RAIN Notes: October 18

Jottings of note:

 

More Book For The Buck

Spotify announces an extension of its audiobook catalog to France,Belgium, the Netherlands, and Luxembourg. European authors are featured in the bulletin, including Gaël Faye, Maylis de Kerangal, Joël Dicker, Suzanne Vermeer, and Saskia Noort. Over 200,000 titles are included in the Premium membership package — the same number as available to U.S. subscribers. Audiobooks not included in that library can be purchased individually. And any non-Premium listener can buy the books. Says David Kaefer, Head of Music and Audiobooks, “This launch is a step toward growing the pie for everyone in the industry, supporting authors in finding new audiences, and making it easier for people to discover the audiobooks format.”

 

PodPreach

Bloomberg columnist Ashley Carman, whose articles mainly cover podcasting, stretches out her current piece to explore the “podcast election” — the emergence of podcasting as a preferred venue for the presidential candidates, to some extent displacing traditional media. She cites Edison’s Share of Ear data about the monthly podcast weekly audience (98 million). “At this point it’s basically mainstream,” she observes. There is also the renowned trust factor — that renowned relationship of host and listener — and cites data about that. And, the unstructured nature of podcasts is favorable to political preaching. “Don’t expect podcast campaigning to slow down in the years to come,” she predicts. READ

October 18, 2024


Brad Hill