Telling great stories in sound.
As 2015 wound down, a phrase kept popping up that has me somewhat mystified. “Podcasting,” it declared, “is the new radio.” I’m in the dark as to what backs up this statement. Maybe it’s nothing more benign than pride and optimism. The trouble is, going off in this direction is hazardous to podcasting’s development.
Time magazine columnist Joel Stein once tweeted, “Everyone has a podcast.” Maybe not everyone, but surely Santa has one. Of course, with his hectic schedule, not to mention all the commercial demands on his time, aren’t you a bit curious (you know you are) about what it takes to put his podcast together?
PodcastOne knows it. Mark Ramsey wrote about it months ago. If this issue doesn’t resonate with you, yet, maybe this post will help nudge you into action. At least it should get you thinking. I apologize in advance, however, because, at the age of ten, podcasting shouldn’t be spawing posts like this and you shouldn’t have to read them.
Regular readers of this blog will know there’s no love lost between me and the current way of distributing podcasts. Podcast distributing? There’s a phrase begging to be redefined. Podcasts aren’t distributed. They’re discovered. And the process resembles a Keystone Kops chase, with people scrambling around iTunes, Stitcher, Spreaker, Libsyn and SoundCloud until they find themselves running in circles. That’s hardly befitting a medium that wants to be taken seriously. Wouldn’t you rather be where your audience is (surely your audience would like that)? If so, this is a great time to be alive.
This post is about the most misused word I’ve seen since my wife referred to my writing as cute. The word is bandied about as if it were the magic bullet that will turn your podcast into an overnight sensation. With it, your brand will become the new Coca-Cola. Without it, the new Edsel (look it up). And yet, many of the people using it do so as if to demonstrate they have no idea what it means.
