

28:36

data , the IAB released their IAB

28:38

Internet Advertising Revenue Report

28:40

. Internet audio is doing

28:42

better than the

28:44

whole of the internet . In

28:47

that internet ad revenue grew 7% . Internet

28:50

audio grew 19% . It's

28:52

7.2 billion dollars , which is

28:55

, from memory , something like 3% of

28:57

all of internet ad revenue

29:00

. So it's still quite small , but we'll learn

29:02

the actual podcast revenue numbers

29:04

on May , the 9th , because internet audio

29:06

, of course , is a little bit more than just

29:08

podcasting .

29:10

And staying down under with

29:12

you , james . The Australian podcast

29:14

Ranker for March was released . What happened

29:16

?

29:16

Yes , so Hamish Nandy is back to number one

29:19

. Amazing what happens when you release

29:21

a show , which

29:24

is what they were actually doing . They

29:27

hadn't released anything for January or for

29:29

February . Their first show

29:31

was actually released on February the 28th . So

29:33

, surprise , surprise , in March , hamish

29:36

and Andy returning to number one . One

29:38

thing I did spot is that the show used

29:40

to use very bad titles Hamish

29:43

and Andy 2023 , episode

29:45

240 . Useless

29:47

title . So now they're using

29:49

titles like the Amazing Hat Prank

29:52

, which is much better . So

29:54

well done them . The ABC's

29:56

Conversation is number one by total downloads

29:59

. What is interesting , though , is iHeart

30:01

here in Australia has been

30:03

promoting themselves as number one for

30:06

podcasts . They're

30:08

number one in one of the rankings and I can't quite

30:10

remember which , because , frankly

30:17

, I don't care , but anyway , one of the interesting things that's going

30:19

on here is that ARN is buying SCA , so ARN owns the iHeart

30:21

brand here . Sca

30:23

is their competitor . They own the listener

30:26

brand here , but what an

30:28

analyst from Morgan Stanley is saying

30:30

is that ARN would basically

30:32

jump away from iHeart , close

30:34

that app and use the

30:36

listener app instead , so

30:38

the listener app will be a

30:41

pretty big app in this particular

30:43

country . So , yeah , which is interesting

30:46

to see .

30:49

Never use a listening app . So and

30:51

who's Hamish and Andy ? I probably

30:53

should find out .

30:54

They do a very good show . It's worth

30:56

a listen to the Hamish and Andy podcast

30:58

, if only because it sounds like a radio

31:01

show and that's because it used to be a radio show but it

31:03

isn't anymore . But there's an awful lot of

31:05

user participation all the way through

31:07

. There's telephone calls , there's you

31:10

know , they have listeners in all

31:13

of that . Listener participation happens all the way

31:15

through and it's really unusual for a

31:17

podcast which is normally much

31:19

less so . So , yeah

31:22

, it's worth a listen .

31:24

Okay , Moving on events and

31:26

awards .

31:32

Quill was one of the winners of the Canadian Business Innovation Awards 2024

31:34

. Congratulations to Fatima and her team for that . The winners

31:36

of the Spanish language global

31:39

podcast Ondas Awards 2024

31:41

were announced , as well as

31:44

have the New York Festival's Radio Awards

31:46

. They

31:50

have also announced the winners . 23

31:58

gold winners and bloodlines from CBC and the BBC won a grand award there .

31:59

There's a shortlist . That's been announced , hasn't there ? Yeah , the shortlist for the Publisher

32:01

Podcast Awards has been announced . The winners

32:03

will be announced on June , the 12th in London

32:06

. And

32:10

a good idea . Each award category has a playlist to listen to the nominations . So you're going to be putting out an OPML

32:13

list , James ?

32:13

are you ? I will . I put out OPML

32:15

lists of winners , not shortlists

32:18

, but I really liked the idea that they've actually

32:20

bothered to produce a complete playlist

32:22

of each award category

32:24

so you can have a listen to the short lists

32:27

there . There

32:31

is also the Publisher Podcast Summit , which

32:33

is happening that day as well in June

32:35

.

32:36

I'm so glad you said that yes it's easy

32:38

to say , isn't it ?

32:41

There is also the

32:43

UK Audio Network , which

32:45

is , I believe , what UKAN stand

32:47

for . They have announced

32:50

that they've got some audio

32:52

awards as well . There

32:54

are some categories in there , including Podcast Producer

32:56

of the Year and Podcast Host of the Year , and that

32:58

sort of thing , and the Festival

33:00

of Media , M&M Global Awards

33:03

. Chocolate Awards Chocolate

33:05

.

33:05

Awards exactly . That's the only reason

33:07

I was excited about it . No , we

33:09

got contacted by ACAST

33:11

to alert us to this new award

33:13

. Well , it's not a

33:15

new award . The M&M Global Awards have been around

33:18

for a while , but they've

33:20

added podcasting as a new

33:22

category now to the awards

33:24

, and ACAST have sponsored

33:26

it . So I got on the blower

33:28

to Jeremy King , the CEO of the Global

33:30

M&M Festival , and spoke to Lizzie

33:33

Pollitt as well , from ACAST to tell us more

33:35

about what the M&M Global Awards are

33:37

about .

33:37

They are a awards program that

33:39

was set up 35 years ago to

33:42

celebrate , initially , the best

33:44

international media campaigns on

33:46

the planet , so any kind of advertising

33:49

, communications or media strategy

33:51

that was implemented for brands

33:53

ranging from automotive to

33:56

FMCG , to retail

33:58

, to finance , etc . So

34:00

just to kind of celebrate and showcase the amazing

34:02

work that happens in the global media

34:04

space .

34:06

So how did you get involved ?

34:09

Basically , we bought the M&M

34:11

Global Awards into our portfolio of awards

34:14

. We run another company called Fessler Media and

34:17

we decided that

34:19

it was an old heritage brand

34:21

. It was a typical B2B awards program

34:23

that had come out of B2B magazine and

34:25

we decided that

34:27

the magazine disappeared , so we thought we'll buy

34:30

the awards program . So we bought the awards program

34:32

in 2009 and

34:34

have been running it since then and

34:36

it's got a lot of old supporters

34:39

and it's starting to gain a new audience

34:41

now , which is one of the reasons why we are

34:43

creating new categories each year to ensure

34:45

we showcase the work that brands are doing in

34:47

the media space .

34:48

That sounds really cool . Now , obviously , this

34:50

is a show about podcasting , so

34:52

why are we talking about this award

34:55

when it sounds like , generically , it's

34:57

a media award ? Why are we talking about

34:59

it on a podcasting show ?

35:01

Because each year , when we are launching

35:03

our awards programs , we speak to the industry

35:06

to ensure that our categories

35:08

represent what is happening within

35:10

their campaigns , and one of the key

35:12

findings that popped out this year

35:14

was all around podcasts and how podcasts

35:17

are being used as a driver

35:19

or a focal point of a marketing and media

35:21

strategy . So we thought let's

35:23

create a new category . And Eminem

35:25

, although it's old , is also

35:27

always up for change and transformation . So

35:30

we felt this was the best program in our portfolio

35:32

to include a podcast category .

35:35

LP . I guess that's where you and ACAST

35:37

come in . How were you approached

35:40

and why have you got involved with this M&M

35:42

Global Festival ?

35:44

Well , I mean , why have I got involved ? First is

35:46

because we want to celebrate

35:48

and champion anything that raises a profile

35:50

of podcast advertising

35:52

and , as we all know , podcast

35:55

advertising is growing exponentially . More

35:57

and more advertisers are using podcasts in

36:00

unique and clever and creative

36:02

ways to reach their target audiences . But

36:04

we still know all of us know that podcasting

36:06

is still massively under-invested in when it comes

36:08

to advertising spend , and we want to change

36:11

that . So the minute Jeremy approached us

36:13

and I've worked in the advertising

36:15

industry in the UK for nearly 20 years

36:17

I know you can't believe it to look at me and

36:19

so I've been a close follower of the Eminem's work

36:21

in general and the Global Awards , and so it was obviously a

36:23

no-brainer for us as a cast to get involved

36:26

as soon as Jeremy got in touch with us . So , yeah

36:28

, looking forward to seeing how it evolves

36:30

, the entries and how we can celebrate all

36:33

the effectiveness that podcast advertising

36:35

brings she's such a professional .

36:37

I'll use the word entries then to ask Jeremy

36:39

and when are the entries ?

36:42

yes , so we are now open for entries

36:44

. We opened last week and we work

36:46

in three tiers . The idea is to encourage

36:49

people to hit deadlines , but inevitably everyone

36:51

leaves their work to the last minute . So if you

36:53

are on the bull and you want to enter early

36:56

and take advantage of a discounted price , then

36:58

you can enter by Thursday , the 25th

37:00

of April . If you miss that deadline , you

37:02

can enter by the 16th of May , and then

37:04

there is no discount if you enter on

37:06

the extended deadline , which is Thursday

37:08

, the 13th of June .

37:11

OK , so let's talk about the price for

37:14

entry . What is the cost for

37:16

entering the awards ?

37:17

Yes , so it's £390

37:19

for an early bird entry , £425

37:22

for a standard and £475

37:24

if you come to the extended deadline

37:27

.

37:28

Okay , and who's judging the awards

37:30

?

37:31

So , yes , good question , very good question . So

37:33

the judges 75%

37:36

to 85% of the judges will be global

37:38

brands , so those who are in the marketing

37:40

and media space , senior global execs

37:43

from anywhere from . I think we've got Unilever

37:45

, p&g , philips , samsung

37:48

, bayer and

37:50

Volvo signed up as part of the

37:52

jury so far . We then have

37:54

someone represented from each of the agency

37:56

media agency networks , and then we'll have a smattering

37:59

of independent agencies and maybe one or

38:01

two media owners involved as well .

38:04

So , lizzie , I assume you're going to be one of the judges

38:07

as well . I guess you would be I

38:09

hope so . It's massively awkward if you say that now

38:11

and jeremy says nah , yes

38:14

yeah , I thought I'd throw that in just

38:16

to make sure jeremy couldn't say no as it's

38:18

live . But is the podcast

38:20

category a single category

38:23

entry , or will there be subdivisions

38:25

within that category ? Because I mean , podcasting is

38:27

such a generic form . I mean

38:30

that to lump everything in one bag might

38:32

be a little bit big here's an exclusive

38:34

for you which I haven't even spoke to Lizzie about yet .

38:36

But this year it will be one single

38:38

category to enter . But the idea is

38:40

to see what work comes in this

38:42

year and what work's being done and then hopefully we

38:45

can then split that out into subsectors

38:47

and potentially create a podcast

38:49

awards program , which is something

38:52

we've done . Similarly , with our Cause

38:54

Campaign Awards program . We had a lot

38:56

of marketing campaigns coming in

38:58

for our Cause category so many in

39:00

fact it was so wide that we had to create a whole program

39:02

for it to ensure that it didn't kind

39:04

of mess with the rest of the categories .

39:07

When will the awards take place and where ?

39:09

Yes , so Thursday , the 19th of September

39:11

, we are looking to secure our venue

39:13

over the next couple of weeks in London . So it

39:16

will be somewhere in central London

39:18

, nice and easy . We do it because it's

39:20

a global awards ceremony . We do it at 12

39:22

pm UK time and

39:28

in the live space guests will turn up at 12 and enjoy some lunch and a few drinks

39:31

and some networking . Then we turn on our virtual audience from

39:33

different parts of the world and we have a kind

39:35

of cinema loungy , everyman

39:37

style setup for the awards program itself

39:39

.

39:39

so it's a hybrid event , but lots of good fun

39:42

if you're there in person as well now

39:44

lizzie , this is great that you're supporting this

39:46

and thank you for doing that ACAST

39:48

, but you've also been the recipient

39:51

of several nominations yourself , maybe

39:53

at the Webby's . Tell me more .

39:56

Yeah , that's right . We've picked up well between

39:58

13 and 16 , depending on how you count

40:00

them nominations at the Webby's , which

40:02

is exciting , and awards are interesting

40:04

. Having said that , I've worked in advertising for 20 years

40:06

. People have different views about awards . I'm

40:08

all for anything that celebrates it and

40:11

raises the profile of work as well

40:13

. So , um , you know , there's also we've

40:15

been nominated for , I think , the

40:17

highest number at the inaugural campaign audio

40:19

advertising awards as well , and I think

40:21

actually , what jeremy was saying just then is really interesting

40:23

, because there is one podcasting category right now

40:25

in the m&m Global Awards . But you know

40:27

what we're seeing ? There are so many different ways

40:30

to use podcasts to reach audiences

40:32

that I think it's really smart to think about

40:34

how we can expand these in the future , whether

40:36

that's using podcasts as part of

40:38

a wider media campaign or specifically

40:41

creating branded content within podcasts or

40:43

a whole branded series . So , yeah

40:45

, it's awards season and a

40:47

cast is putting in a good show across all of them , whether

40:49

that's our actual podcast , whether that's our work that

40:51

we're doing , or whether that's partnering with people like eminem

40:54

.

40:54

So , yeah , we love it and

40:57

the last question to you , lizzie . The

40:59

london podcast show is fast approaching . Um

41:02

what can we expect from a cast at the london

41:04

podcast show ?

41:06

well , here's an exclusive . I don't know

41:08

if this is not an exclusive , let's pretend it is . So

41:10

we've always had the a cast arms , which

41:12

is our own sort of pub because , being a british-based

41:15

podcast awards , we like to bring a bit of personality to it

41:17

, and we're actually bringing the a cast arms to the

41:20

show at the very front , so you'll see

41:22

it and that's the place where we're going to be meeting

41:24

People are able to network . We can hang with

41:26

our podcast as advertisers . We've got

41:28

loads of talks . We're bringing loads of talent

41:30

down podcasters . We've got actually

41:32

quite a few of our US team coming in , which is really exciting

41:35

. From Tiffany , who runs our US office , we're

41:37

also bringing Dan , who runs Higher Ground

41:39

, the Obama's podcast company . It's

41:42

going to be hard to miss us . We're really excited about

41:44

it . As ever , a lot of work to do between now and then , to

41:46

be honest .

41:48

And you're fast approaching a 10-year anniversary

41:50

. I hear Somebody at Podcast Movements

41:53

nudged me about it and we've got

41:55

Ross coming on the 24th , which is very exciting

41:57

to talk about it , but can you believe ? It's 10

41:59

years of ACAST .

42:01

I know it's weird , isn't it ? Because 10 years

42:03

in most industries feels very

42:06

young and podcasting is obviously very young

42:08

, but therefore to have been a whole decade

42:10

. When we invented dynamic ad insertion back

42:12

in 2014, . Did our

42:15

founders then think that podcasting would go

42:17

on this journey and ACAS would go on the journey that has

42:19

everything from growing to now having

42:21

over 100,000 shows , to being a public company

42:24

, to working with anyone and everyone

42:26

around the world ? It's going to be a real moment to celebrate

42:28

and reflect , I guess , not just on ACAST

42:31

growth , but how podcasting has grown

42:33

in that time and what's going to happen in the next

42:35

10 years .

42:36

Well , I'll ask Ross . Don't worry

42:38

, I will be asking Ross , what are you planning for the next

42:40

10 years , right ? So

42:47

I won't put that burden on you , but congratulations as well . Podtrack number one

42:49

global . So again we're all falling into place for you at the

42:51

moment .

42:51

LP . It's good , and I bet Jeremy's pleased

42:53

that he thought to ask us before all this stuff

42:55

kicked off . So he's there for a front seat for

42:57

the M&M Global Awards . I don't know if that's a good answer

42:59

. It just felt very PR-y to say guys .

43:03

No , I liked it , I

43:06

liked , no , I liked it , I liked it . I'm I'm very much looking forward

43:09

to the podcast show our office dam is actually in the same building as the

43:11

podcast show , so we'll be there .

43:12

We do a drinks the night before the show kicks off

43:14

. I'll add you to the list oh , thank

43:16

you now , before we all

43:19

go and celebrate something like the weekend again

43:21

. Jeremy , first of all , where's the website

43:24

? Where can people find more about these awards ? How can they submit their entries

43:26

? Yes , they . Where's the website ? Where can people find more about these awards ? How can

43:28

they ?

43:28

submit their entries . Yes , they would go to the

43:30

website , which is festalofmediacom

43:33

forward slash MMG .

43:36

Excellent and just remind me very

43:38

quickly submission dates and event

43:40

date .

43:41

Yes , of course , event date is the 19th

43:44

of September . Of

43:48

course , event date is the 19th of september and , in terms of submissions , we've got the three deadlines

43:50

of the 25th of april , the 16th of may and

43:52

the 13th of june excellent

43:55

.

43:55

Thanks lp , thanks jeremy , thanks

43:57

sam nice to see you .

43:58

See you , what if I didn't see before ?

44:00

see you at the podcast show podcast

44:02

events on the pod news weekly

44:04

review so there's

44:07

a ton of events coming

44:09

up .

44:09

Crossed Wires in Sheffield

44:11

in the UK , lots of podcasters

44:14

there . Uni Podfest at Birmingham

44:16

City University in the UK in

44:19

early June . The

44:21

next event that I will be at is the

44:23

podcast show in London , which

44:26

is the 22nd to the 23rd

44:28

of May . You can watch

44:30

this show going out live towards

44:32

the end of that . You can watch me doing

44:35

an opening keynote right at the beginning of

44:38

that . So that should be fun

44:40

as well , and we might

44:43

have some drinks as well and things like that . So why

44:45

not ?

44:46

Yes , we have our drinks

44:48

confirmed , james , the night before

44:50

Tuesday , the 21st of May . I'll

44:53

put out details later , but

44:55

yes , put it in your diary if you think you're

44:57

going to come along . If you came along last year , you're

45:00

probably coming along this year , so

45:02

put it in your diary , that's all I'd say and weekly

45:04

at podnewsnet .

45:05

If we've got any spaces , then

45:07

we'd love to hear from you Weekly at podnewsnet

45:10

. We'll find that that's going to your Gmail

45:12

at the moment , sam , and I should update that

45:14

to go to the email

45:16

account that you actually use . That would be helpful

45:18

, wouldn't it ?

45:19

Well , I look at both . Still , I

45:22

still look at both , you're okay ? Oh well , there you go , you don't have to change

45:24

.

45:25

And also there's a podcast week

45:27

coming up in Berlin , september

45:30

the 10th to the 15th . I should say

45:32

that actually , spotify has just held another

45:34

event in Berlin this

45:36

week . It was the event that I was speaking at

45:38

last year . A

45:40

very good event . I'm desperately trying to

45:42

remember its name but I can't . But

45:56

it was a very good , big event . They do an

45:58

event for podcasting one day , an event for music the next day , and so

46:00

if you were there then I hope it was a the Power

46:03

Up Podcast Summit . It's

46:05

$100 Canadian dollars for you to go

46:07

. Lots and lots of people

46:10

speaking on Sunday afternoon in Toronto

46:12

at the Westin Harbour

46:15

Bridge , harbour Castle , harbour

46:17

something . Anyway , it's the old

46:19

hotel close

46:21

to Union Station . I'll

46:27

be there . If you would like to be there , then Radio Days North America is what you want to

46:29

be typing into your web browser and you'll find more information about the podcast

46:32

power up summit

46:34

. And there are more events , both paid for and free

46:36

, at Pod News Virtual events or events

46:38

in a place with people . If you're organising something

46:41

, it's free to be listed .

46:42

Podnewsnet slash events the

46:44

tech stuff on the Pod

46:46

News Weekly Review .

46:48

Yes , it's the stuff you'll find every Monday in the Pod News

46:50

newsletter . Here's where Sam talks technology

46:52

. What have you got for us this week , Sam ?

46:53

I was on as a guest on

46:56

Mark Asquith's show called

46:58

In and Around Podcasting and of

47:00

course I said podcast apps are

47:02

struggling because nobody pays for them

47:04

and probably you're going to see a

47:06

few of them fail . And then you go and

47:08

put out , don't you ? You just had to

47:10

put it out there . Yes , pocket casts

47:12

have 50 000 subscribers

47:15

who pay them . So there , that

47:17

told me , didn't it that ?

47:19

told you . Well . Well , I

47:21

think I can possibly rescue you here

47:23

, because I I didn't say I

47:25

said that Pocket Casts has over

47:28

50,000 subscribers . I'm

47:31

a subscriber to Pocket Casts and I don't pay

47:33

because I was grandfathered

47:35

in to Pocket Casts Plus . I

47:37

don't know how many people were grandfathered in

47:39

. It might be 40,000 for

47:41

all I know . So

47:43

my suspicion and

47:45

I'm just being slightly rude here , but my suspicion

47:48

is yes , they've got 50,000 subscribers

47:50

to Pocket Casts Plus , but I don't

47:53

think all 50,000 of them pay . Even

47:55

so , it's a really nice number , isn't

47:57

it ? It is , and

48:00

I did get agreement

48:02

from them that I could actually mention

48:04

that . They also wanted me to say but

48:07

a little bit too late that there's 50%

48:09

off in most countries at the moment . So if

48:11

you want to get

48:13

a Pocket Casts subscription , then

48:16

go for it . You can get 50%

48:19

off right now in

48:22

your favourite app store .

48:24

Now , data newly available from

48:26

OP3 and published by

48:28

the podcast Business Journal shows that the

48:31

big three podcast apps Apple

48:33

, amazon and Spotify account

48:35

for 74% of all downloads

48:37

for the over 2,000

48:39

shows measured that are currently on OP3

48:42

. That sounded very good as well , didn't it ? 74%

48:45

.

49:00

Well , yeah it , 74%

49:02

slash data . Now

49:04

, I think that that might be a little bit

49:06

high given the data

49:09

that we've seen from Buzzsprout , from other

49:11

podcast hosts , and

49:13

John Spurlock is very keen . He says

49:16

there are about 2,000 podcasts

49:18

being measured by OP3 . He's

49:21

very keen that you don't look at it for

49:24

an overall view of the

49:26

entire industry . But I'm going to do

49:28

that anyway and I

49:30

think Extrapolate

49:33

, extrapolate . Well , it makes the point . I

49:35

think , from my point of view , it makes

49:37

the point that basically

49:40

, those three big apps I mean to be fair

49:43

, those two big apps , spotify and Apple Podcasts

49:45

big

49:49

apps , I mean to be fair , those two big apps , spotify and Apple

49:51

Podcasts , are still so large and anything that we want to do , it's important

49:54

to at least think

49:56

what happens if we can't

49:58

get Spotify and Apple Podcasts

50:00

doing that as well , because that's

50:02

just those two . Spotify

50:04

and Apple Podcasts are more than 75%

50:07

of all downloads right now , and

50:11

you know 1.27% , by the

50:13

way , for Google Podcasts , 1.17%

50:16

for Amazon Music , and this

50:18

is over the last 30 days

50:20

. Does YouTube

50:22

.

50:22

Get a mention in there at all .

50:24

YouTube does . But of course YouTube is different

50:26

because YouTube mostly is

50:28

playing its own videos and so therefore

50:31

isn't listed . In the same

50:33

way , youtube Music will be listed

50:35

in here because

50:37

YouTube Music also plays RSS

50:40

feeds . It

50:44

is number 32 in the list at 0.13%

50:48

, but then , you know , most of

50:50

the playbacks from YouTube music

50:52

are actually going to be directly YouTube

50:54

videos anyway . So I'm not

50:56

quite sure how much we can , you know , look

50:58

into that . But yeah , I mean , there's

51:00

a bunch of data , but

51:03

I think it's just interesting keeping an

51:05

eye on this data and

51:07

reminding ourselves that

51:09

everybody jumps

51:12

up and down and says we don't have

51:14

accurate minute by minute stats

51:16

for podcast listening . Well

51:19

, we do , for 75% of all

51:21

podcast listening , because both Spotify and

51:23

Apple podcasts will give you that data , because

51:27

both Spotify and Apple Podcasts will give you that data . If you're wanting demographics

51:29

data , it might be skewed , but 45% of all of your downloads

51:31

have demographics data there , because

51:34

45% of all of your downloads are

51:36

coming through Spotify . So

51:38

actually we've got an awful lot of

51:40

this data anyway , and

51:42

I wonder how much we are

51:44

flailing ourselves

51:46

saying that we don't have good enough stats

51:49

when we have minute by minute

51:51

data for both Apple Podcasts and for Spotify

51:54

and therefore for 75% of all downloads

51:56

out there . So perhaps

52:00

we should stop thinking about that and start

52:03

focusing on other things that matter a little bit more

52:05

Indeed .

52:06

One of the things that jumped out at me was Castbox

52:09

is the biggest independent podcast app , at number

52:11

four , which was quite surprising .

52:12

Yes , yes , well , and there's

52:15

whatever app is still using Apple

52:17

Core Media , and I mean that's

52:19

something that at some

52:21

point it would be lovely to get

52:23

rid of all of those Apple Core medias because they are

52:26

still 2.7%

52:29

. But yes , castbox , the biggest independent

52:31

, at number four 2.23%

52:33

currently and Overcast at number

52:35

five 2.17% and

52:38

our friends at Pocket Cast at number six with

52:40

just about 2% . So

52:42

, yeah , there's an awful lot of fighting for

52:44

the long tail there .

52:46

Now question for you , James Should

52:48

apps have a paid service

52:50

? I mean , is Pocket Cast proving

52:53

that there is a market for

52:55

subscriptions for podcast

52:58

apps ?

52:59

Well , I mean , overcast also has a paid-for service

53:01

as well , as does Podcast

53:03

Addict . I'm not so

53:05

sure about CastBox I've not used

53:07

it and I can't

53:10

remember whether or not it does but

53:12

you know , a developer needs to eat at some

53:14

point , and whether or not you put

53:16

adverts in the app

53:18

, as Podcast Addict does a

53:20

little bit , or whether or not you do

53:22

something else , like you know

53:24

, fountain or Podverse of sharing a little

53:27

bit of the support which

53:29

is sent , but

53:31

developers do need to eat , so you

53:34

know . However , you end up paying

53:36

for . It would be an interesting

53:38

plan . Obviously , you've got open tools

53:41

like AntennaPod , number 14

53:43

in this list , which is a complete open source

53:46

tool that anybody can

53:48

download and use on Android

53:50

. But yeah , I mean , I think

53:52

we need to work out how these

53:55

apps end up earning

53:57

their money , because I

53:59

think that that's , you know , obviously an important

54:01

thing .

54:02

One of the things I've started to

54:04

talk about is podcasting , being a second

54:07

class digital citizen to music

54:10

and films and books , because

54:12

the expectation on the user is that they will

54:14

pay for music . I wonder whether

54:17

Apple making their app free and

54:28

making podcasting free

54:30

is the reason . Could

54:33

Apple suddenly turn on

54:35

a ? You have to pay 99

54:38

cents for a podcast , like

54:40

they did with music ? Could that change

54:42

the model so that apps themselves

54:45

could actually then change the model , Because we're

54:48

strapped by the very fact that you can't change

54:50

it because everyone will go oh well , I'll just use Apple

54:52

then , Because there's always a free version

54:55

somewhere else to use . Is Apple

54:57

the reason why we can't actually charge

54:59

for podcasting ?

55:01

Well , I mean , you know , I don't know , I

55:03

would say , on the other side , apple have made

55:06

it very easy for you to charge

55:08

for a podcast as a creator , if you

55:10

want to . Apple clearly keeps a

55:12

chunk of that , nearly a third of

55:15

that money . So

55:17

that's Apple's business model . They're not

55:19

giving that product away for free . I

55:21

mean you also have to buy an Apple phone

55:23

as well . Zach

55:26

will be proud of me . Did you notice ? I just called

55:28

it an Apple phone there .

55:29

Yes , not a toy phone . Yeah , yeah

55:31

, your Google fandom is slipping

55:33

.

55:33

Yeah he'll be proud of me for that

55:36

. So yeah

55:38

, so I don't know . I mean , I think

55:40

there is always something there for a completely

55:42

free app like Antenapod

55:45

, which has no advertising

55:47

in it , which is not there to do anything other

55:49

than just be a good app . But

55:51

I think it's also absolutely fair for

55:54

all of these services , whether it's Spotify , which

55:56

, of course , is also free if you want to

55:58

use it that way , you

56:01

know , I think that's absolutely fine

56:03

too , and I think it would absolutely

56:05

harm the industry if we were to start

56:08

putting paywalls in front of podcasts .

56:10

Yeah , but maybe remove the ads . Anyway

56:12

, let's move on . We'll never make

56:14

that decision here right now . Pocketcast

56:18

we talked about it briefly 7.61

56:20

, which launched on Android and iOS

56:22

with super chapters , but the other thing that

56:25

was announced was they've moved to

56:27

Podping rather than a WebSub

56:29

.

56:29

Oh , have they . I didn't even

56:31

know that . Where has

56:34

this information come ?

56:35

from .

56:35

It comes from Ellie directly actually

56:37

, so yes , the Podping

56:39

support Podping support already live on our server

56:42

. Well , there you go . There's a thing

56:44

I had no idea . I'm

56:47

imagining that they're still using websharp under the hood as well , but they are supporting

56:49

both websharp and podping as

56:52

signals , which makes perfect

56:54

sense . Well , there you go .

56:56

I'll uh , I'll copy and paste

56:58

that into a into

57:01

a newsletter for monday , uh , and

57:03

we talked a little bit about OSHA . They

57:06

are adding their transcript service

57:08

. The tool creates Apple Podcasts compatible

57:10

transcripts , and transcripts are available in

57:12

99 languages , which is quite

57:14

interesting as well .

57:15

Yes , and , by the way , Apple Podcasts

57:18

transcripts aren't available in

57:20

99 languages . So

57:22

therefore , obviously , the question there

57:25

is going to be what happens for

57:27

Apple Podcasts if it

57:29

sees a transcript which

57:31

is available in , I don't know , Norwegian

57:33

or Swedish or

57:36

Scots Gaelic that

57:38

it doesn't support ? Presumably

57:41

, it just won't appear in Apple Podcasts

57:44

, whereas it will appear in tools like

57:46

Podcast Addict or

57:48

Podcast Guru .

57:50

Now Podcasting 2.0 has

57:52

a new logo , guy Martin

57:54

who produced it . Congratulations , james

57:57

. What are your thoughts on it ?

57:58

Yes , I think it's very smart . I think it's very clever as

58:00

well in that it's got if

58:03

you look carefully at it , you can see it's an ear

58:05

, you can see an RSS icon

58:07

in it . You can see potentially

58:10

hints of the Apple Podcasts logo

58:13

in there as well . But

58:15

, more to the point , it's built

58:17

with three characters , it's built with 2.0

58:20

, if you look at it carefully

58:22

. So , it's a really nice logo . It's

58:25

a logo that anyone can use . Podcast

58:28

Standards Project is , of course , different , but this

58:30

logo anyone can use . If you are

58:32

supporting Podcasting 2.0 in

58:35

some way shape or form or your podcast

58:37

is , so that's a lovely thing

58:39

. There's a full website with lots of information

58:41

about how the whole thing works . My plan

58:43

for PodNews is to put

58:45

a little Podcasting 2.0

58:48

badge on

58:50

any podcast that is using

58:52

a Podcasting 2.0 tag

58:54

in some way , shape or form , which , to

58:57

be fair , will be most of them right now , given

59:00

that transcripts are

59:02

so popular and

59:05

given that there are a lot of other support

59:07

for other tags in there as well . So

59:10

, yeah , I think it's a really smart , modern

59:12

looking logo . Listen to me , how old do

59:14

I sound ? It's a modern looking logo , but

59:18

yes , I think it'll be very nice . It will

59:20

be on the 2.0

59:23

website shortly . There

59:26

is a change

59:30

which has been already put forward

59:32

, but I'm not brave

59:35

enough to press the button that says go and

59:37

rebuild this entire website . I'm

59:39

leaving that to Daniel , and I

59:41

think Daniel is just making sure that everything

59:44

is as correct as he wants it

59:46

to be prior to it going live .

59:48

Excellent . So where were you , grandad

59:50

, when the new logo came out ? Well , let me

59:52

tell you children yes , there

59:54

you go Now . Production

59:57

tool Alitu now includes magic

59:59

filters . What are magic filters , james ?

1:00:02

They get rid of ums , errs , filler words and long

1:00:04

silences . It's

1:00:11

a bit like what Descript has done and that's um , completely automatic

1:00:13

, uh , which is very nice . They've also added video calling so you can see your

1:00:15

guest . It doesn't record the video yet , but , um , if you're uh

1:00:18

just having a conversation , then um , uh

1:00:20

, it'll record the audio , but at least you can see your

1:00:22

guest now , which is nice . And

1:00:25

CasterPod has released a new version , version

1:00:28

1.11 . That's a

1:00:30

bag of Richards , and

1:00:33

CasterPod is supporting

1:00:35

transcripts and support for the podcast

1:00:37

trailer tag . Not a moment

1:00:40

too soon so far as I'm concerned . So

1:00:42

that's all good news . Activitypub

1:00:45

is um , dave and Adam

1:00:47

are getting very , very excited by

1:00:49

. I tell you what . As soon as I can actually

1:00:52

understand what it is that I should be doing

1:00:54

, I will be . I will be , um

1:00:56

, trying to get involved in activity

1:00:58

pub as much as I can . I still

1:01:00

don't really understand it , other than everybody is saying

1:01:03

activity pub , activity pub , activity pub

1:01:05

, um , so , uh

1:01:07

, yeah , so I'm looking forward to understanding it a

1:01:10

little bit more . But

1:01:13

Podfriend , peertube , antennapod

1:01:15

, working on Activity Pub

1:01:17

things .

1:01:18

They're already yeah , they're already putting

1:01:20

out comments and zaps into

1:01:23

the social interact tag via

1:01:25

the activity pub protocol . So

1:01:27

that's pretty good . Stephen Crader

1:01:29

created a little tool called Podcast

1:01:32

AP , which basically

1:01:34

allows you to follow a podcast

1:01:37

in the activity pub . It's basically

1:01:39

building on Dave Jones's original

1:01:41

work , but it's creating a nice

1:01:43

UI so you can import an OPML

1:01:46

if you want and you can search for podcasts

1:01:48

, music feeds , and then when you

1:01:50

follow them in your AP

1:01:52

client , your activity pub client , you'll then

1:01:54

get a notification if there's a new episode

1:01:57

or there's a new music track or whatever

1:01:59

. So the

1:02:01

fundamental thing , james , is that

1:02:03

you have to not

1:02:05

think of ActivityPub so

1:02:08

much as a social network

1:02:10

, as more of a messaging backbone

1:02:12

. So it has an inbox and outbox

1:02:15

metaphor . So the outbox and

1:02:17

inbox is really where messages get

1:02:19

sent to . So when

1:02:22

you look at what Dave Jones has done , he's

1:02:24

basically posting

1:02:26

to your inbox in

1:02:28

your activity pub saying oh

1:02:31

yes , there's a new episode of Pod News Daily

1:02:33

, for example . And when

1:02:35

he is sending that , it's basically

1:02:38

a verb called follow that you've connected

1:02:40

to . That's the activity stream verb and

1:02:42

it comes from his outbox because he's

1:02:45

getting a notification via pod ping to say

1:02:47

that the episode has been updated

1:02:49

. So his outbox sends

1:02:52

you a message to your inbox to

1:02:54

tell you that something's happened , and that's

1:02:56

all it is .

1:02:56

It's an inbox outbox messaging

1:02:58

backbone and that's what activity pub

1:03:01

is right , I'm still none the I'm

1:03:03

still none the wiser in terms of how

1:03:06

you could use it for podcasting . It did strike

1:03:08

me that if you

1:03:10

were going to use this as a

1:03:12

tool to store where

1:03:14

your podcast subscriptions are so

1:03:18

that other people can see what podcast you're subscribed

1:03:20

to but , more to the point , you

1:03:22

can actually . You know , other people can

1:03:25

also jump in and go oh

1:03:32

, I wonder what Adam's listening to now , or I wonder what Sam's listening to now . It struck me

1:03:34

that that is also a thing

1:03:36

that could essentially store

1:03:38

all of the shows that you have listened

1:03:41

to and how far you got through them and

1:03:48

how far you got through them , which you could then essentially just flick between different

1:03:51

podcast apps , and it would know exactly what you subscribe to , where you'd got to in each

1:03:53

specific show , and

1:03:55

so you , as true fans

1:03:57

, don't need to keep massive , great

1:03:59

big , you know databases anymore , because

1:04:01

you could literally , just , for every user

1:04:03

, just read that information off

1:04:06

their activity pub um

1:04:08

information somehow . But I'm not quite

1:04:10

sure how that bit works either okay

1:04:12

, so let's take a step back , could it ? could it

1:04:15

actually do that ?

1:04:16

yes , it could , I don't think

1:04:18

it will do that , or I don't think the apps

1:04:20

will want it to do that , because , fundamentally

1:04:22

, giving away all the app data . But

1:04:25

let me step it back for a second . So

1:04:27

you play a podcast , right , that's

1:04:29

a signal . And I follow you

1:04:32

on Activity , pub Mastodon

1:04:34

, let's say , now , that can then

1:04:36

be published by you . So

1:04:38

the app will , with your permission

1:04:40

, publish that from the app's outbox

1:04:43

your activity to your

1:04:46

inbox in Modon , right

1:04:48

? So it says james has now

1:04:50

played , don't know , uh , pod

1:04:52

news weekly , uh , and you can

1:04:54

say how long the time he's played it . Maybe

1:04:56

you gave some value , so you actually

1:04:58

paid some sats or whatever it may be . All

1:05:01

of that is a signal . I follow you on

1:05:03

mastodon . Oh right , james has

1:05:05

boosted . Right , let me go and have a look

1:05:08

and I can have a link back to it . So

1:05:10

in step one , basically , what

1:05:12

we want to do is create a number

1:05:14

of activity verbs in apps . We all

1:05:16

have to agree on that . It's like a namespace

1:05:18

, and then we will then

1:05:20

say , right , you can publish

1:05:23

all of these , some of these , none of these . It

1:05:25

depends on the user , but

1:05:27

it's a signal to people who

1:05:29

follow you of what you're doing . So

1:05:32

that's step one . Step two is that

1:05:34

we have the creator , the

1:05:36

podcaster , use the social interact

1:05:39

tag as the central repository for

1:05:41

where they want all the comments for that show

1:05:43

or episode to be placed , where

1:05:45

they want all the comments for that show or episode to be placed

1:05:47

. Now I can

1:05:50

make a boost in True Fans and you can make a boost in Fountain while we listen to the same

1:05:52

podcast episode . They all appear in the social interact

1:05:54

tag and a bit like a pod ping , but

1:05:56

it's not that the other apps

1:05:58

can then listen to that social interact tag

1:06:00

location in the ActivityPod

1:06:03

client and pull back other

1:06:05

comments that aren't from their

1:06:07

app , ergo cross app comments

1:06:09

. So there's a number of steps . One

1:06:12

, the first step , really is just to say look

1:06:14

, we want to put out a signal that says

1:06:16

somebody's doing something in a podcast app

1:06:18

who I follow . I'm interested in

1:06:20

that and therefore I might then click

1:06:22

on a link and go and do the same thing and listen

1:06:25

to that podcast as well . So it's a

1:06:27

way of trying to get a signal

1:06:29

out of apps to a

1:06:31

social network , in effect , where

1:06:33

I can then come back and see something

1:06:36

. So that's what step

1:06:38

one is . And step two , then , is towards cross-app

1:06:40

comments . But it can be more . It could be ratings

1:06:43

, it could be reviews , it could be follows , it could

1:06:45

be many other verbs , not just

1:06:47

a simple . You know , somebody's

1:06:51

made a comment on one app and somebody's made the same or similar comment for

1:06:53

that episode on another app .

1:06:55

Yeah Gosh . Well , there you go . It's

1:06:58

clearly going to be a thing as soon

1:07:00

as anybody , can you know , I'm

1:07:02

just , I'm , you know , really interested in

1:07:05

following it . Anybody , can you know ? I'm just , I'm , you

1:07:07

know , really interested in following it . At the moment , my social

1:07:09

interact tag points to my own Mastodon

1:07:11

server and points to a post that

1:07:13

I put there automatically every single

1:07:15

time . But it strikes me that the activity

1:07:18

pub thing

1:07:20

that Dave has been working on is completely

1:07:23

automatic and I mean , and I

1:07:25

mean could link to uh , I

1:07:27

could link to that automatically as well . So

1:07:29

I don't really know what it is that I

1:07:31

should be linking to . Um , probably

1:07:34

my own .

1:07:34

but uh , the two are

1:07:36

separate . One is one is telling you

1:07:39

or telling people who want to follow your show

1:07:41

that there's an update , that's . That's a

1:07:43

verb that I follow . So

1:07:46

I want to know if James Cridland updates Pod News Daily and at what time , and

1:07:49

I can jump on that and the minute I get that signal

1:07:51

. But the other one is you

1:07:53

, when you broadcast Pod News

1:07:55

Daily as a podcast , I can

1:07:57

leave a comment and that could be

1:07:59

in your social interact tag as well , and

1:08:02

that's all it is . So the two are

1:08:04

separate things .

1:08:06

Okay , well , is this is what I think

1:08:08

? This is why it's hurting my head . So I'm

1:08:10

looking , I'm looking forward to learning a little bit more .

1:08:12

Um so , and uh see

1:08:14

, see what I can do there well , if you're interested

1:08:17

, there's a full discussion going to happen on friday

1:08:19

night , because I'm on the show with adam and dave

1:08:21

ah , yes , yes , well

1:08:23

, I will be .

1:08:24

I will be having a listen as I trundle around the supermarket

1:08:26

on Saturday , in that case .

1:08:28

Okay , uh , now

1:08:30

the other couple of quick things . Uh , happy birthday

1:08:33

to Pixel Fed . It's six years old and

1:08:35

PubKit , which I think you will want

1:08:37

to get hold of , james , is a testing

1:08:40

tool for anyone who wants to create activity

1:08:42

, pub andub and ActivityStream

1:08:44

services . So

1:08:46

it's free and it just came out yesterday

1:08:49

, so that'll be quite interesting to play with . And

1:08:52

I'm guessing that none of this ActivityPub stuff

1:08:54

makes the cut , so it doesn't really matter .

1:08:56

Moving on , who

1:09:00

knows , it might make the cut .

1:09:02

Yeah , I'm not holding my breath on this one Right

1:09:05

now . Moving moving on a side job linked

1:09:07

posted on mastodon that you can get the rss

1:09:09

feed for a specific youtube channel

1:09:12

from a lesser known endpoint

1:09:14

, um . So I've put that

1:09:16

in there , um , and also

1:09:18

he said he put in there . I've

1:09:21

not validated the feed , but it sounds like you

1:09:23

have . Yeah , I checked and it wasn't a fully formed feed

1:09:25

. I don't think it's

1:09:27

a good source for their podcast , but maybe

1:09:29

some man in the middle transformation could improve

1:09:32

it , like James . So I think he's

1:09:34

looking at you , james , for some saviour

1:09:37

work to be done on that .

1:09:38

Well , I'll tell you about that

1:09:40

particular , the particular

1:09:43

RSS feed . So

1:09:48

, looking at it , I mean A it's not an RSS feed , so let's get that out of the way

1:09:50

. It doesn't have an item tag

1:09:52

in it . It's got an entry tag

1:09:54

. It doesn't have a channel tag

1:09:56

. It's not an RSS feed , but it is a feed

1:09:59

which is in

1:10:01

XML , and that feed

1:10:03

, which is in XML , doesn't contain

1:10:05

the enclosure tag , so obviously

1:10:07

you can't download the audio . One

1:10:10

of the things it does do is it contains

1:10:12

view numbers , which

1:10:15

is nice . It contains ratings

1:10:18

as well , so you can actually pull the ratings

1:10:20

of each individual show from

1:10:23

there . It includes the descriptions

1:10:26

and the you know artwork

1:10:29

and all that kind of stuff too , and

1:10:32

obviously links to the actual video

1:10:36

as well . So I mean , it's usable

1:10:39

to an extent in

1:10:41

terms of how it might work , seems

1:10:44

to be for channels only

1:10:46

, so I'm wondering whether or not it works

1:10:48

for a playlist rather

1:10:51

than for a channel , because it would be

1:10:53

rather more useful if it worked as a playlist

1:10:55

. That said , you can't

1:10:58

actually see the main Pod News playlist

1:11:01

in YouTube anymore

1:11:03

for some reason , and I

1:11:05

don't know why . I'm

1:11:08

sure there's a good reason for that , but

1:11:11

yes , so I

1:11:14

mean it's certainly worth a peek at

1:11:16

, but I'm not quite sure how you could use it as

1:11:18

an RSS feed for a podcast

1:11:20

app , because there's no media

1:11:23

there to actually play Right .

1:11:25

Oh well , I just thought it was a nice

1:11:27

little bit of a find from Cy

1:11:29

Jobling , but maybe

1:11:32

it's just a bit of XML lying around

1:11:34

in YouTube .

1:11:35

I mean , you know it's some useful XML

1:11:37

, you

1:11:40

know . So from that point of view that's kind

1:11:43

of handy . I'm confused

1:11:45

as to why the Pod News Daily isn't

1:11:47

available in

1:11:49

our own YouTube channel

1:11:52

and the Pod News Weekly Review is but

1:11:54

not the Pod News Daily . For some reason

1:11:56

that's not marked as a podcast in

1:11:58

there , even though it is . So

1:12:01

who knows what's going on and

1:12:03

, frankly , does anybody care ?

1:12:04

Yes , Moving

1:12:06

on then , podcast app

1:12:09

for those who love the terminal window that might be

1:12:11

you , james Tailcast is a free

1:12:13

download using Rust . There you

1:12:15

go .

1:12:18

Yes , it's madness . And Odyssey is doing

1:12:20

some clever things with AI . They've

1:12:23

partnered with Eleven Labs to make them lots of synthetic voices , so they don't

1:12:25

have to pay DJs anymore . And they've partnered with Eleven Labs to make them lots of synthetic voices , so they don't have to pay DJs anymore . And they've

1:12:28

partnered with a company called Super Hi-Fi

1:12:30

which will play all of

1:12:32

the songs for them , so they don't have to pay

1:12:34

any music directors

1:12:36

anymore . So hooray for Odyssey

1:12:39

Microphones

1:12:41

. Tons of

1:12:43

new microphones happening

1:12:46

. You're very excited , I think , about

1:12:48

the new Rode Interview Pro

1:12:50

microphone .

1:12:51

Well , I'm not because I'm not going to buy one , but

1:12:54

I like the idea because it uses the

1:12:56

wireless GoPros , so

1:12:59

the ones that I've got , the little square ones

1:13:01

, if you wanted

1:13:03

to have a handheld microphone

1:13:05

that worked while you're roaming

1:13:07

. This is now the new mic and

1:13:10

it basically pairs up with

1:13:12

the little square road

1:13:14

wireless mics . And

1:13:16

also , if you want , for some strange reason

1:13:18

, if you want , you can also carry your roadcaster

1:13:21

pro 2 or duo and link a wireless

1:13:23

mic to it as well , so I

1:13:25

can see where it fits in in the roster

1:13:28

. If somebody wants to do interviews

1:13:30

with a mic and just hand a mic forward

1:13:32

and not have to hand their little square wireless

1:13:35

GoPro to someone's lapel , then

1:13:37

it's quite a nice little tool .

1:13:39

Yeah , I'm sure that we will be seeing it for

1:13:41

TV news cameras and

1:13:44

camera teams and those sorts of

1:13:46

people . I'm sure that we'll see it on screen , where

1:13:50

I can see that microphone being used , a wireless

1:13:52

mic that also happens to record as well

1:13:54

. Well , great , that looks like a really good plan

1:13:56

.

1:13:57

The other thing that they did bring out with there was some

1:13:59

nice rigs . So for your iPhone , you

1:14:01

can now , if you've got a magnetic

1:14:04

case , um , I think the iphone

1:14:06

12 plus . So yours , james yes

1:14:08

, mine does you can attach . You

1:14:11

can attach this new uh road

1:14:13

uh frame to the back and then you

1:14:15

can put your wireless go pros on the back

1:14:18

and other bits and pieces , so it looks very

1:14:20

nice . I mean again , it's a nice way of putting

1:14:22

all your kit around your iPhone

1:14:24

and being able to carry it very easy .

1:14:27

Yeah , it looks very good . You can't do that with those toy

1:14:29

Android phones , can you ? No , you've

1:14:32

changed , james .

1:14:33

No more Google YouTube . Oh

1:14:36

, you've changed .

1:14:38

Shure have released the MV7 Plus microphone

1:14:41

, which is much the same as the MV7 that I normally

1:14:43

use , except it's got a USB-C connection and a fancier LED display , which is much the same as the MV7 that I normally

1:14:45

use , except it's got a USB-C connection and a fancier LED display

1:14:47

, which is nice . And Lewitt

1:14:49

we covered this yesterday Lewitt has

1:14:51

a fancy microphone

1:14:54

called the Ray microphone

1:14:56

and , in case you've wondered what

1:14:58

it sounds like , it sounds like this because

1:15:00

I'm using one right now and

1:15:03

what it does , sam , which is

1:15:05

very clever . It's got two different functions

1:15:07

on it . One of the functions is it's got

1:15:09

a mute thing so

1:15:12

that if you are a

1:15:14

little bit further away from the microphone , then

1:15:16

instead of it sounding awful , it will just mute

1:15:18

you completely , so you can just lean to one

1:15:20

side and cough if you want and it will just automatically

1:15:23

mute . But also , I

1:15:25

mean the more important thing is it's got this

1:15:27

LiDAR thing in . It's got a laser

1:15:29

inside it . It's got a freaking laser

1:15:31

inside it and what it does

1:15:34

is that it works out how far you

1:15:36

are away from the microphone . A

1:15:38

typical microphone will have proximity effect

1:15:41

and proximity effect is when you're very

1:15:43

close to the microphone , everything all becomes

1:15:45

sounding very bassy and

1:15:47

very you know you can tell that

1:15:50

you're really close to the

1:15:52

microphone , whereas this has

1:15:54

got none of that , because if you're nice

1:15:57

and close to the microphone , as I am right now , then

1:15:59

it knows that and it applies EQ

1:16:02

and other things to fix

1:16:04

that . But if I was to go

1:16:06

back , if I was

1:16:08

to go back a whole arm's length away

1:16:10

from this microphone , then what

1:16:12

you'll notice is that it

1:16:15

sounds a little bit more echoey because I'm

1:16:17

in a very untreated room , but

1:16:20

it still sounds pretty good . It's upped

1:16:22

the volume , it's changed the EQ

1:16:24

, it's changed the way that it works

1:16:26

and you know

1:16:29

, as a microphone it's much more

1:16:31

forgiving about how close

1:16:33

you are to the mic or how far away you

1:16:35

are from the mic than most microphones

1:16:37

are . And I , as I said

1:16:39

in my review that I posted yesterday

1:16:41

, I said that this is the perfect microphone

1:16:44

for a guest . Yesterday

1:16:46

I said that this is the perfect microphone for a guest . If you've got a guest that doesn't

1:16:48

understand how to use a microphone and is , you know , a bit frustrated

1:16:50

about always having to stay the right

1:16:52

distance away from a microphone which most people

1:16:55

don't do then this is a great microphone

1:16:57

for that , because this actually deals

1:16:59

with all of that completely automatically , so

1:17:01

it's a nice tool .

1:17:03

I quite like it . How many times when I was doing radio

1:17:05

with guests and you'd be like

1:17:07

giving them little hand signals

1:17:09

to get closer because they

1:17:11

start off nervous . So they lean into the mic

1:17:13

, but as they get more comfortable they sit back

1:17:15

in the chair and eventually just

1:17:17

disappear off the radio and you go . No

1:17:19

, no , come back , come back .

1:17:21

Yeah , yeah , whereas this , you

1:17:23

know , eventually you can . You can lean back as

1:17:25

far as you like and it doesn't change

1:17:28

the audio particularly much . The only

1:17:30

time when it fails is if you

1:17:32

start waving your hands around so much that your

1:17:34

hands get in front of the sensor and

1:17:37

then that messes everything

1:17:39

up completely . But you know , accepting that it's

1:17:41

a very cool thing , so it's worth a look . I

1:17:44

think $349 is the

1:17:46

price . They haven't confirmed that with me

1:17:48

, but that's what I saw on another

1:17:50

review that I watched

1:17:52

, so I think that's the price

1:17:55

. The guy that I was watching said

1:17:57

I think this is actually worth £3,500

1:18:01

. I'm not entirely convinced it's

1:18:03

worth that , but I do think it's

1:18:06

very unusual . As I said in my review , it's very unusual

1:18:08

for a microphone to have a new idea

1:18:10

in it , and this microphone very clearly

1:18:13

has a new idea in it , and

1:18:15

that new idea is this closeness

1:18:18

thing which they've called aura . So

1:18:21

it's very cool , james

1:18:23

, ok here's the acid test .

1:18:25

Then Will you stick with it or

1:18:27

will you switch back to your Shure ?

1:18:29

If you could keep both , Well

1:18:33

, and I believe that these normally

1:18:35

when you're sent a microphone , just

1:18:38

for total transparency normally

1:18:40

when you're sent a microphone they're yours to keep . So

1:18:43

I now have quite the collection of microphones

1:18:46

so I'm doubtless we'll be keeping this

1:18:48

. So if I could keep both of them . I

1:18:51

bought the Shure . I would probably

1:18:53

go back to the Shure , if only because it's got inbuilt

1:18:55

compression and you know I'm

1:18:57

having to run this through a Focusrite box and

1:18:59

all of the fiddling around that happens from that

1:19:02

. But having said that , you

1:19:04

know we'll see . I'm using this for the

1:19:06

next couple of weeks anyway , so we'll

1:19:08

see how it works .

1:19:11

Now , now that you've got a new Apple phone

1:19:13

, I'm sure you've upgraded to 17.5

1:19:15

beta 2 , James , haven't you ?

1:19:17

I mean you are joking . I know that you're

1:19:19

joking , but of course I have , because

1:19:24

that came out yesterday morning my

1:19:26

time and , yes , absolutely , it's

1:19:28

already been updated . I've got no idea

1:19:30

what it's got in it . You're probably going to tell me it's got all

1:19:32

kinds of exciting things in there no

1:19:34

, not a lot , but because you're

1:19:37

not in the European Union .

1:19:38

But if you were in the European Union , you'll

1:19:40

be able to now download apps directly from

1:19:42

other websites . You'll be able to use

1:19:44

alternative app stores . I

1:19:46

think I saw one yesterday which

1:19:49

had the sum total of two apps

1:19:51

in it , but that was it . It was exciting

1:19:53

. You could go to their app store and

1:19:55

download one of two apps . But hey , it's

1:19:58

a start .

1:19:58

Boostergram , boostergram , corner , corner

1:20:01

, corner On the Pod News

1:20:03

Weekly Review .

1:20:05

Yes , it's our favourite time of the week , sam , and I

1:20:07

share all of the boosts and stuff that

1:20:09

you send us . So please

1:20:11

do . Weeklypodnewsnet is where you

1:20:13

can share your

1:20:16

fiat currency with your credit card

1:20:18

or just press the boost button

1:20:20

. That will be a good thing . We have had some

1:20:22

boosts , sam . I know that you haven't

1:20:24

put any onto the form here , oops , but

1:20:28

we have had some . So thank you

1:20:31

to Dwev , who

1:20:33

is now . I should know

1:20:35

what Dwev's real name is , because he's

1:20:37

the man Guy Martin , yes , guy Martin

1:20:40

. Indeed , he's the man that invented

1:20:42

the podcasting 2.0 logo . Anyway

1:20:44

, 3,500 sats from Castamatic

1:20:46

OPML is great for data portability

1:20:48

, especially for an app sampler like

1:20:50

me . I'd love to see more support for it . Opml

1:20:53

, yes , it's the future . Anyway

1:20:56

, mike Dell , 1,701

1:20:59

sats that must be a special numerology

1:21:01

number . Can't be bothered to read it . Anyway

1:21:03

, mike , thank you , customatic , keep

1:21:06

doing what you're doing . He says

1:21:08

that's to the Pod News Daily

1:21:10

, talking about Hot Pod

1:21:12

going away . What other

1:21:14

boostergrams have we had

1:21:16

?

1:21:16

One thousand sats from RW Nash

1:21:18

saying have you ever had Adam Curry or John

1:21:21

C Dvorak on the show ? Never

1:21:23

, ever would have John C Dvorak

1:21:25

on the show . Never , ever would have

1:21:27

John C Dvorak on the show . Oh , I quite

1:21:29

like John C Dvorak . No , he might be Adam Curry's best mate . I'm

1:21:32

sorry .

1:21:34

He gets no spam .

1:21:35

He gets no love either .

1:21:38

That , by the way , he gets no spam

1:21:41

is only for

1:21:43

listeners to Buzz Out Loud from CNET about

1:21:45

15 years ago . Only

1:21:47

them . Only they would have understood

1:21:49

it . Buzz Out Loud and also Twit

1:21:52

as well , which of course he used to be on an

1:21:54

awful lot . No , I

1:21:57

would be up for having John C Dvorak .

1:21:58

I'm not quite sure what he would add I look forward to

1:22:00

your interview with John then .

1:22:02

Yes , and obviously Adam Currie . We've

1:22:04

had Adam on this show before , haven't we ?

1:22:06

He has an open invite at any time

1:22:08

he wants to come on this show , so that's

1:22:11

never a problem . It's actually

1:22:13

asking Adam to come on the show , but

1:22:16

yes , he has an open invite . So , no

1:22:18

, not had John , but we have had Adam

1:22:20

. Who else ?

1:22:22

James Guy Martin 2000 Sats

1:22:24

from Castomatic . Go podcasting 2.0

1:22:26

logo . I see what you did there . Thank

1:22:29

you for that Again to

1:22:31

the Pod News Daily Mike

1:22:33

Dell 1,000 sats Test boost

1:22:35

from Fountain . They're always my favourite

1:22:37

. Now I have to tell you about that one ?

1:22:40

It looks like Todd is going to be paying

1:22:42

out sats for driving

1:22:45

traffic to his show . So last night

1:22:47

I saw a really interesting thread between

1:22:49

Oscar and Todd which was along

1:22:51

the lines of I want to send more people

1:22:53

to my show . How can I do it ? I've

1:22:55

got a bag full of sats . How

1:22:57

can I give you them , oscar , oscar's , like

1:23:00

, hmm well , you can give them to me and I'll see what

1:23:02

I can do . I

1:23:10

can create a voucher maybe , where they then redeem

1:23:12

it when they come to your show . So I think there's a really interesting I don't

1:23:14

know what you want to call it deal going on between Blueberry and Fountain as to how to

1:23:16

drive traffic to Todd's shows .

1:23:17

Well , it sounds like an excellent plan . I did use

1:23:19

Fountain in the past for promoting

1:23:21

the Pod News Daily . Actually , and of

1:23:24

the many different ways that I've

1:23:26

looked into doing this , it

1:23:29

was the most successful . I'll

1:23:31

absolutely say that it got a lot of plays

1:23:33

. It got a lot of exciting boosts back

1:23:36

as well , because

1:23:38

I think they recognise that they get paid when

1:23:40

they listen to a show which has been promoted

1:23:42

in that way and

1:23:44

, yes , I thought it was a good thing . I am an

1:23:46

advisor for Fountain , but I

1:23:48

would have given that a go even if I wasn't

1:23:51

. So , yeah , no , I think that was a

1:23:53

pretty good thing . So , yes , there's

1:23:55

a thing .

1:23:56

I think if you get paid , people will do it .

1:23:59

And two more messages

1:24:01

. Dave Jones , 5,150

1:24:03

sats , cast-o-matic Rich guy starts a

1:24:05

podcast network Yawn , which

1:24:08

could have been for this week's show

1:24:10

.

1:24:10

Oh , I was going to say I was going to say we

1:24:14

look forward to the same boost

1:24:16

for next week .

1:24:16

Dave as well . Yes , exactly Exactly

1:24:18

. And Andrew Grumet a row of ducks 2222

1:24:21

. Sats Love the AI guest appearance

1:24:23

. Perhaps Sam could interview them in a future episode

1:24:25

. No , sats love the ai guest appearance . Perhaps sam could

1:24:27

interview them in a future episode . No , that is not going to happen . Um and uh , as you may have

1:24:29

noticed , sam , in the middle of all of that , um

1:24:32

, six sats from podcasting

1:24:34

2.0 , from the uh

1:24:36

ipfs uh podcast , ipfs

1:24:38

thing . Um , giving me

1:24:40

a six sat share in

1:24:42

the podcasting 2.0 show

1:24:46

via IPFS podcasting .

1:24:49

Don't knock it , James . Don't knock it . You never know

1:24:51

. Those six sats in the future could be worth a lot

1:24:53

of money .

1:24:53

It's all good , I mean the doubling , or is it the

1:24:55

doubling , the halving , the great doubling , the great halving

1:24:57

? Yes , it's on the way . I've got no

1:25:00

idea . So what's

1:25:02

happened for you this week , Sam ?

1:25:03

Just a couple of things I've been reading . So

1:25:06

Evan Prodomo wrote

1:25:08

a nice post called the Responses

1:25:10

to Rabble on ActivityPub

1:25:12

. Somebody was knocking all

1:25:15

the things that they thought was wrong with

1:25:17

ActivityPub and Evan went

1:25:19

and knocked them down Again . Have

1:25:21

a look . It's on Evan's . I

1:25:24

think it's on his sub stack .

1:25:25

It's on his own blog , of course , evanmpme

1:25:30

, yes , I must read

1:25:32

his book . Is his book out ? No

1:25:34

September .

1:25:36

You can read chapters of it on

1:25:38

O'Reilly . But yeah , no , not out

1:25:41

until September .

1:25:42

I should really do that .

1:25:43

And then Evo wrote Unlocking the Potential

1:25:45

of Fiction Podcasts , which I thought was very good

1:25:47

, and If you Love Podcasts

1:25:50

, dump Spotify , yes . So

1:25:53

Alex Sojong wrote that that

1:25:55

was quite an interesting read .

1:25:57

Yes , I thought it was quite an interesting read . It would have been

1:25:59

a good read a year ago , but pretty

1:26:01

well all of his arguments have

1:26:06

gone away . In that he's saying that nobody

1:26:08

at Spotify likes RSS and everything's

1:26:10

exclusive . I mean , that was

1:26:12

the case a year ago . It's not the case now . So

1:26:15

yeah , I wasn't such a fan of that article

1:26:19

, but still there we are Worth a read .

1:26:21

And then Ian Forrester from Tech

1:26:23

Grumps had a little mention for you

1:26:25

, james , in his podcast

1:26:27

this week . It's a proposal

1:26:29

for labelling if a transcript is AI

1:26:31

generated or human checked , which I think is

1:26:33

one of your proposals . Yes , yes .

1:26:36

And I know that that is a

1:26:38

proposal that Apple are quite

1:26:40

keen in doing as well . Doing

1:26:48

as well , they want to be able to show whether or

1:26:50

not a podcast transcript has actually had any human editing

1:26:53

in there or not . So , yes , I think that that would be a good plan

1:26:55

. So what's happened for you , james ? I went to

1:26:57

a show yesterday which

1:26:59

was very weird . It was a show which

1:27:02

was put together Basically

1:27:05

. They played lots of little clips

1:27:07

from big historical things

1:27:09

on the radio over the last 100 years

1:27:12

and they accompanied

1:27:14

it with music , and so they had

1:27:16

people on stage and they were running through

1:27:18

this video and

1:27:20

the people on stage were playing the music

1:27:22

. It was very clever and

1:27:24

, yes , very , very much enjoyed

1:27:26

that . And I discover

1:27:29

, when I came home after it , I

1:27:31

discover that there's actually an album

1:27:33

. It's a 99 track album , it's

1:27:35

on Apple Music and

1:27:37

it's basically the show that we watched and

1:27:39

they were playing . You know they were just doing

1:27:42

the album live . If you can

1:27:44

follow me on Mastodon

1:27:46

then you'll find all of the details

1:27:49

of how that works . But that was quite

1:27:51

fun for the audio nerd , so

1:27:54

I rather enjoyed that .

1:27:56

Oh , and I should just mention very quickly , I

1:27:58

was on Barry Lubret's

1:28:00

podcast called About Podcasting

1:28:03

, so if you want to find that one , and

1:28:05

I was also on Mark Asquith's podcast called In and Around Podcasting , so if you want to find that one , and I was also on Mark Asquith's podcast

1:28:07

called In and Around Podcasting , so if

1:28:09

you fancy hearing more of me or less of me , well

1:28:11

, I wouldn't listen to those . If you fancy hearing more , then

1:28:14

check those out .

1:28:15

And that's it for this week . Thank you so much

1:28:17

to our many guests , especially

1:28:19

Sean and Lizzie and Jeremy

1:28:21

. You can also listen to the Pod News

1:28:24

Daily , of course . Find that wherever

1:28:26

you got this podcast and subscribe to the

1:28:28

Pod News newsletter for more of these stories and

1:28:30

everything else .

1:28:31

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1:28:47

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1:29:00

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