Podnews Weekly Review

Send James and Sam a message or voicemailSpecial Guest: Laura Ivey - Director of Research at Edison ResearchNews:Will we see a podcast player in Twitter? Alessandro Paluzzi has spotted a podcasts option in the latest Twitter code, and Jane Manchun Wong has also unearthed a Podcasts tab. Nathan Gathright has brainstormed some ideas about what he hopes Twitter is up to - let’s hope it’s not just reruns of Twitter Spaces.A new podcast platform, Spooler, has launched. It’s founded by a who’s who of podcasting, including CEO James O. Boggs, formerly Head of Podcasts at Apple; CCO Andy Bowers, co-founder of Slate Audio and Megaphone; CTO Dan Benjamin, founder of Fireside·fm and the 5by5 podcast network, and Exec Producer Kerry Donahue, former EP at WNYC. The product claims to be a new modular content management system for audio, allowing instant edits and re-ordering of content while being compatible with RSS podcast apps. The tech also incorporates Dolby·io to smooth audio volumes and apply noise reduction. Axios has more information.The British Podcast Awards 2022 are now open to enter. If you’ve created at least six episodes of a podcast over the last year, you’re probably eligible.iHeartMedia’s Conal Byrne has made a number of predictions about podcasting for 2022, writing in Forbes. “The entire internet will be converted to audio and distributed on-demand”, he says.iHeartRadio has added a tool called “Talk Back” to its app. It lets listeners send short voice messages to radio and podcast hosts. It “will roll out to interested iHSupport the showConnect With Us: Email: weekly@podnews.netFediverse: @james@bne.social and @samsethi@podcastindex.socialSupport us: www.buzzsprout.com/1538779/supportGet Podnews: podnews.net

Send James and Sam a message or voicemailGUEST:John Spurlock talking about implementing ActivityPub/Co-Comments  LINKS: https://podcastsocial.orghttps://minipub.dev/NEWS: Anyone can claim to be a creator of any podcast within the GoodPods app, without any proof or validation, we’ve discovered. Acast has been been “spamming podcasters”, says competitor Buzzsprout, which has published an unsolicited email from Acast sent to many of Buzzsprout’s customers; we’re aware they’ve also been sent to Anchor users too. “Email marketing is one part of our marketing strategy as we look to bring even more great creators to Acast, and we’re focused on providing the best possible tools and services to help them reach their potential.” — Ross Adams, CEO, AcastHow should apps best verify ownership?  Fountain asks for the email held in the RSS file to claim podcast? Proposed Solution by James Cridland.  Is there a better, easier way to help podcasters “claim” their podcast on different apps? Currently, that process is a clunky method of hoping someone has access to the email address in the RSS feed, and then sending them an email. We think there might be something rather easier. Here’s some proposed documentation of how it might work.WebFinger is a protocol specified by the Internet Engineering Task Force IETF that allows for the discovery of information about people and things identified by a URI. Edison Research released their Super Listeners study, with Ad Results Media. “Super listeners” - US adults who listen to 5+ hours of podcasts a week.Responding to Spotify purchasing Podsights and Chartable, Bryan Barletta writes this week in Sounds Profitable that “Grading your own homework isn’t third-party measurement,” Support the showConnect With Us: Email: weekly@podnews.netFediverse: @james@bne.social and @samsethi@podcastindex.socialSupport us: www.buzzsprout.com/1538779/supportGet Podnews: podnews.net

Send James and Sam a message or voicemailSPECIAL GUEST:Mike Carr. - Crowd Network NEWS:Spotify has acquired Podsights and ChartableSpotify has published an interview with Sean Creeley from PodsightsApple has just published a guide to getting promotion for your podcast from Apple PodcastsBreakit, a Swedish news website, has published an article (translated) that alleges downloads are being bought on SpotifyiHeartRadio in the US has signed with Sounder to offer advertisers brand safety tools. The company is a seed investor in Sounder’s latest Series A funding roundPodnews is launching the first annual report card for the podcast industry. Please give your views here before Mar 1.Delegate day passes have just gone on sale for The Podcast Show 2022, coming to London in May. May 25-26  You can get your day passes today - use promo code PODNEWS for 20% off a limited number of day passes. Podnews is a media partner (and we’ll be there)A podcast has turned into its own radio station in the UKFacebook appears to have rolled-out audio rooms across the world Support the showConnect With Us: Email: weekly@podnews.netFediverse: @james@bne.social and @samsethi@podcastindex.socialSupport us: www.buzzsprout.com/1538779/supportGet Podnews: podnews.net

Send James and Sam a message or voicemailGUESTS:Gigi -  Closing the Loop - The Future of ValueOscar Merry - Fountain Podcaster WalletEvo Terra - Hall of Fame InductionStewart Townsend - Podcast HawkNEWS:Lightning Network is now available on Cash App. It's the fastest, free way to pay anyone in bitcoin. The Lightning Network is a new way to send BTC/SAT that's faster and free!!!Some legend gave 100 million sats (1 bitcoin) to Cinemuck, the people behind the movie "Human B" - Gigi #Value4Value Podcast app Fountain has launched a full Podcaster Wallet, making it the easiest way to earn Bitcoin from your podcast. Just search for your podcast and claim it in the app:  you can monitor how much you earn, and see messages, in the app too.Castos has released a new feature enabling all its podcasters to earn Bitcoin from listeners, as well as links to PayPal, Patreon and others. It’s one of the first podcast hosts to build in support for “value4value”.Exclusive: Mumbler has released what they call the first monetisation study for podcasts in Spain. This year’s Podcasting Hall of Fame inductees will be unveiled at 9am ET today by Podcast Movement.  Podcast Movement: Evolutions: Mar 23 · Los Angeles, California, USAEdison Research has released the top 50 US podcasts for 2021. Podtrac reports iHeartRadio is #1 for podcasting Support the showConnect With Us: Email: weekly@podnews.netFediverse: @james@bne.social and @samsethi@podcastindex.socialSupport us: www.buzzsprout.com/1538779/supportGet Podnews: podnews.net

Send James and Sam a message or voicemailGUESTS: Mark Asquith co-founder and MD of Captivate.FM talks about their acquisition by Global and what's next for Captivate and how the line between radio and podcasting has blurred?Craig Hewitt founder and CEO of Castos talks about the latest version of their platform and their upcoming support for Value4Value and why advertising is not the future for podcast monetisation.  NEWS: Google is randomly switching podcasts in its app to point to pirated copies with ads. Jason Calcanis noticed his podcast, All-In, mysteriously had ads in it; Google’s Danny Sullivan replied: “we appear to have mistakenly pointed to a duplicate version of the podcast”Buzzsprout’s data suggests that the Google Podcasts app is losing market share, from 2.6% to 2.3% in the past year. Buzzsprout’s global stats for January, calculated to the IAB standard, show the company hit 100 million monthly downloads for the first time.A website using Google Fonts has been fined for breaking GDPR privacy rules, since it leaked the visitor’s IP address to Google without their permission. Podnews phased out use of Google Fonts for privacy reasons more than two years ago.When publishing a show to Spotify, you are now reminded to read the platform rules; though not to explicitly agree to them.SiriusXM has launched AudioID. The BBC says it saw a total of 257m podcast downloads globally last quarter. That would make it the #3 podcast publisher in the world.TECH: TECH: Support the showConnect With Us: Email: weekly@podnews.netFediverse: @james@bne.social and @samsethi@podcastindex.socialSupport us: www.buzzsprout.com/1538779/supportGet Podnews: podnews.net

Send James and Sam a message or voicemailGUESTS: SCOTT WAXMAN // HALA TAHANEWS:Spotify takes Meghan Markle and Prince Harry’s podcast ‘into its own hands’ after the couple produced NO content for a YEAR.Spotify picks Joe Rogan over Neil YoungStephen Fry has launched a new podcast exploring the brain. The podcast is exclusively on Audible.Amazon Buys Exclusive Rights to ‘My Favorite Murder’ Podcast. Amazon Music and Wondery will offer new episodes of the podcasts for a week before they are available on other services.Libsyn has put its new user interface, Libsyn5, live to all users. The new interface is easier to use, and features 'social scheduling’ and support of the locked tag.Exclusive: The free and open-source podcast solution for you to self-host, Castopod has reached v1.0, and now has a website of its own.  The podcast platform includes open comments, video clips, anonymised analytics, and wide support for the new podcast namespace. It’s available for download today.Podcast hosting company Castos has added customisable podcast website themes.CEO Craig Hewett will be a guest on the show next week. Captivate launch Automated Show Notes. Mark Asquith will be a guest on the show next week.Anchor podcasts are unplayable in some podcast apps. Overcast CEO/Developer Marco Arment, added, in a tweet to Anchor: “It’s been two weeks that you’re serving malformed files, breaking media players, and losing the audiences of your customers. Do you care about this medium at all?”Ross Mathews and Nikki Boyer are co-hosting The Ambies, the second annual Awards for Excellence in Audio run by The Podcast Academy. They’re the co-hosts of Dying for Sex, the winner of the 2021 Podcast of the Year; the ceremony is on March 22 in Los Angeles, and live online.Castopod joins Spotify, Podchaser and Podnews in adding copious amounts of JSON_LD to podcast pages.this podcast (@seetee.io) is putting their boost messages onto their website. (If you’ve an Umbrel running Helipad, http://Support the showConnect With Us: Email: weekly@podnews.netFediverse: @james@bne.social and @samsethi@podcastindex.socialSupport us: www.buzzsprout.com/1538779/supportGet Podnews: podnews.net

Send James and Sam a message or voicemailGUESTS:  Brad Mielke - Host/Managing Editor, "Start Here" Podcast at ABC NewsEffy Kang - Head of Capital Markets at Lizhi - the first podcast app that Apple promoted in the Chinese app storeNEWS:Apple Podcasts has launched “Listen With”, a podcast playlist service to help listeners discover new shows. The first podcast guide is Jay Shetty. Creators can request to be included using this form.The flagship podcast from ABC News, Start Here, marks 1,000 episodes today. Since its launch in March 2018, the podcast’s host, Brad Mielke.PodPing a method to inform podcast apps the instant a new episode is published, Podping saw 139,328 new episodes published over the last seven days.Use the Podping Watcher to see new episodes in real-time.  Home bitcoin and lightning node Umbrel has released v0.4.11, and the first version of Helipad: an app that lets you see a live view of incoming boosts and boostagrams.  We’ve a guide to get started. Over 4,000 podcasts are now on the Lightning Network!Exclusive: PodInbox has launched a monetisation feature to allow podcasters to get fan donations.  Here is Evo Terra’s.48% of podcast downloads are of old shows, says research from Firstory. German podcast hosting company Julep Hosting has launched “Dynamic Baked-in”, a system that allows a bridge between baked-in advertising and DAIPodchaser reviews are now available in Podcast Guru, a podcast app. Podcast Guru users can read, and add, reviews direct from the app.Support the showConnect With Us: Email: weekly@podnews.netFediverse: @james@bne.social and @samsethi@podcastindex.socialSupport us: www.buzzsprout.com/1538779/supportGet Podnews: podnews.net

Send James and Sam a message or voicemailNEWS: Spotify has launched clickable call-to-action cards, - described as ad banners for podcasts.  Currently limited to Spotify Originals and Exclusives, US only.Spotify’s new CTA cards aren’t new and aren’t open. The new JSON-based chapter specification from Podcast Index also allows graphical banners and clickthroughs which can be timed with audio.Spotify has added star ratings to its app for podcasts. Could you please rate us?Spotify added 1.2m new podcasts to Spotify’s catalogue in 2021. “Anchor continues to drive 80% of the new podcasts. Podcast Index added 466,000 shows in the past six months. It added 3.1m this yearThe Podcast Font for websites, containing icons and logos for popular podcast platforms, apps with just one line of code. It’s open and freeMore new podcast episodes were published last month on Anchor and Buzzsprout than anyone elseThe Podnews Ranker shows an unchanged top threeThe podcast:liveItem tag has been formalisedGot licensed commercial music on your podcast? Facebook will edit it out, muting your show insteadA content warning and privacy notice has been added to the Google Podcasts app - the notice links to Support the showConnect With Us: Email: weekly@podnews.netFediverse: @james@bne.social and @samsethi@podcastindex.socialSupport us: www.buzzsprout.com/1538779/supportGet Podnews: podnews.net

Send James and Sam a message or voicemailJames Cridland talks with Jonas Woost Director Of Strategy at Pacific Content about his podcast predictions for 2022. They talk about ...Who is Pacific Content?Is Podcasting still open in 2022?Paid Subscriptions?Legacy media buys into podcastingWhat does that mean for indies?The rise of fiction podcastingAre celebrity podcasts dead?It’s been another remarkable year for many in podcasting with some tremendous growth in our industry.  As 2021 nears its end, it’s time to ask, ‘What’s Next?’  For the seventh year in a row, Pacific Content has asked some of the smartest thinkers in podcasting this important question. We received plenty of predictions!Part One:https://blog.pacific-content.com/in-the-year-2022-320f4c175f6fPart Two https://blog.pacific-content.com/in-the-year-2022-part-two-92c22c1c44b0BuzzsproutStart podcasting - keep podcasting!Disclaimer: This post contains affiliate links. If you make a purchase, I may receive a commission at no extra cost to you.Support the showConnect With Us: Email: weekly@podnews.netFediverse: @james@bne.social and @samsethi@podcastindex.socialSupport us: www.buzzsprout.com/1538779/supportGet Podnews: podnews.net

Send James and Sam a message or voicemailGUEST: Larry Rosin, the co-founder and President of Edison Research Spotify buys Whooshkaa! Congratulations Rob  Loewenthal.  A great guy and a great team.  SiriusXM is being sued for failing to provide podcast transcripts for deaf users by the National Association for the Deaf and the Disability Rights Advocates.  As we researched in June 2020, transcripts can offer significant SEO benefits.  The podcast:transcript tag is an open standard, supported by a number of podcasts and offers both static transcripts (in HTML or text) or real-time captions (in the SRT format). Widely supported by many modern podcast hosts including Captivate, Transistor, Buzzsprout, Omny Studio and others, a number of podcast apps display these transcripts, including the popular Android app Podcast Addict. Amazon Music has a proprietary solution for transcripts.Spotify added the right to transcribe using their own proprietary solution in May 2020, and a limited beta in May 2021. There is no mechanism for publishers to supply their own transcripts.Google offers live captions within every Android app on Pixel phones; that live caption tool is also available on desktop Chrome .  The company doesn’t support the podcast:transcript tag.Apple surprisingly doesn’t offer any live captioning.  The company doesn’t support the podcast:transcript tag.With the exception of Podcast Addict,  no major podcast app supports transcripts. In terms of podcasts to test things on, Podland contains live captions and transcripts using the transcript tag. Also using that tag, the Podnews podcast contains a transcript only.CommSupport the showConnect With Us: Email: weekly@podnews.netFediverse: @james@bne.social and @samsethi@podcastindex.socialSupport us: www.buzzsprout.com/1538779/supportGet Podnews: podnews.net