Same here, I very much like this phrase. No vendor, no corporation, not even an ecosystem mentioned with that. Yet still it is clear where to get those podcast episodes. :)

@daedalus there is, unfortunately, one I like which has been shoved into the Spotify walled garden.

@Capheind @NatureMC @simon @daedalus hosting is the least expensive part of producing a quality podcast. Things like Spotify exclusivity aren’t about hosting, they’re about a reliable income stream for the Podcaster, who can now free up time and spoons that were previously spent on managing sponsorships and so on.

I’m not a fan of Spotify for doing it, but I can hardly blame a Podcaster for finding the offer compelling

@Capheind @NatureMC @simon @daedalus even the DIY shows, the main cost is time, if there’s any care about producing something good (and most DIY podcasters who have any success do seem to care a lot about quality.) Time to research, plan, write, edit, produce. If this is someone’s livelihood, it also means time to do the business management parts of subscriptions and/or sponsors and ads. Hosting is nothing in comparison.

I can’t blame someone for looking at Spotify’s offer and concluding it might be easier to spend time on the parts they’re passionate about if they have a more reliable income and less business management to do. But go ahead and be angry at the people doing the hard work and not the big corporation exploiting them. You do you.

@Capheind @simon @daedalus you are so right! But who can resist a million $ deal?😉 😁

@Capheind @simon @daedalus A professional podcast is much more than hosting.

I’ve been sharing this here and there when the topic of “#podcasts” that don’t do #RSS comes up

@fsnk
and also today you have things like Castopod that lets you host and manage your own podcast, making it ready for RSS and to publish at services like Apple and Google Podcasts.

Castopod is also part of the fediverse so you can follow your favorite podcasts via Mastodon and the like.

I love when a podcast isn't restricted to a platform like Spotify, it must be free for audiences to choose where to consume it.

It's interesting that you take this as a positive sign, because I see this as a sign that the decentralised open podcast landscape might be loosing slowly but surely. Let me explain why:

While there is of course no single source for *all* podcast, each podcast indeed has this definite source: Its feed and the files linked to it, under a certain URI and domain. This feed is then often fed into directories like iTunes or even not-really-podcast platforms like Sp*tify.

->

What podcast.platforms do you recommend? Currently using Castlight for Android but it is starting to annoy me. It fails to download some episodes and continually retries them. Looking for alternatives.

@adamshostack

Given that this post has been read by way more people than I was expecting, and some folks are learning about the role of RSS in podcasting for the first time, here’s a bit more context:

Like many long-running projects, there are a lot of people who deserve the credit for RSS being what it is, including the amazing Aaron Swartz.

Most relevantly for podcasting, at the turn of the millennium Dave Winer released an update to RSS that added support for multimedia to be included in feeds, and gave the example of using it for audio. This is the technical mechanism that led to the rise of podcasting and is still what fuels it today.

RSS is how your podcast-listening app of choice (yes, even Spotify, Stitcher, and Apple Music) knows that the podcast exists and when new episodes are published, no matter where they are hosted. It is what enables syndication and listener choice. (If it isn’t syndicated, it technically isn’t a podcast! That said, technical definitions aren’t social definitions, and many things fall under the colloquial umbrella, so use “podcast” however you like. Audio is such a great medium regardless of what is under the hood.)

#RSS #podcasts

I agree with the sentiment, but as a podcast producer I can't stand this phrase. It helps nobody — if someone knows how to listen to podcasts, feels like a given. If the listener isn't a podcast person, it doesn't actually tell them how they might start subscribing to a show! A better phrase, IMO, is "Subscribe to the show in your favorite podcast app." Conveys it's available in all podcast apps, and for new listeners they should look for "a podcast app" as a starting point.

I have the opposite perspective on the phrase. I'm not a big podcast user, and "anywhere you get your podcasts" doesn't actually tell me where to find it. I don't use apps or a mobile phone for podcasts; my default way to find content is to look for it on a website. But without being told where to go, I have a devil of a time tracking it down.

I'm not arguing the utility of RSS. Just saying it doesn't cover all the bases of where users are coming from.

I also think it's a cautionary tale: no one has ever found a better way to tell people how to use podcasts and RSS than to just vaguely geature at them, no matter how important they are to a vibrant medium like podcasts. Even when these open systems become popular, people don't really learn or recognize that they're using them.