James Cridland: 0:00

It's Friday, the 30th of August 2024.

Speaker 2: 0:04

The last word in podcasting news. This is the Pod News Weekly Review with James Cridland and Sam Sethi.

James Cridland: 0:14

Yes, back in sunny Brisbane. I'm James Cridland, the editor of Pod News, and I'm Sam Sethi, the CEO of True Fans In the chapters. Today, descript launches season seven with Rooms. Wondery keeps on buying things, apple Podcasts and their market share continues to drop and Libsyn sells another company Plus….

Mignon Fogarty: 0:33

I'm Inyan Fogarty, and later I will be talking about 18 years in podcasting.

James Cridland: 0:38

She will. This podcast is sponsored by Buzzsprout, with the tools, support and community. To make sure you keep podcasting. Start podcasting. Keep podcasting with Buzzsprout. With the tools, support and community to make sure you keep podcasting, start podcasting. Keep podcasting with.

Speaker 2: 0:48

Buzzsprout From your daily newsletter, the Pod News Weekly Review.

Sam Sethi: 0:53

James. So this week Wanderie's off purchasing more podcasts. What are they doing?

James Cridland: 0:58

They are Blimey. They've definitely got large pockets. Have the good folks at Amazon's Wanderie. Yes, they ended up buying the New Heights with Jason and Travis Kelsey podcast which were rumoured back in May. Interestingly, they bought it and then instantly released a new episode because it's the beginning of the NFL season. Listen to me as if I know what I'm talking about. And the deal is said to be worth more than $100 million over three years.

Sam Sethi: 1:31

So okay, I'm confused. They've done Smartless, they've done Dark Shepherd. They're going down the road. Didn't Spotify try this and fail abysmally?

James Cridland: 1:43

Well, and so I believe that Smartness has now left them. But yes, you're right, they're doing a number of different things. What they're basically doing, firstly is that they are obviously selling ads. That's the number one thing. Jason Travis Kelsey's show was a number four show back in the first quarter of this year, number 12 show, I think, from memory. No number 14 show in the last quarter, so arguably it's already peaked, but anyway, it's still a very large show, so they want to sell the ads in there. They also want new shows to add to the Wondery Plus app that Wondery operates, and so clearly adding more content to there will help. And then they are looking at merchandise, they're looking at live events, and they're also looking at taking the show and translating it into well, at least into three languages German, portuguese and Spanish, because that's where the NFL fans are, and so, yeah, so they seem to be covering a fair amount of this stuff.

Sam Sethi: 2:55

I assume it's in Australia as well. James, available for you to listen?

James Cridland: 2:58

to. Yeah, well, you'd have thought that. Weirdly, it doesn't appear to be available at all on Apple Podcasts. I don't quite understand why that would be the case, but if you try searching for it, if you are connected to the Apple Podcasts Australian store, as I am, then it doesn't actually appear. And I've checked that with a few other people, including Russell Harrawer, friend of the show, and he can't see it either when he's connected to the Australian store. But you can when you're connected to the US store. Not quite sure what's going on there, frankly, I don't think that Apple do either. So we'll find out what's going on there. No NFL fans in Australia maybe? Well, we've got Aussie rules football mate. You don't need any of this NFL nonsense. Yeah, that's not the same sport, mate, is it not? That's not the same sport. No, no, no.

Sam Sethi: 3:52

Yes, similar round of ball, but that's about it. I'm not even sure the ball is round, is it? Well, it's ellipsed. Yes, it's an ellipse ball.

James Cridland: 4:01

Yeah.

Sam Sethi: 4:01

Okay, let's leave our sports show to another day.

James Cridland: 4:06

Sports knowledge.

Sam Sethi: 4:08

Now look, this show grew because of his relationship with Taylor Swift. The audience were growing by four and a half times because of the relationship. Now, that's all the Swifties going there and I can't imagine 16 year old girls being heavily into NFL on a major cycle. I mean why? I mean that's the growth, isn't it? Everyone went, oh, let's go and join that because it's Taylor Swift's boyfriend.

James Cridland: 4:33

Yeah, I'm absolutely convinced that that's the case and I'm absolutely convinced that that's why the show peaked in quarter one when the relationship was brand new, I mean only yesterday. You will have noticed that I covered in the Pod News Daily a number of different headlines from the online press. One of them fans predict baby's first words after early exposure to Jason and Travis Kelsey's podcast. Some poor baby is being played this podcast in the cot while they try and go to sleep. I know Another one Swifties believe Taylor Swift's cat meows in the background of Travis Kelsey's New Heights episode. That's from US Magazine and from USA Today.

James Cridland: 5:21

Travis Kelsey makes a very demure reference on the New Heights podcast and fans loved it. I'm not quite sure what very demure is. I'm guessing it's another Taylor Swift reference. It's all Taylor Swift stuff and, as you say, I am not sure I mean.

James Cridland: 5:38

Firstly, you know I don't wish to say anything bad about that relationship, but Taylor Swift is on boyfriend number 12. That's absolutely fine. A young lady like that can have as many boyfriends as you want, but at some point that relationship may not continue and in which case, what does that mean for this particular show? And also, as you rightly say, as soon as the relationship went public, the numbers for this show went up by four and a half times. Also, the show's demographic changed from being two thirds male to 50 percent female. So, very clearly, the Taylor Swift effect has had a thing here. And I wonder I mean to be blunt, I wonder whether or not this show's time has already come. And I also wonder whether or not Wondery have overpaid, given that, you know, one of the brothers is retiring from NFL, I think. And then, of course, you've got the whole Taylor Swift saga. So, yeah, I find it a very peculiar thing.

Sam Sethi: 6:52

I hope their lawyers have got a breakup contract there. I mean, if she does break up with him, I wonder if they can get some of that 100 million back.

James Cridland: 7:00

Well, I'll tell you one thing that she would say she would say that they were never, ever, ever getting back together.

Sam Sethi: 7:07

Oh my God, you have been so indoctrinated, haven't you?

James Cridland: 7:11

I do. I do have an 11-year-old girl, so, yes, the answer is yes.

Sam Sethi: 7:16

But I mean genuinely. I was thinking in my head. I wonder if Taylor Swift's breakup album would be worth more than the cost of this podcast.

James Cridland: 7:24

Who knows would be worth more than the cost of this podcast, who knows Well, and one person has said that the amount of money that Wondery have paid is more than they would have got from their NFL salaries, which may or may not be true, I don't know. But yeah, I mean it is a large amount of money. It's the third largest licensing deal so far this year. Smartless is now with Sirius XM. They paid $100 million for that show. You might remember that last week Alex Cooper was announced Sirius XM buying that show, Call Her Daddy for $125 million. And then, of course, Joe Rogan re-signing only earlier on this year with Spotify for 250 million or, if you prefer it better that way, one-eighth of the entire podcast industry. So I just find them fascinating. Yeah, it's a really strange massive, massive numbers, Isn't the first?

Sam Sethi: 8:25

sign of madness. Doing the same thing time and time again, find them fascinating. Yeah, it's a really strange massive, massive numbers. Isn't the first sign of madness? Doing the same thing time and time again and hoping for a different result? Because clearly, how are they going to? Even if you sell advertising till the cows come home, you are not getting $125 million back in value.

James Cridland: 8:40

No, I mean. So the argument goes that there will be a lot of people wanting to advertise on those podcasts, and so what you do as a sales network is you say, yes, of course you can advertise on New Heights, but in order to advertise on New Heights you need to buy a network buy, and that network buy will also include some of the other shows that we're not actually selling so well. So, you know, you end up basically using new heights as a way to get new advertisers in and as a network sale with a bunch of other shows that aren't selling quite so well. That, I think, is the plan, and you can see, you know, for something like Joe Rogan, there is an argument to say that that was quite successful in that, you know, you basically got no access to that show unless you advertised on a bunch of others.

Sam Sethi: 9:37

Did he sign his contract? I thought that was still up for grabs.

James Cridland: 9:40

Yeah, I think he re-signed earlier on this year, and you know, I mean, what I find interesting is 250 million earlier on this year, and Adam Currie, if he's listening, will be saying it's all. You know. All these numbers are nonsense because you know they've all got targets to hit and it's over three years, and you know, et cetera, et cetera, but the fact remains 250 million. The previous deal, when Rogan was an exclusive to Spotify, was 200 million apparently. So Spotify paid even more this time round and have actually arguably got rather less, because that show is now available everywhere and also available on YouTube, so you know. So who knows quite what's going on there? Is it available on YouTube without ads? I would imagine that it's available on YouTube with the ads that you're allowed to do on YouTube. So you know, you and I could mention a sponsorship by Buzzsprout and so on and so forth, but there wouldn't be any programmatic ads. You know, put in the middle of it Now.

Sam Sethi: 10:51

you've been talking to somebody else recently as well, james. Who's that?

James Cridland: 10:55

Yeah, I've been talking to Mignon Fogarty. There've been a few special dates this month. One date, Dave Slusher, who celebrated 20 years of podcasting. You might know Dave Slusher as the first podcaster to ever use the word podcast in a podcast I know meta, so he celebrated his 20 years of podcasting and if you find his Evil Genius Chronicles wherever you get your podcasts, you'll hear a special episode from him. He reckons he runs the longest continuous podcast, and who am I not to agree with that? Meanwhile, 18 years of podcasting for Mignon Fogarty and she has been podcasting for 18 years. I wondered what kind of changes that she had seen in the podcast industry and whether things were for the better. So I caught up with her a little earlier this month and I asked her firstly what her podcast, Grammar Girl, is all about.

Mignon Fogarty: 11:57

Well, it started as a quick tip about writing a quick and dirty tip to help you write better. Today it's about language and everything that is exciting and fun about language, as well as the quick tips.

James Cridland: 12:08

And I noticed I was listening to a recent episode all about accents and singing and why Adele sings in an English accent, or rather an American accent, when she speaks in a very English accent. And all of that.

Mignon Fogarty: 12:23

Wasn't that fascinating.

James Cridland: 12:24

Yeah, which was really, really interesting, which I really enjoyed, and one of the things that I found fascinating and you know, having been in podcasting for 18 years, the first thing that I heard was an advertisement for the Gold Coast University, which is just down the road from me here in Australia. Wow, the Gold Coast University, which is just down the road from me here in Australia and I was there thinking you must have seen an awful lot of change in podcasting in the last 18 years. What's the biggest changes that you've seen?

Mignon Fogarty: 12:57

Yeah, it's funny that you would mention that, because I do think dynamic ad insertion is one of the biggest changes that, at least, has had the biggest effect on my business and what I do. You know, the meat of what I do producing the podcast hasn't changed that much really, but, yeah, but with dynamic ad insertion. Well, you know, I'm also the founder of the Quick and Dirty Tips podcast network and the nature of our shows, like what I do with language and we have parenting and health tips and nutrition tips it's all evergreen, and so we have a massive archive of episodes that are still live and get a lot of traffic, and so our ability to monetize that backlist has just made all the difference in being a going concern.

James Cridland: 13:48

You know, having a business, yeah, so how has advertising changed for you in the last 18 years? Can you remember who your first advertiser was?

Mignon Fogarty: 13:56

Oh my gosh. You know, I know, in the early days Audible was there in the beginning, very early on. I don't know if they were the first, but they were with. I mean they probably advertised on the show for 10 years at least they were a huge early supporter. And then I remember very early on we had a couple of movies advertising. Oh, I should be able to remember Stomp the Yard. Stomp the Yard was a movie that advertised in Grammar Girl, like way back in the very early days.

James Cridland: 14:26

Wow, why don't? Why don't movies advertise in podcasts anymore? Or maybe they do in the US, I don't know.

Mignon Fogarty: 14:32

I haven't had one in. Yeah, I can't even that was. That was probably the last one.

James Cridland: 14:37

Yeah, wow, and. And so advertising back then I'm guessing was um, uh, were they? Were they supplied to you as a spot, or would you host read, or how did advertising work?

Mignon Fogarty: 14:49

Oh, they were all host read. In fact, that was for a long time. I mean, I would say it's only oh gosh, I lose track of time, but maybe the last six or seven years where we've had pre-recorded ads. I mean, it feels like not that long ago that I had to record ads every week and I don't have a single ad to record myself. I don't think this month it's all pre-recorded and dynamically inserted, which actually saves me a huge amount of time.

James Cridland: 15:19

So you say that the way that you make your show hasn't changed that much. You're not using AI or any of these new fancy tools.

Mignon Fogarty: 15:28

Well, you know the tools have gotten better, but you know I still research the topic, write a script, record that script and then we produce it in an audio program Like the meat of it hasn't changed, but all the technology around it has. The meat of it hasn't changed, but all the technology around it has. I was thinking about that. You know it is so much easier to do an interview than it used to be. You know we have Squadcast and Riverside and Clean Feed all the various tools to record interviews. None of that existed when I started. It was much harder to do an interview. You know I used to transcribe my interviews by hand. That took hours, you know. And now that is AI. We, you know we used a script and it just pops out a transcript and it's not perfect. And you know, because my show is Grammar Girl, I still have to edit it?

James Cridland: 16:20

Yes, of course.

Mignon Fogarty: 16:20

You know, it saves hours of time.

James Cridland: 16:23

So what are the big changes? I mentioned advertising, but what are the big changes that you've seen over the past 18 years? And has podcasting? I guess the question has podcasting changed for the better?

Mignon Fogarty: 16:38

I think it has. I mean, I think, the fact that it's easier to make a show and it's easier to financially support a show. You know, it's not just advertising, it's listener support, like through, you know, patreon and Apple podcast subscriptions. And you know I do something called subtext, where people subscribe and I send them a text message a couple times a week with a fun language tip, couple times a week with a fun language tip. You know, there are just so many more ways to support a show, whether you're a big show or a small show, and I think that's a huge plus for the industry because it means that more people can produce podcasts. You know, we also have to compete more with other people. Certainly, there are many more celebrities in podcasting than when I started, and there were a couple. Back then there was, you know, penn Jillette and Kevin Smith were pretty early. But today, you know, is there a celebrity who doesn't have a podcast today? I'm not sure there is.

James Cridland: 17:37

No, I think you're right, and you mentioned video. Of course you know video. I was going to say it's one of the things that's changed. I'm not sure it is. I mean, I was watching Leo Laporte maybe not 18 years ago, but certainly quite some time ago doing that show in video in Apple Podcasts, and Apple Podcasts still supports video. But are you doing much more video now than you used to?

Mignon Fogarty: 18:02

Yeah, Again, I messed around with video in the very early days too, so it's not brand new. But again, it is a lot easier to do than it used to be. You know, now we have iPhones and everyone knows how to do video because of TikTok and Reels and YouTube, and it's just easier and it is. You know, it's interesting. I feel like it's expected now to have a video component to your podcast and that's a lot of extra work.

Mignon Fogarty: 18:31

It's also fun. You know I love technology, so it's been really fun learning how to do video and buying the equipment and setting up my studio and you know all the fun tech stuff. But yeah, I don't know if it. I don't know if that drives people to the audio podcast either, which is what I consider my. I don't know. It's my home base, it's the primary, the primary outlet.

James Cridland: 18:55

Do you think video kind of gets in the way of making a podcast, or is it just sort of something that we have to do these days?

Mignon Fogarty: 19:04

I don't think it gets in the way and I do think it's nice for when you're interviewing someone, to be able to see their face and you know, get the reaction and maybe know when you can jump in more safely or something like that, but I don't think it takes away from it. I think, you know, I think the biggest negative would probably be that people feel intimidated by it. So maybe they don't start podcasting because they think they have to do video and you don't have to, you know.

James Cridland: 19:34

But yeah, I do wonder how many new podcasters are there. You know buying cameras and buying lighting and you know dressing up their offices and everything else or their recording spaces. For the video side, given how little video for most podcasts, you know how little video actually changes the amount of people who consume it.

Mignon Fogarty: 20:00

Yeah, it really doesn't. I mean, I feel really pressured to do it, but I can't tell you why it doesn't. I don't feel like it changes anything and if you're out there listening and you're worried about it to start, it's true, you absolutely don't have to do it.

James Cridland: 20:13

Yeah, so, looking forward, how do you think that the industry is going to change in the next 18 years and what do you hope that the industry will change to? And what do you hope that the industry will?

Mignon Fogarty: 20:23

change to? Oh my gosh. You know I really wonder what role AI is going to play. I think that's the biggest new technology on the horizon. You know, I remember when the internet was new and that changed everything. And I remember when podcasting is new and for me that changed everything. And I remember when podcasting is new and for me that changed everything. I feel like AI is at least that level of a new technology and it's going to be really hard to predict how it's going to change things. You know I'm watching the voice AI really closely and you know I haven't used it in my show but I play with it because I think it's important to understand what it can and can't do. And you know I read about used it in my show but I play with it because I think it's important to understand what it can and can't do. And you know I read about it, listen to things all the time, and I think that it probably will play a role. I mean 18 years, I think for sure it's going to play a role.

Mignon Fogarty: 21:16

I just can't really predict what it's going to be. And the Quick and Dirty Tips podcast network. Tell me more about that. How long has that been going? And I had spent time in Silicon Valley at startups and so I knew when you had an audience that big, you had a business.

Mignon Fogarty: 21:56

I didn't know what that business was at that time because there wasn't really advertising back then yet. But I launched a network and hired some of my friends to do shows in the network. We had six or seven shows before I partnered with Macmillan and they really took over, especially in 2009,. They fully took over and they manage the whole network now and have grown it to what it is today.

James Cridland: 22:17

So how did the Macmillan partnership start then?

Mignon Fogarty: 22:22

Yeah, they approached me about a book.

James Cridland: 22:25

Well, there you go.

Mignon Fogarty: 22:27

Yeah, grammar Girl was the web pick of the day in the Wall Street Journal and multiple publishers approached me about book deals and I was at the time. The network had grown beyond really what I could handle and I was looking for a partner. So I pitched them back and said, well, how about we form a partnership to grow this network? And they loved the idea.

James Cridland: 22:49

Makes a load of sense. A load of sense. Well, so many congratulations 18 years ago today, the 30th of August. So if someone wants to learn more about you and Grammar Girl and the Quick and Dirty Tips podcast network, where would they go?

Mignon Fogarty: 23:08

Yeah, I would say probably, just go to Google and search Grammar Girl and you will get to all the things you would want to know. Or you can find me on social media. I'm on, as you said, mastodon as Grammar Girl at Zerkus. I'm on Threads as the Grammar Girl. I'm on Blue Sky thegrammargirl. I'm on blue sky as grammargirl. I'm on Facebook and LinkedIn as grammargirl. So I'm very findable.

James Cridland: 23:32

You've got all the badges for all of the social networks.

Mignon Fogarty: 23:35

I do, oh and YouTube. I forgot YouTube.

James Cridland: 23:38

Oh, yes, is probably important as well. Thank you so much for your time. I really appreciate it.

Mignon Fogarty: 23:43

Thank you, James.

Sam Sethi: 23:44

There we go, mignon Fogarty, and you can hear a longer version of that interview with James on.

James Cridland: 23:49

Pod News Extra yes, and the show recently also concluded a season of bonus interview episodes. If you're a fan of word nerds, then you will like it. The author of Dune, kevin J Anderson, the famed Dune narrator, scott Brick there's a name and Dr Sonia Lainhart as well, who is the advisor to the Oxford Dictionary of African American English. So you can check that out in Grammar Girl.

Speaker 2: 24:17

The Pub News Weekly Review. With Buzzsprout Podcast hosting made easy.

Sam Sethi: 24:23

Moving on, james Libsyn reports that another new low for Apple podcast downloads. What are they saying?

James Cridland: 24:30

Yes, they are saying 46.7% of all downloads for shows on Libsyn, which is a new historical low for Apple podcasts. And you might be thinking, well, it'll all be fixed now that Apple Podcasts has that fancy new web player. Well, yeah, no, the fancy new web player is currently doing 0.3% of the downloads from the app, according to OP3, which is about 450 downloads from it a day in comparison to, you know, tens of thousands. So, yeah, it doesn't seem to be moving the needle yet, but you know, there's still plenty of time. I'm sure Is everyone reporting?

Sam Sethi: 25:16

it correctly now.

James Cridland: 25:17

Yeah, I mean more and more people are reporting it correctly. Castos is now reporting it, as well as a bunch of other web-based players. So TrueFans correctly, and actually I think quite a lot of this is good news for web-based players like TrueFans, because if you can measure the Apple Podcasts web player correctly, then you should be able to measure all of these web-based players correctly. So just download the list from the oporggithub and you should be away. So OSHA, buzzsprout, spreaker, captivate Transistor, rsscom have also put a code change out to monitor it correctly, as well as OP3 are using those, so you can actually see how that platform is going for you.

James Cridland: 26:11

I have to say I have spotted a few bugs and there are bugs, particularly if you don't live in the US. So it doesn't seem to work very well when you link to it, because it automatically goes to the US catalogue rather than the catalogue wherever you happen to be, and that sometimes causes a problem with some shows which are available in some countries but not in others. But it also causes a problem when you're trying to buy a premium subscription. If you try buying a premium, well, firstly, you might not even see it there if you're in the wrong store, but also, secondly, you certainly won't be able to actually buy it or even play the episode in some cases. So I'm not sure that it's been 100% checked before it was thrown live, but perhaps they needed to throw it live on the week of podcast movement, I guess.

Sam Sethi: 27:11

Another thing you wrote about this week was David Oxton Ford was saying that it's important for you to disclose your sponsors. So our sponsor is Buzzsprout. He's a media lawyer out, he's a media lawyer, and I think this is really interesting because a few years ago, instagram influencers were being pulled up quite heavily by advertising standards groups saying that you cannot promote a product unless you declare your relationship to that product, and I think David Oxenford is saying the same thing for podcasters.

James Cridland: 27:46

Yeah, pretty well. I mean there are a few changes in FTC rules over the next couple of months which basically mean that the FTC can now fine you rather more if you don't, and if you're not clear in saying that if it's sponsored, you should say that it is sponsored. So you will notice, every time we mention the Buzzsprout word, we will always say our sponsor in this particular show, because they are, and thank them for doing that. What David Oxenford is also suggesting is that you know you need to. Basically, if you've been given something that you mention, then you should disclose the fact that you were given it. So there's all of that kind of stuff. Fine, you, which is quite a thing. So just something just to bear in mind, I guess, and you know, clearly also making sure that you're not promoting something, trying to claim that you are using a product which you absolutely aren't.

James Cridland: 29:05

So, if you remember, there was somebody who was getting paid an awful lot by Samsung to promote a new Galaxy phone and they tweeted a photograph and they put hashtag Samsung, hashtag, galaxy phone.

James Cridland: 29:21

Anyway, if you were to look at the uh, the photograph, then you would have seen that it was taken with an iphone. So so you know a lot of these fake consumer reviews and things. What what it does also mean, by the way, is that if you are using one of those um, uh, podcast promoters um, I will love your, I will love your podcast long time then you just need to be careful, because that is, strictly speaking, now illegal under FTC guidelines. If you know that they are buying false customer reviews, false customer stars or even download numbers because even those are a social media influence tool again, you just need to be careful. So if I give a rating to this podcast on Apple Podcasts and never listen to it, is that a false rating? Employing an army of 200 people in Bangladesh just to put five stars on this particular show, then that is not really a very acceptable thing.

Sam Sethi: 30:38

I think Stephen Bartlett diary of a CEO has also just had his knuckles wrapped for not revealing his investment in Huel, which is the product he promotes throughout that podcast.

James Cridland: 30:49

Yes, indeed. So the Advertising Standards Authority in the UK has a very similar rule. I think they lack some of the opportunities of fining you which the FTC has, but nevertheless the ASA also has a number of these rules, as I'm guessing would the ACCC here in Australia. So you know, again, just being honest and open is probably a good thing.

Sam Sethi: 31:19

Let's whiz around the world a little bit, james. Oh, let's Now in India, ghana. The Indian podcast and music app has been acquired by ENIL, the owner of Radio Merchi. In fact, they're both the same thing, really, and they're all part of the same group the Times India Internet, the Times India. So yeah, I spoke to Gotham and and from Hubhopper to find out more about this, actually because I don't know enough about it. And basically what it was is Ghana used to have lots of Chinese investment from Tencent and others. That's now stopped and dried up because the Indian government won't allow Chinese investment into India because of the ongoing dispute between the two countries, and so they literally are doing a fire sale for the brand name only and that's the only value, and they're using the Times of India sales team to sell both radio and podcasting ads. But he thinks it's just literally a end of life sale. You know? Yeah, that's it.

James Cridland: 32:25

Yeah, yeah, I mean the sale in inverted commas was 30,000 US dollars. I mean, it's hardly anything. There is something weird going on with the Times of India group, which is actually called Bennett Coleman. Something a little bit weird going on with that in that that entire company is splitting in two. One of the brothers is taking the newspaper with him, the Times of India, which is the biggest English speaking newspaper in the world, and the other one of the brothers is taking the TV and radio stuff with him, and so Times Internet my understanding is kind of is going away because they need to work out who owns what. They need to work out who owns what. Hence why Times Internet has essentially sold it to ENIL, which is the owner of Radio Mirchi. So, yes, it's a very complicated thing, but also, I mean, it's costing them an arm and a leg to keep going. They ended up giving the company $2 million in funding just in quarter one of this year.

James Cridland: 33:37

So Ghana is not in particularly good shape, and one of their competitors, wink W-Y-N-K Wink, has closed in the last week. So that again is another Indian music and podcast app and that has closed its doors. That was run by Airtel, one of the other mobile phone companies. So my suspicion what's going on in the Indian world is, firstly, spotify is actually closing all of these things because Spotify is available there and they see that as being a market that they want to jump into. But also it's actually really hard to make money out of these things. And so Ghana not in good shape. Wink, just having closed GeoSavon, which has a big mobile phone company behind that as well, is still going, but for how long. So I think it's a fascinating watch looking at what's going on in the Indian world. It is.

Sam Sethi: 34:38

I think we'll keep a close eye on that one. Now, moving over to the Netherlands, Podimo's acquired a Dutch podcast company. Who's that, James?

James Cridland: 34:47

Yes, it's called Tonny Media. So now they have two Dutch podcast companies because they owned Dag Nacht, day Night, which they bought last year. Polymer has also announced that it's profitable in the Netherlands, which is good news. I believe that it mostly sells subscription access to its shows. I think that that's the way that Polymer works, but interesting to see them still on the acquisition trail in the country, seemingly doing very nicely.

James Cridland: 35:24

And in Germany. This is a strange old thing. Do you remember? Libsyn bought a company called Julep Media, which was a German podcast advertising company and a podcast host. They bought them back in August 2022. Anyway, it turns out that Julep Media is now independent again. The original Julep management team bought the company back in March. Libsyn, surprisingly, has said nothing. David Mosler is the new CEO of Julep and Julep's podcast hosting outfit has been spun off to a new company which is called Audiorella. Audiorella is IAB certified. Well, rather, julep was, but Audiorella. Well, rather, julep was, but Audiarella, I think, can now lay claim to being IAB certified. So again, that's an interesting divestment from Libsyn.

James Cridland: 36:22

My understanding is that it wasn't making any money. Well, it was losing money hands over fist, one person told me. So maybe that's a good thing that they are no longer part of the company. But yeah, so it does kind of point to Libsyn having this big growth, buying all kinds of different companies, and then all of a sudden they've shrunk back down to essentially running two companies Libsyn Ads and the hosting company. They still own, glow. My understanding with Glow is that if you try to, glow is kind of a bit like Patreon. But if you try and sign up to Glow, you get a couple of pages into the sign up process and then it says, oh, we're not taking any new customers at this time. So my understanding is that Glow has basically died, unless anybody knows different, in which case? Editor at podnewsnet. I would be delighted to issue a correction, but I think you know Libsyn is now very much focused on selling ads, which they see as their main focus, and also operating a heritage hosting company on the other side.

Sam Sethi: 37:30

How long before Do they have a new CEO yet?

James Cridland: 37:33

They don't have a new CEO yet. I would imagine that their new CEO is going to be somebody from the advertising side, and it wouldn't surprise me if the hosting portion, which I understand is still a very profitable and very useful part of their business, is kind of run as a bit of an afterthought. Certainly, my understanding is that all of the good coders are now working on the advertising side rather than on the hosting side. It may come not too much of a surprise if you've ever tried using it.

Sam Sethi: 38:04

Linda Iaccarino from X probably needs a new job. Maybe she'll go there. Maybe she will Gosh imagine Now Podcast Movement, where you were last week. They've put out their highlights reel.

James Cridland: 38:24

You didn't make it, james. I didn't, which I'm delighted at. I was speaking on stage, but I wasn't speaking on the big keynote stage. In fact, I never even went into the keynote stage, so I never even saw it. But you can watch the highlights reel.

James Cridland: 38:33

I would find Podcast Movement on YouTube, because they have started putting some of the keynotes on there as well, so you can also watch the good folks from Multitude, amanda McLaughlin and Eric Silver, doing their keynote speech. You always knew what made a good podcast and also there's a Tom Webster keynote speech on there as well. So just do a search for Podcast Movement on YouTube and, if you want to, you can still go in and buy all of the audio podcasts from the entire event. So if you want to hear me bluffing my way through an AI demonstration, then you can absolutely do that. I think it's $45 if you weren't there and, depending on the level of your ticket, you might find that it's free as well. So, yeah, there's plenty of things to have a listen to, or indeed, as I plan to do, to read all of the transcripts from and see what was said.

Sam Sethi: 39:42

Now you're off on your travels again. James, where are you going?

James Cridland: 39:45

I am. I'm going to Podcast Day Asia, which is happening early next week. It's part of Radio Days Asia in Kuala Lumpur and, yeah, it should be a really good couple of days. So, yes, KL will be where I am next week and KL will be possibly where this show comes from, depending on timing tomorrow, which we should talk about. So, yes, so that should be a good time, I think.

Sam Sethi: 40:15

Well, while you're in Kuala Lumpur, I will be in London at the London Podcast Festival, which starts also on September 3rd. They've got some very interesting guests. They've got Maisie Williams from Game of Thrones, who's doing her podcast, frank Film Club. There's also Nick Grimshaw doing Dish Live. So, yeah, I think I'll be looking at a couple of those shows. It goes on for a couple of weeks, I think. So yes, I'll be looking to see which podcast to go and listen to.

James Cridland: 40:44

Excellent, yes, it looks like a very good thing. And also Lower Street are running Lower Street Office Hours events. The first one is on September the 18th, stephen Pratt I don't know why I've just called him Stephen, because he's not called Stephen Steve Pratt taking part in the first event talking about his new book Earn it Unconventional Strategies for Brave Marketers. He'll be on this podcast no doubt during September as well. The book comes out on October the 1st, so worth taking a peek at that and worth signing up.

Speaker 2: 41:22

The Tech Stuff on the Pod News Weekly Review.

James Cridland: 41:27

Yes, it's the stuff you'll find every Monday in the Pod News newsletter. Here's where Sam talks technology. There is a bunch of new and exciting things going on. Sam. Tell me about ActivityPub.

Sam Sethi: 41:39

Well, you know I'm very gung-ho on ActivityPub.

Sam Sethi: 41:43

So are several other people. You were on the podcasting to the O Show talking about it quite a bit as well. John Spurlock last Friday released a new browser called the ActivityPub browser. You can find it at browserpub, which is a really cool debugging tool for those building ActivityPub applications, because ActivityPub has been badly documented. I know there's a new book from Evan Prodomo coming out right now, but it's really hard to actually build good ActivityPub clients because the documentation doesn't support much of what you want to do. And so, john, brilliant as he is, created this little browser that shows you all of the different fields and options and the JSON files. Yeah, so thank you, john Spurlock, is all I'd say.

James Cridland: 42:31

No, it's very cool. Browserpub is where to go there If you want to fiddle around on the Fediverse Threads has added a bit more to its activity pub integration you can now see replies and things and you know, and they're sort of very slowly getting into the whole Federation stuff, which is nice. There's also a new symbol for the Fediverse as well, which is three little stars. It's called an asterism, I believe, and it's a very cool and smart thing. I think it's a nice thing. So you'll notice on the Pod News website I've got rid of the Mastodon logo in one place, or the silly old multicoloured cat's cradle type Fediverse logo. That is very hard to really understand. What on earth is going on. That has also gone to be replaced by this nice new symbol Instead. If you want to learn more about that, you can go to symbolfediverseinfo in your web browser and you can learn a lot more about that. But to me it looks like a good plan and it's just a Unicode symbol, so therefore it's available in every single font already, so why not?

Sam Sethi: 43:49

I just have to find out what the code is then font already?

James Cridland: 43:54

um, so why not just have to find out what the code is then now? Um, well, you, you just go to that website and you can just copy it. I mean, it really is as simple as that.

Sam Sethi: 43:57

We go nice and simple, okay, super good now, uh, olby, who provide the digital wallets that we use on true fans and podverse and podcast guru? Um, they've now got sub accounts. They've called them uncle jim's. That's completely an americanism that I have no understanding of. Um, but basically you can set up an account for somebody else if you have an albie hub. Um, I'm not sure who's gonna do that, because I'm still not sure who the albie hub is aimed at. I mean, you know, yes, podcast apps like true fans use the albie hub, but I can't see power users using an albie hub themselves. It seems such an overkill to set up in order to just have a wallet.

James Cridland: 44:41

Yeah, and it costs it costs money every single month for you to have one of these things and, uh, yeah, I can't really see the benefit of it to, to be honest. But perhaps it's the only way that they can operate that kind of service and remain within the law, I guess. But, yes, strange old thing, but, you know, worthwhile keeping an eye on, I guess. I published some research a while ago but mentioned it again last week, mentioning that ID3 tags waste of time. Stop doing them.

James Cridland: 45:15

Whether that's ID3 tags because you think that they're good for SEO they're not. I've done the work. They're not. They're not being used in SEO at all or whether or not they're any good in podcast players they are not used in podcast players at all, unless you really want to support some very old you know, 15-year-old hardware players. My recommendation to you, if you're worrying about what your ID3 tags look like, is to stop worrying, because it's a complete waste of time. The Pod News Daily has proper ID3 tags. That's nice, and this show, I believe, has proper ID3 tags because Buzzsprout, our sponsor, actually writes them into the audio file. So hooray for Buzzsprout for doing that, but really no need to, because there isn't anything really that uses those tags anymore. So stop bothering about them is my humble opinion.

Sam Sethi: 46:11

Hmm, so what's happened with your favourite podcasting app, james?

James Cridland: 46:15

Well, they've brought back a couple of new features. This is Overcast, of course, and they brought back a couple of new features. Smart Speed now actually shows what speed it's currently playing at, which is always quite fun and quite geeky to look at, and it's also brought back streaming playback, which was quite a surprise. Seemingly, Marco got enough gripes and moans from people saying that streaming playback or a progressive download if we're going to be strictly technologically accurate is a good thing. So, yes, that is back in Overcast. I'll continue using it because it's got the best fast speed thing. Although Pocket Cast is very good and I'm sure the True cast is very good and I'm sure the true fans is very, good too um no, no, it's not.

Sam Sethi: 47:00

No, no, no, no. I'm not going to claim we have, we have it. But you know um, we haven't got any secret sauce behind it, so I'm not going to claim anything there um, I'm I'm looking forward to the day that overcast has one single podcasting 2.0 feature, which will be lovely, but until that day, yes, it's a legacy app to me. Yes.

James Cridland: 47:21

Well, to be honest, I would agree with you. I would like to see more from that side. And you know, I mean I'm looking at Pocket Casts every now and again and going, maybe I should go back to that, maybe I should, who knows, maybe I should go back to that, maybe I should, who knows? I mean, you know, pocket Casts has an Apple Watch logo that actually works and various other things, so, yeah, that might be a good thing. So anyway, yes, overcast. What else is going on?

James Cridland: 47:49

Op3 is nice. Op3 is a free and independent podcast analytics tool that you can use, dear listener, and that you should be using, and if you are not a chicken, as Todd Cochran is, then you can publish your numbers. I accused him of being a chicken to his face for not publishing the numbers for the new media show through OP3. And he just looked at me and he went, so I'm assuming that he is a chicken. Anyway, he has added a not todd, but john, who runs op3, has added a top african regions box. If you are a podcaster with more than three percent of your traffic in africa, it'll now tell you exactly where that's coming from, which is quite cool, um, so worthwhile taking a look at that. There's also a simple plugin to enable OP3 if you're using microblog, which is a weird and wonderful platform that you can host podcasts on if you really want to, and there's a bunch of other things going on with OP3 as well, so worth a peek at that.

James Cridland: 48:56

And finally, congratulations. Audio Means IAB version 2.2 certified status, and they are the first hosting company to achieve certification in all four IAB certified metrics, so congratulations to them. Omni Studio and Headliner have partnered to get customer podcasts onto YouTube. And new data from Scientia Mobile telling us that Android now has 66% share of the global smartphone market and iOS at 33%, which I believe is a record for Android. I could be wrong, but I believe it's a record for Android, so hurrah for Android, I guess.

Sam Sethi: 49:38

Just quickly going back to that audio means it's one of the four elements they have client-confirmed ad play.

James Cridland: 49:46

Yes.

Sam Sethi: 49:46

Remind me again how they do that when it's a download.

James Cridland: 49:51

Well, it calls itself the most accurate count for ad plays in a podcast, but it does require client side tracking. So it's not just downloads, it's other things as well, then. So a player on the Audio Means website in that particular case, then they can actually measure how much of the ads have been played, and that's where the client confirmed ad play comes from. If you read the IAB specification, it says that currently less than 3% of players are capable of providing this kind of data, so relatively useless. But audio means at least has done the work on their own embedded player so that they can measure client confirmed ad plays on those.

James Cridland: 50:46

but um, yeah that's not, uh, not the world's most exciting thing, is it?

Sam Sethi: 50:50

no, let's move on to something much more exciting it's boostergram corner boostergram, boostergram, corner, corner, corner on the pod news weekly.

Speaker 2: 50:57

Exciting, it's Boostergram, corner, boostergram, boostergram, corner, corner, corner. On the Pod News Weekly Review.

James Cridland: 51:00

Yes, it's our favourite time of the week. It's Boostergram Corner, and anything that we make from this goes straight to Sam and me. It doesn't go to the rest of the massive Pod News team, whoever they are, and thank you for your boost. This is also where we go, and we mention any boosts from the Pod News Daily podcast as well, which you can also boost and stream your sats to Matt Cundall. 5,150 sats, it's probably a number. Don't know what that number is. Anyway, he says great seeing you in Washington. I think he's talking to me. Thanks for the AI tool tips. Fun watching you record the show from the expo floor. Yes, it was fun doing it. So, matt, thank you very much and thank you for taking that photograph, which we've used all over the place, of me doing it. So that was a nice thing, John McDermott.

Sam Sethi: 51:47

he sent 4,444 sats. Okay, I don't mean to be cheap, lol. Here's double ducks to make up for last week's cheapness. Yes, thank you, John.

James Cridland: 51:58

Yes, he does a very good blog. If you do a quick search for John McDermott podcast blog then you'll find it, and he does do quite a good piece about how complicated all of this streaming sats malarkey is, which I think that we should all read and remember that, yes, it is still hugely complicated. Anyway, as part of that, he says that he learned last week that his boost of 200 sats was cheap, which was about 12 cents. So the double ducks, the 4,444 sats, is around $3. Hopefully James and Sam can live large on that, but at least it seems socially acceptable. John, thank you, and a number of other messages from John as well. 200 sats saying how far tech has come. Two continents recording live with one guy walking around a convention centre Sounds great. I miss you. Switch 56. Any idea what Switch 56 is, sam?

Sam Sethi: 53:00

No, no idea. I thought you, being a radio nerd, would have told me actually.

James Cridland: 53:06

No well, John is an ex-radio person and so he probably understands what Switch 56 is. Wikipedia tells me that it was a networking protocol built on telephone cabling hardware by Nortel, and it's basically kind of ISDN-ish. It would carry 56 kilobits of data on its lines. There you go. There's a thrill. I'm imagining that they must have used that for outside broadcasts at the radio station that he once worked for, and he's also sent a True Fans zap, which I'm not quite sure what a True Fans zap is. What is a True Fans zap, Sam?

Sam Sethi: 53:46

It's when you heart something, you just simply just want to send quick 10 sats. Yep, I'm hearting this, so you get 10 sats for doing that very nice have we had sats from anybody else we have. We've had it from the pod stage himself. Dave jones sent 10 000 sats and he simply said thanks for all you guys do so thank you very much.

James Cridland: 54:05

Thank you, dave jones, and it was a great pleasure. I was on the podcasting 2.0 show last week, um, from a random airport lounge. Super enjoyed doing that. That was great fun. And super enjoyed also putting my umbral hub through its paces, because of course, when you are on that show then they split the sats with you and so, crikey, my little hub has been going. Oh, all these people, all these connections, so that was a wonderful thing.

James Cridland: 54:35

Hugely enjoyed being on with Dave and with Adam and sort of ever so gently taking the piss out of Adam, which I think he hopefully got so super enjoyable. Thank you for that. Also, thank you to those who are listening just with streaming sats they haven't bothered pressing the boost button, but that's still fine Brian Entsminger, the late Bloomer actor, adam Currie himself, dave Jackson, brian of London and Kyren, and a few more as well. So thank you for listening and streaming sats, much appreciated. Thank you also to the Magnificent Seven, our power supporters Cy Jobling, rachel Corbett, dave Jackson, mike Hamilton, matt Medeiros, marshall Brown and Cameron Moll. So what's happened for you this week, sam?

Sam Sethi: 55:24

Well, I'm looking forward to two conferences coming up this month.

James Cridland: 55:28

Are you really?

Sam Sethi: 55:30

I am actually yeah.

James Cridland: 55:31

Go on.

Sam Sethi: 55:32

Meta's Connect Conference, because I love my sunglasses and I want to see what they do with the next version. They're bringing out an AR augmented reality version of the glasses, so that's going to be interesting to see what they do there. And Apple's Glow event on the 9th of September. Obviously, James, you'll be upgrading to the iPhone 16 Pro Max.

James Cridland: 55:55

Not sure I will be.

Sam Sethi: 55:58

We'll see. We'll see. I got interviewed by matthew passy on his show podcasting tech, talking about podcasting 2.0 and everything to do with true fan. So you can listen to it on his podcast or find it on youtube. And I also got interviewed by neil mckay for smarter podcasting, talking about very similar things podcasting 2. And I also got interviewed by Neil Mackay for Smarter Podcasting talking about very similar things Podcasting 2.0. And also you can see that on YouTube as well. The other thing I'm talking to is Gautam Anand over in India about doing a podcasting Desi event in India in February 2025. I'm also hoping to do one in South Africa. James, you will be included, don't worry, Gosh well, that's all very exciting, isn't it?

James Cridland: 56:42

Are you planning to actually be in India and in South Africa at all? Is that your plan?

Sam Sethi: 56:47

Yes, yeah, that's the idea. I think what we want to try and do is, again, it goes back to what you and I were trying to do many months ago, maybe even a couple of years ago, with podcasting, live, uh, for this show, um, and you know, uh, we, we didn't extend that, but I think there's a demand. I've been talking to john savage and and to um gotham and they would love to have events in their country, um, so they'll be finding venue, sponsors and, yeah, you and I are going to be invited to go along and say a few words.

James Cridland: 57:26

Well, that'll be fun. I haven't been to India for a long, long time, so that will be good fun to go back there and indeed, go back to South Africa, which I haven't been to for a long, long time. So, yes, all sounds good. So what's happened for you, james? So I, apart from being on Podcasting 2.0 and apart from trying to get rid of my jet lag which is much harder on the way back than it is on the way there I'll tell you.

James Cridland: 57:52

But apart from those two things, I was on the BBC yesterday, which is very exciting live on a global news channel from this very office. The people from Lewitt Microphones, I notice, have just sent me an email because they were thrilled seeing their microphone. It's the one thing that I didn't cover up, because I know how the BBC are like with brands and things. What I should have done is I should have covered up the brand, but I didn't. So they were delighted to end up seeing that. But that was great fun. If you're a media geek and you would like to learn a little bit more about what it's like actually going live on the BBC, on the TV channel, then I have something in my personal blog just do a web search which explains how they do it. But yeah, very interesting experience doing that. I put on a suit and tie and everything. I was still wearing jeans. You couldn't see that under the table With a sign on the door saying do not disturb yes, yes, exactly no, but that was good fun, so I enjoyed doing that.

James Cridland: 59:03

Hopefully, if I did a good enough job, I'll be asked back again, but we will see yes, down to the colonies to find out the word about podcasting, sure that's how it works.

James Cridland: 59:15

And that's how it works, and that's it for this week. If you enjoy the podcast, the Newsletter's Better, you can find it by the way, I've heard Dave Jackson saying that three times in an English accent the newsletter's better, which is very amusing. But yes, if you enjoy the podcast, the Newsletter's Better, you can find it at podnewsnet and also find the Pod News Daily, wherever you get your podcasts. I've just extended the RSS feed of that so that, instead of just being the last 50 shows, it's all 2000 of them, wow. So yes, it's beginning. It's gosh. My cloud front went absolutely mad as lots of people downloaded every single one of those. So that'll be fun. Anyway, there are longer interviews as well in the Pod News Extra podcast as well.

Sam Sethi: 1:00:00

You can support this show by streaming. Such, you can give us feedback using the fan mail link, which we did actually forgot to mention. We got Jordan, who sent us a lovely fan mail link, saying yes, she thought it would be a shame I didn't make it over to Washington. Yes, it was a shame, but thank you, jordan, I'll see you over in Chicago. Probably you can also send us a Boostergram or you can become a power supporter at weeklypodnewsnet.

James Cridland: 1:00:25

Our music is from Studio Dragonfly. Our voiceover is Sheila Dee. We use Clean Feed for this and we're hosted and sponsored by Buzzsprout. Start podcasting, start podcasting, start podcasting, keep podcasting.

Speaker 2: 1:00:38

Get updated every day. Subscribe to our newsletter at podnewsnet.

James Cridland: 1:00:44

Tell your friends and grow the show and support us, and support us. The Pod News Weekly.

Speaker 2: 1:00:49

Review will return next week. Keep listening.