by Bill Rosenblatt
Guest columnist Bill Rosenblatt speculates a podcast world in which Amazon has acquired Wondery, fulfilling that rumor. A certain bifurcation would become evident in that scenario, pitching an Amazon/Spotify axis pushing for exclusivity of content, and an iHeartRadio/NPR axis pushing for ad revenue. A must-read column. Continue Reading
by Jeff Umbro
In this week’s column, Podglomerate CEO Jeff Umbro covers key podcast news items from the past week. Megafy? That’s mega-Spotify. Also, a review of three radio quarterly earnings reports. Continue Reading
Podcasting consolidation continues, as Spotify — an acquisition giant in the field — announces that it is buying Megaphone, one of the world’s leading podcast hosting and ad-tech companies. The deal represents not only Spotify’s growing imperialism in the podcast space, but the deepening influence of modern ad technology and audience targeting on the business of podcasting. Continue Reading
by Jeff Umbro
In this week’s column, Podglomerate CEO Jeff Umbro covers key podcast news items from the past week. Also, he claims to have listened to non-political podcasts … for one day. Continue Reading
After Spotify’s Q3 earnings call this week, SPOT stock demonstrated investor unhappiness with some aspects of the financial performance, along with a wider midweek market downturn. This post digs into the call details to uncover several key points related to content metrics, audience size, and podcast strategy. Click through for some interesting metrics. Continue Reading
MIDiA Research has concluded its quarterly podcast survey, Podcasts Q2 2020: Spotify Takes an Early Lead. It’s a subscription product, but MIDiA has pulled out one intriguing bit: Spotify is the most-used podcast platform according to 780 survey respondents across six countries. Continue Reading
U.S. stream listening slipped about 3% month-over-month in August, according to the Triton Digital Webcast Metrics Top 20 Ranker. The two leaders, Pandora and iHeartRadio, each slipped a bit from the month before. Click through for other details and RAIN’s unique long-term Webcast Metrics tracker. Continue Reading
“Think of your favorite drive-time radio show,” Spotify says in an announcement. That is the only mention of “radio,” but it is telling. The company has launched a new listening product which jabs an arrow straight into radio’s underbelly, or apparently aspires to. This new product is (oddly) unnamed, but it mixes music and commentary similar to radio and enables users to become public DJs within the Spotify app. Click through for details, commentary, and how to find it. Continue Reading
David Cooper, RAIN Summit speaker who has held executive roles in the UK with Global, Spotify, and Global-owned DAX, has joined audio production house Red Apple Creative. Red Apple creates audio for publishers, advertisers, and agencies. It’s productions range across audio branding, audiobooks, podcasts, radio ads, foreign language content, and more including a special years-long relationship with Spotify. Continue Reading
by Bill Rosenblatt
Guest columnist Bill Rosenblatt analyzes Amazon’s most significant entry to podcasting — a podcast listening service integrated with Amazon Music. Comparing Amazon to Spotify is instructive, and this piece also takes into account how Amazon’s lead in the smart speaker market plays into strategic decision around podcasting. One question for the near future, according to rosenblatt: How will audiobooks play in these global audio platforms? Continue Reading
Spotify employees are more than unhappy with Joe Rogan’s controversial guests and remarks in some catalog episodes of The Joe Rogan Experience, which is starting an exclusive distribution deal. Much of the turmoil is reportedly centered around perceived transphobia expressed in the show. rogan recently apologized … for something else. Spotify staff have petitioned leadership for pre-publishing editorial control of the podcast. According to anonymously sourced reports, Daniel Ek has decided against that. Continue Reading
U.S. stream listening slipped about 3% month-over-month in July, according to the Triton Digital Webcast Metrics Top 20 Ranker. The two leaders, Pandora and iHeartRadio, each slipped a bit from the month before. Click through for other details and RAIN’s unique long-term Webcast Metrics tracker. Continue Reading