In the October report of Triton Digital’s Webcast Metrics Top 20 Ranker, overall stream listening inched upward a bit (one percent from the previous month). Hidden in that modest movement are significant gain by five of the top six entities, composed of three pure internet plays and three radio groups. Continue Reading
General Motors is reportedly adding podcasts to the dashboard of about one-million cars. Only a handful of podcasts will be included in a proprietary selection. The most interesting aspect of this venture is GM’s recognition of podcasting as a worthy audio category around which to build business relationships and proprietary distribution products. Continue Reading
The awaited Podcast Analytics suite from Apple has arrived in beta. Whatever its shortfalls in the minds of some industry observers, and however ambivalent some podcast publishers might be about the intrusion of new data, Apple’s reporting of podcast consumption will sharply influence the shape, growth and revenue prospects of podcasting. Details and RAIN analysis. Continue Reading
The National Association of Broadcasters (NAB) announced that five new House representatives have signed onto the Local Radio Freedom Act (LRFA), making a majority of support. LRFA is a non-binding resolution against any new performance royalty imposed on U.S. radio stations. At issue is broadcast radio’s historic exemption from paying artists and labels for playing music recordings over the air. Continue Reading
In a RAIN webinar last August, Melbourne-based podcast hosting and technology company Omny Studio announced a technology achievement that seemed either revolutionary or implausible, depending on one’s perspective. Omny claimed to offer podccast listening data captured from Apple’s Podcasts app. Today, prompted by the imminent release of Apple’s own podcast analytics, Omny has unfurled a description of its previously secret method. Continue Reading
Over the weekend TechCrunch broke news from undisclosed sources in Apple that the tech giant was close to acquiring market-leading music-ID platform Shazam — Apple confirmed the acquisition this morning. The enormously popular and influential Shazam has historically taken the role of Switzerland, standing in the midst of Spotify, Napster, Apple Music and others, offering to funnel ID’d songs to the user’s preferred listening platform. That could change. Continue Reading
In a whitepaper released yesterday on its blog, Triton Digital explains how podcast caching challenges the growth of podcasting, offeers supporting metrics, and and pledges its full support of platforms which move away from the practice. Continue Reading
Marvel Entertainment and podcast distribution platform Stitcher have joined to create Wolverine: The Long Night, a 10-episode audio series. In casting and production, the show seems to reach for a new level of cinematic reality, creating something that might be described as a movie for the ears. Continue Reading
In the September report of Triton Digital’s Webcast Metrics Top 20 Ranker, overall stream listening inched upward a bit (one percent from thee previous month), and a couple of entities moved significantly. Continue Reading
In what could be described as the Kerry Trainor era of SoundCloud, starting when the Vimeo ex-CEO took over the Berlin-based streaming platform, a quickened pace of product development seems to be in progress. It’s good news for the creator/uploader community which pays a lot of SoundCloud’s bills via subscriptions for cloud storage of tracks. Continue Reading
The news that Apple has withdrawn its timetable to launch the HomePod smart speaker this year is a final buttoning down of the holiday lineup of smart speakers, as we enter Black Friday week. The broken promise of a Q4 launch is certainly disappointing to Apple loyalists who are deep into the ecosystem. Was the HomePod squeezed out of its market position by a surprise maneuver by Sonos? Continue Reading
August webcast listening showed a 4% increase across the board in Triton Digital’s Top 20 Webcast Metrics report for August, with each streaming entity in the group gaining ground from July. That unanimity is rare. Continue Reading