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We Lose A Lot When Podcasts Go Closed Instead Of Open (techdirt.com) 63

Posted by msmash from the closer-look dept.
Mike Masnick, writing at TechDirt: Last year, when Spotify purchased a bunch of podcast companies, we worried that it foretold the end of the open world of podcasting. You can get a Spotify account for free, but unlike most podcast apps, you can't get any podcast you want via Spotify. Spotify has to agree to host it, and as a podcast you have to "apply" (indeed, Techdirt's own podcast was initially rejected by Spotify, though has since been let in). That's a "closed, but free" setup. Most podcasts are both open and free -- published as open MP3 files, using an open RSS feed that any regular podcast app can grab.

Spotify, so far, hadn't done much to close off the podcasts that it had purchased, but perhaps that's changing. Earlier this week it was announced that one of (if not) the most popular podcasts in the world, Joe Rogan's, would now be moving exclusively to Spotify. News reports have said that Spotify paid over $100 million to get Rogan's podcast on board, while some have put the number closer to $200 million. While it's totally understandable why Rogan would take that deal (who wouldn't?), it does remain a sad day for the concept of an open internet. When we lock up content into silos, we all lose out. The entire concept of podcasts came from the open nature of the internet -- combining MP3s and RSS to make it all work seamlessly and enabling anyone to just start broadcasting. The entire ecosystem came out of that, and putting it into silos and locking it up so that only one platform can control it is unfortunate.

I'm sure it will get many people to move to Spotify's podcasting platform, though, and that means those that do offer open podcasting apps (most others) will suffer, because most people aren't going to want to use two different podcast apps. Even if the initial economics make sense, it still should be seen as a sad day for the open internet that enabled podcasting to exist in the first place.
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We Lose A Lot When Podcasts Go Closed Instead Of Open More

We Lose A Lot When Podcasts Go Closed Instead Of Open

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  • Story of everything (Score:3)

    by lessSockMorePuppet ( 6778792 ) on Friday May 22, 2020 @01:51PM (#60091926) Homepage

    You built an Internet, but they wanted the ARPAnet back.

  • A few podcasts go behind a paywall that requires a custom app to listen to and suddenly the open internet is threatened? I don't get it. The vast majority of podcasts are open and will always be, so third-party podcast apps will always be a thing.
    • People get confused. A free and open Internet doesn't mean nothing costs money. Far from it. A thriving, free internet should feature tons of paid content. That's people successfully making money delivering a product people want. That's a good thing. It enables people to earn a living producing something of value, and it encourages others to produce something of value. What DOES hurt a free and open Internet is if these pay-to-play players abuse their market positions to derail other podcasting platforms.

      • A free and open internet means that there's still a way to steal all the "paid" content, if you're smart.

  • Spotify is closed, but YouTube is an open closed p (Score:5, Interesting)

    by klipclop ( 6724090 ) on Friday May 22, 2020 @01:57PM (#60091940)
    Seems like Joe was sick of YouTube demonizing his videos. Spotify might be a closed platform on the consumption side, but open for content creators. On the flip side, YouTube is open on the consumption side, but can be arbitrarily closed up for content creators. It definitely sucks all his stuff will get pulled from regular podcast platforms since I use that. But I definitely think YouTube is the main reason he did this.

    • Seems like Joe was sick of YouTube demonizing his videos.

      I think the $100million contract probably swayed his opinion a bit.

    • Demonetizing, not demonizing. Youtube censorship was also a thing. I understand that he wants to talk to a couple of doctors who had a video about what they are seeing re: the Wuhan coronavirus. Youtube took down their video because it contradicts their preferred narrative (it was anti-lockdown to some degree).

    • YouTube is starting to realize some content has to be paywalled... they've got about three add-on packs these days!

      • Re: (Score:2)

        by Luckyo ( 1726890 )

        Youtube has a huge amount of closed "pay to view" content. Did you know that they host a huge amount of hollywood movies?

        Almost no one wants it, because things like Netflix already exist for such content, and offer a much better model for it for most people.

    • Re: (Score:3)

      by AmiMoJo ( 196126 )

      They are paying him $100m to switch, far more than he was ever making from YouTube. His entire yearly income was about $30m at its peak and only a fraction of that was YouTube. He was TV shows, merchandise, appearances, sponsorship...

  • > News reports have said that Spotify paid over $100 million to get Rogan's podcast on board, while some have put the number closer to $200 million.

    Hey everyone, check out my new Network Security podcast.
    Please subscribe. :D

  • The people who actually make the podcast gain money. In the end that's the reason for it all.

  • Anything to get away from Youtube (Score:3, Interesting)

    by DNS-and-BIND ( 461968 ) on Friday May 22, 2020 @02:23PM (#60092026) Homepage

    As long as it helps people get away from YouTube, it's a good thing. Joe Rogan's show is deliberately blocked from YouTube's "Trending" tab in America. They also put their finger on the scale for other "inconvenient" independent content producers, from hiding them in the search results to suppressing them.

    Once the champion of the little guy - hence the name, YOU tube - YouTube now openly wishes the little guy would stop talking. Today YouTube admits boosting mainstream media channels over individualsâ(TM) videos even though users watch less of them and it makes them lose money. [reclaimthenet.org] They don't want your money, though. YouTube isn't even profitable to Google, they earn profit through other services. They want control over you.

    • Re: (Score:3, Interesting)

      by ZombieDonut ( 1291338 )
      Exactly. When the threat of demonetization from YouTube for copyright claims kept happening combined with flags for hate speech whenever he'd have someone controversial came rolling in, effectively forcing the podcast to stop being broadcast live, well the YouTube days were numbered. It's not really open if someone can tell you that you're 1 strike away from having everything taken away from you and if you talk to so and so too openly then we're hiding all your content unless people know what they're look

    • Re: (Score:1)

      by DRJlaw ( 946416 )

      As long as it helps people get away from YouTube, it's a good thing. Joe Rogan's show is deliberately blocked from YouTube's "Trending" tab in America.

      Which completely explains why show #1477 is listed in Trending [youtube.com] right now.

      They also put their finger on the scale for other "inconvenient" independent content producers, from hiding them in the search results to suppressing them.

      Sure they do. I completely trust your already-proven-false post concerning YouTube's practices.

      • He's had a grand total of two shows in Trending. You're probably outside America, or in Canada, or somewhere, or using a VPN. Anywhere besides America he regularly makes the Trending tab. You *do* know Youtube provides different experiences to different regions, right?

        • Re: (Score:2, Interesting)

          by DRJlaw ( 946416 )

          He's had a grand total of two shows in Trending.

          It's Trending, for God's sake. His week plus old shows won't be trending, and why must every show be trending?

          You're probably outside America, or in Canada, or somewhere, or using a VPN.

          No, no, and no. Three strikes and you're out.

          Anywhere besides America he regularly makes the Trending tab.

          He makes the Trending tab in America too. Like anyone in America can see. Right now. Like you just did.

          You *do* know Youtube provides different experiences to differe

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by DRJlaw ( 946416 )

      I've got karma to burn, people.

      As long as it helps people get away from YouTube, it's a good thing. Joe Rogan's show is deliberately blocked from YouTube's "Trending" tab in America.

      Which completely explains why show #1477 is listed in Trending [youtube.com] right now.

      They also put their finger on the scale for other "inconvenient" independent content producers, from hiding them in the search results to suppressing them.

      Sure they do. I completely trust your already-proven-false post concerning YouTube's practices.

  • Without RSS it should be called something else than Podcast.

  • actually wanting to make money off of their effort. How dare they?

    • Historically, I think the "Internet is free' will be the seminal, and terrible idea that brought us the crap-Net we have today. We should have been paying for news, paying for entertainment, paying for software, paying for everything just like we did pre-Net. Ideally the cost of these goods and services would be less, since you didn't need the whole physical distribution model, but priced nonetheless.

      Blame it on the media industries that wanted to keep prices the same for digital and physical, blame it on

      • Re:Those evil people... (Score:4, Interesting)

        by SteveSgt ( 3465 ) on Friday May 22, 2020 @03:22PM (#60092264)

        You're not wrong, edi_guy.

        As one of the earliest podcasters, I also struggled with how to pay for it, but as a non-profit, I managed for almost 3 years through grants and donations. Selling subscriptions to listeners for access to extra content wasn't as successful. Micropayments might have been one of the better systems. Whoring for advertisers, as an alternative, makes for a pretty bleak existence.

        I think we're more likely to be stuck with the Netflix model of a few gatekeeper aggregators charging a subscription fee. In such a model those aggregators have ultimate power over what gets distributed. That's sad, because it creates the same kind of narrowing of discourse and limiting of perspectives that we had when there were only a few large TV networks.

        I liked to blame Apple back when I produced a show, because when they first brought podcasts to iTunes, they had the heft and the resources to implement a micropayments system.

        But as a consumer who's no longer a producer, I'll argue that if a show is exclusively on Spotify, instead of openly available for any RSS reader to download, then it's no longer a "podcast", but rather some other proprietary distribution method. It may be an Internet-transmitted audio or video program, but it is NOT a podcast.

        • You really feel like arguing about the precise definition of a word that was invented less than 30 years ago and coopted to a different definition so that well over 95% of the people using the word use the new definition is a productive use of your time?

          Might as well start arguing about hacker again.

      • Blame it on ... (Score:2, Interesting)

        by raymorris ( 2726007 )

        > Historically, I think the "Internet is free' will be the seminal, and terrible idea that brought us the crap-Net we have today. We should have been paying ...
        > Blame it on the media industries that wanted to keep prices the same for digital and physical, blame it on credit card companies for thwarting micro-payments. blame it on AOL for bundling

        I was there working with a lot of different web sites in the 1990s, lots of sites trying lots of different revenue models. A series of issues got us to wher

  • and the fact that it's always about the money is why it has ALWAYS been about making the internet closed.

    And so it goes...

  • If I can't find his podcast in my free thirdparty podcast app... then I'm never gonna listen to his pod again. Oh well.
  • I mean, Rogan might be entertaining (I can take or leave the guy) but I don't think he's really doing much of a public service. There's no shortage of free podcasts out there (shout out to Pat The NES Punk's Completely Unnecessary Podcast and it's awesome hair metal intro plus the Retro Computing Roundup and those crazy guys with their odd ball retro computing projects).

    What makes podcasting great is that anybody can do it well with a little preparation and a $100 bucks worth of microphones and foam.

  • Rogan.. SGN... who's next (Score:4, Interesting)

    by The New Guy 2.0 ( 3497907 ) on Friday May 22, 2020 @04:06PM (#60092418)

    This falls on the same week when Some Good News was sold outright to CBS All Access, removing it from YouTube.

    We went from Free MPEGs, to YouTube and such, now as paywalled.

    Just the would moving on here... everybody wants to get paid!

    • Comment removed based on user account deletion

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by Luckyo ( 1726890 )

      To be fair, the process of "popular podcast goes behind a paywall" has been ongoing for years at this point. There's a lot of medium sized podcasts on things like patreon for example.

  • The real news about Rogan going to Spotify is that a major talent has taken his listeners away from the de-platforming SJW's at Google, not that it is no longer "public".

  • I agree that I would like all podcasts to be free, just like I would all media outlets to be free on the internet. The problem is that they need to make money and sometimes free access does not cut it. Rogan's podcast may be unusual because it is so popular. I wish I had a solution.

  • Rogan smelled a rat (Score:4, Informative)

    by erp_consultant ( 2614861 ) on Friday May 22, 2020 @05:52PM (#60092778)

    In recent times YouTube has been censoring or demonetizing content that they deemed inappropriate. If it is just some dumb cat video with 5,000 views then big deal but if you have a podcast like Rogans' with millions of views then it is a very big deal.

    To me it's a lot like when Howard Stern went to satellite radio. Yes, it is a big pay day but it is also a way to retain creative control over his content. I'm pretty sure that Spotify told Rogan to just keep doing what he's doing.

    As far as following him to Spotify I'll probably just find something else to listen to and watch. Not really looking to add any new apps to my phone.

  • You will be able to get my podcast for free, forever. Listen to it instead of the Spotify ones. Let them choose obscurity and reward people with your attention who do [subscribestar.com] not [youtube.com] restrict [mega.nz] how [buzzsprout.com] you [bitchute.com] listen [pornhub.com] to [magnet] them [facebook.com].

  • I'd suggest any nerd-types who may be around look into the SW stack and donation model of podcasts like No Agenda ( http://www.noagendashow.com/ [noagendashow.com] - sorry not feeling like dealing w/HTML right now).

    Open-source software distributing a system of podcasts funded by producer donations (if you contribute, you care, and can get some minor input into the show, hence "producers"). Where I struggle is "how to get a normal person to understand that this is much better than the censored (self- or otherwise) drivel th

  • Spotify has serious problems with podcast searches as they default to the local language of the device based on network. I can't find podcasts I regularly listen to when I'm on my work wifi as the entire system switches to German, I can barely find English ones at all when I'm on LTE since everything defaults to Dutch.

    Even as a Spotify fiend I still listen to podcasts mostly by streaming them from Youtube.

  • This is why Luminary doesn't work.
    I'm fine with paying for certain podcasts, usually via Patreon and it's custom RSS feeds that give me extra episodes, but force me to use a substandard podcast app and you're out of luck!

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