The audience for podcasts continues to grow, with 42 percent of Americans 12 and older reporting last year that they had listened to one in the previous month, according to a report by Edison Research.

The three are among a cohort of former child stars, many from Nickelodeon and Disney Channel shows from the 2000s, who have started podcasts as a way of connecting with a nostalgic Gen Z and millennial fan base. In doing so, they are embracing roles that they played as children and teenagers — characters that some had spent years trying to move bey... See more

Compare that to the first-time listener experience for fiction podcasts, which is quite bad, if I’m being brutally honest. Install a podcast-listening app—or choose the one that is already on your phone, possibly one you play music with or maybe watch videos in?—and choose a fiction podcast. No, not just any podcast. A fiction podcast. Yeah. You go... See more

‘Decoder Ring’

Willa Paskin’s deep-dive investigations into questions you never thought to ask (Is Parmesan cheese “authentic” Italian? What ever happened to slow dancing? What was the deal with hovercraft?) are more rigorous than they need to be, which is what makes them so fun. Paskin — a former television critic, and among the best writers worki... See more

Betches is exploring a variety of strategies to grow, from sports and events to a splashy podcast deal with the TikTok news star V Spehar of Under the Desk News. It’s in talks for a partnership with the comedian Ilana Glazer (a gushy fan who described Betches as “if ‘Broad City’” — her cult hit TV show — “were a media company”).

Creators should organize into a series of cooperatively owned ventures. Some have already done this - notably Defector, Maximum Fun, and 404 Media. There are others. But there are so many more opportunities to do this. Everyone who has been laid off recently can reorganize into cooperative groups. They can create governing bodies for themselves and... See more

a cooperative is an ownership structure , not a business plan. You need to have BOTH to run a successful business. And the business of podcasting is hard . There are only so many ways to make money: advertising, membership/subscription, and sponsorship/branded content.

The goal, as I understood it, was to build a small, independent production company that specialized in high-end, smart and funny content with a strong point of view.