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If podcasts are like blogs, they will need a crazy amount of time and energy to get off the ground and that’s why we don’t see so many blogs any more. Discovera

If podcasts are like blogs, they will need a crazy amount of time and energy to get off the ground and that’s why we don’t see so many blogs any more. Discoverability is too hard for most individuals to even try for now

leetrout 4y ago
This is very true. I was shocked at how much I needed to have in place to record, to get listed on the major players (and Google took DAYS to publish my show but Spotify and Apple did it within hours).
BlackjackCF 4y ago
Yeah. I remember when podcasts first came out (before they were even called podcasts in the iTunes Store.) It was super easy to be discovered because there was so few things out there, and most of them were junk.
pksebben 4y ago
yep. If one could solve the discoverability problem for podcasts they'd make a mint. The problems, as I see them: - must be resistant to gaming. Many of the really popular podcasts are backed by marketing money, many of the best ones are buried - must be able to account heavily for taste. I really love midst, magic tavern, darknet, zzyx (RIP), night vale. Lots of people aren't into fiction so the system would have to have market segmentation built in. like a music app recommendation engine. - should provide mechanisms to link to other stuff for the podcast. A huge part of the problem for the podcasters is the friction there is to give them money. This is mostly solved by podcast metadata but any good tool needs to display these properly. as it is, current podcast recommendation algorithms miss tons of good content. There should be more than enough data on me to recommend a lot of stuff that I've had to hunt down Internet 1.0 style by googling and reading blogs.
- barbariangrunge 4y ago
  I wonder if an embedded cbatgpt like system could offer such a recommendation engine on demand for different sorts of media. It wouldn’t ever be the best recommendations of all time, but it might be able to handle scale better than humans. Eg, to get something YouTube algorithm like for other services like podcast apps
tootie 4y ago
Podcasts are no different than any digital medium. I can create a podcast, a blog, a YT channel, a Twitter feed with a few clicks. Record on my phone. Even plug into ad networks. But getting an audience is still really, really hard.
theandrewbailey 4y ago
I can second that. I started a podcast almost 10 years ago with some friends. The guy who ran the site had analytics on everything. Each episode got maybe 100 downloads, but despite soliciting comments, only about 3 other people that we didn't know listened. It ultimately felt like a job, and I was putting too much effort into it and getting too little out of it. The format and topics on the show eventually felt long in the tooth, and I stopped in late 2019. If I figure out a plan to address those problems, I might start it again.

leetrout 4y ago

This is very true. I was shocked at how much I needed to have in place to record, to get listed on the major players (and Google took DAYS to publish my show but Spotify and Apple did it within hours).

BlackjackCF 4y ago

Yeah. I remember when podcasts first came out (before they were even called podcasts in the iTunes Store.) It was super easy to be discovered because there was so few things out there, and most of them were junk.

pksebben 4y ago

yep. If one could solve the discoverability problem for podcasts they'd make a mint. The problems, as I see them: - must be resistant to gaming. Many of the really popular podcasts are backed by marketing money, many of the best ones are buried - must be able to account heavily for taste. I really love midst, magic tavern, darknet, zzyx (RIP), night vale. Lots of people aren't into fiction so the system would have to have market segmentation built in. like a music app recommendation engine. - should provide mechanisms to link to other stuff for the podcast. A huge part of the problem for the podcasters is the friction there is to give them money. This is mostly solved by podcast metadata but any good tool needs to display these properly. as it is, current podcast recommendation algorithms miss tons of good content. There should be more than enough data on me to recommend a lot of stuff that I've had to hunt down Internet 1.0 style by googling and reading blogs.

barbariangrunge 4y ago
I wonder if an embedded cbatgpt like system could offer such a recommendation engine on demand for different sorts of media. It wouldn’t ever be the best recommendations of all time, but it might be able to handle scale better than humans. Eg, to get something YouTube algorithm like for other services like podcast apps

tootie 4y ago

Podcasts are no different than any digital medium. I can create a podcast, a blog, a YT channel, a Twitter feed with a few clicks. Record on my phone. Even plug into ad networks. But getting an audience is still really, really hard.

theandrewbailey 4y ago

I can second that. I started a podcast almost 10 years ago with some friends. The guy who ran the site had analytics on everything. Each episode got maybe 100 downloads, but despite soliciting comments, only about 3 other people that we didn't know listened. It ultimately felt like a job, and I was putting too much effort into it and getting too little out of it. The format and topics on the show eventually felt long in the tooth, and I stopped in late 2019. If I figure out a plan to address those problems, I might start it again.