Podcasts Everyhwere!

So, Podcasts. When the hell did they get so popular? Seriously, podcasts aren’t really new, I started listening to them back in 2013, but they seem to be everywhere all of a sudden, no matter where you look. Your favourite news source? It probably runs at least one podcast, many of the major news outlets have many. The same goes for all types of content creators, from Twitch streamers to YouTube creators to almost every type of celebrity or influencer out there. Hell, even politicians or political parties are getting in on the act now, as are companies of all shapes and sizes.

However, with this explosion of podcasts over recent years, I can’t help but wonder whether this is sustainable in the long run or whether this is a gold rush that will burn itself out? Mind you, I’m not writing this to be a naysayer or a begrudger. I’m a content creator myself and if podcasting enables some people to find their inner voice and share it with the world, then go for it. However, as a content creator, I’m also aware of the significant roadblocks that come in the way putting out any type of content on a regular, or even semi-regular basis, and let me tell you, those roadblocks are pretty sizeable!

Lets look at the financial side for example. Granted, setting up a podcast isn’t that expensive. You just need a semi-decent microphone, some software to edit the podcast, and an account on all those platforms that you want to upload your podcasts to, so SoundCloud, Spotify, Apple Music/Podcasts/iDon’tknow and so on. Once you try to take things full-time however, that’s when the trouble starts. That’s when you’ll need more specialised equipment and software, with the requisite costs attached to that. Plus, you’ll have to generate enough monthly income to, you know, pay your rent, put food on the table, and so on, not to mention paying for both internet and electricity, both of which are apparently kind of important when you want to launch any type of online venture. So how are you going to go about that? Are ads available on the platform you want to use? Is your podcast attractive enough to land sponsorship deals? Will you have to go for other options, such as crowdfunding via platforms such as Patreon or Steady?

More importantly though, is there even still a market for more podcasts? According to podcastinghost.org, there are currently 1.5 million podcasts available, with 34 million episodes between them. Those are staggering numbers, even more so when you consider that these podcasts exist in addition to millions of more content creators on the likes of YouTube, Vimeo, or other streaming services. However, out of this sheer glut of podcasts, around 50% have less than 136 downloads within the first 30 days from release, a vanishingly small number. So while the likes of Joe Rogan may net hundreds of millions of downloads and easily sign nine-digit deals with the likes of Spotify, there is a vast number of podcasts that rarely ever garner any attention.

Then, there’s the issue of credibility. With podcasts being so easy to produce, everyone is getting in on the game. And I mean everyone! The same platform that hosts your favourite gamer’s podcast might be housing a show run by religious zealots, an archconservative action group, a manufacturer of industrial lubricants (I wish I was making that one up!) and similar “interesting” organisations. Do you honestly think podcasts will be taken seriously when they’re hosted by middle-aged men in ill-fitting suits, scarred by a lifetime driving an office desk, waxing lyrical about a new ball-bearing invented by a company that hasn’t received a logo update since the days of President Clinton and whose website looks like it was botched together in the early 2000s by an underpaid intern? Yeah, I thought so.

Now to be fair, this isn’t the first time I’ve seen this type of development. All of this has happened before and all of this will happen again, to paraphrase a rare example of a well-executed reboot. Once the first bloggers at the time began making an impression, everyone began to rush in, and every company, religious group, political party, pressure group or whatever needed to have a blog of their own. These were often run by people who had no idea of the rules and customs of said medium, turning many of these blogs into horribly stilted affairs, or graveyards for poorly worded press releases. Independent bloggers meanwhile ended up getting the short straw in this contest and ended up being deprived of the publicity they would have needed to make a mark.

Then, about ten years later, along came YouTube, and the whole pattern began to repeat. To be fair, the conditions and restrictions of YouTube are quite different from those faced by bloggers and as such, cheap “look, we’re hip and are on Youtube”-Type corporate channels never really took off. This is simply due to the fact that you either a) need to speak the language of the audience on the platform and in the niche you’re serving or b) really know your stuff with regards to filming, editing and post production. As such, it was much easier for a diverse ecosystem to develop on YouTube, which now houses everything from lifestyle to tech, to gaming to physics, to historical and even political channels. Granted, there are some issues around content moderation, monetisation and advertiser-friendly content, all of which have done quite a bit of damage to the site, however as an avid YouTube viewer myself, the sheer breadth of content on the platform is still impressive.

Podcasts are of course not just limited to a single platform, which is of course one of their main advantages. Even blogs mostly exist in a mostly homogenous ecosystem, split between blogger.com, where this blog is of course hosted, and Wordpress, of course excluding self-hosted blogs. This splintering, together with increasing interest by big players such as Apple, Spotify, Amazon and others, could be the biggest advantage of podcasts. However, it could also turn out to be their Achilles Heel. How this will play out is anyone’s guess. One thing is for sure though, podcasts aren’t going anywhere in the meantime!