the state of podcasting

The great podcast saturation has pushed companies to think more deeply about their brand to build a loyal audience across multiple shows. More companies are following the path of streaming services and magazine publishers by launching subscription models, offering live events and access to talent as part of a package deal.

Other podcast companies are taking a similar approach as competition for listeners mounts and investors start to get serious about profitability. They are turning the audible into the visualto advertise shows across billboards, streaming platforms and the internet, and hiring marketing executives from studios and streamers to lead the charge, even ... See more

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

Sports audio plays an integral role in female sports fandom – 57% of female sports fans “frequently” or “occasionally” listened to sports audio content in the last year.

‘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

The industry is primarily funded by two groups: advertisers sold on the premise that they can reach young, educated consumers, and technology companies looking to turn listeners into paying subscribers with a relatively cheap-to-produce form of media.

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