Popular listening platforms, from streaming music to broadcast radio, have stepped into podcasting by pulling podcasting onto their platforms, mostly through acquisitions. Alphabet/Google/YouTube is taking a somewhat different tack, offering six-figure grants to podcasters and podcast networks to create video versions of their shows. This according to Bloomberg, which cites anonymous sources.
According to those sources, YouTube’s offers have ranged from $50,000 to $300,000. Those amounts are unattached to any information about what, exactly the money would pay for — just straight filming of the audio performance, for example, or a more native-video treatment. Certainly, producing video is substantially different in process and cost than producing audio.
Last September YouTube shifted Kai Chuk from his role as Director, Digital Media & Enterprise Partnerships to Director, Podcasting and Next Gen Media Partnerships. The podcast grant initiative seems like it falls in his purview.
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