Podcast Movement Recap and Insights #641

In this episode titled “Podcast Movement Recap and Insights,” hosts Todd Cochrane and Rob Greenlee discuss their experiences and observations from the recent Podcast Movement conference held in Dallas. Todd has also posted a piece on Linkedin that has garnered nearly 8000 views. Todd kicks off the conversation by expressing gratitude for the listeners. Rob … Continue reading Podcast Movement Recap and Insights #641 →

The post Podcast Movement Recap and Insights #641 appeared first on New Media Show.

Episode Transcript

(00:01):
Hey, Rob. Here we are for another new
media show. Everyone, thank you for joining us.
Yeah. It's great to be here, Todd.
The host podcast movement. Yes. We got a
we got a live one today.
Show me the money, Todd. Show me the
money. Is that that's your theme. Me is,
I'm I'm being a little nicer.

(00:22):
Recap.
I got the got the re recap going
on here. Well, that's that's also part of
this, Doug. Yeah. Yeah. For sure. I'm, I'm
shutting down some, previous streams. Okay. Let me
do there we save some bandwidth.
You know, I walked away from
let's just put it this way. My biggest
complaint is always, do we see enough creators?

(00:45):
Yeah. I saw enough creators.
You know But they were all pretty much
local. Oh, they were local. To Dallas. Right?
Yeah. I guess let's back up. Let's,
let's start. We we got in there well,
I got in Sunday. I probably really didn't
need to get into Monday
Yeah. Because they didn't let us in to

(01:06):
set up until in the afternoon. So I
could have saved a
180 or 200 or 300 or whatever the
hotel cost was for one night.
So, anyway, got in there. I got set
up Monday.
And then,
one thing I noticed immediately
was, woah, way

(01:27):
I mean, Libsyn's got this big massive, you
know,
20 by 20 booth or whatever it was.
And then there was just
a smattering
of other vendors. I don't know what was
there. 20,
maybe 20 other vendors.
Yeah.
Yeah.
And so before we dive into too much,
I mean Yeah. There may be people that

(01:47):
are watching this that maybe don't know
anything about Podcast Movement. So Yeah. So let
let's just share. Podcast Movement happened,
last week in down in Dallas, and
and it has been historically, it's about eleven
year running annual podcasting conference. It's been known
as the
the largest podcasting conference really in the world,

(02:09):
though I would say it's maybe lost that
handful now. In The United States.
Right. Not in the world anymore.
Right. And I'm not even sure it's even
the biggest podcast
conference even in The United States anymore. Oh,
yeah. Compared to this year's numbers for sure.
Yeah. I think Podfest is probably as big
or bigger Very. Yeah. Podcast movement now. Yeah.

(02:30):
So
this is a conference that's been pivotal
in the podcast industry since 2014.
And so, you know, each year has been
a completely, you know, different experience,
but also a a reflection of where we're
at in the podcast medium. Right? From,
this balance between

(02:51):
kind of the the business side of podcasting
and the creator side of podcasting, which,
historically have kind of
and this year's
plain to see is
a conflicting
prioritization
for the industry.
Yeah. You know,
I was worried about the numbers. We talked
about it two weeks ago.

(03:11):
Yeah. And, a buddy of mine in the
Dallas Fort Worth area had gotten an email
three or four days before
Podcast Movement,
said, hey. We got a special price ticket
for you that are local. And I think
his ticket was a 170
or a 100 and you know, something like
that. A $170
maybe. And considering what everyone else paid for

(03:33):
a ticket,
it paid off to be in the Dallas
Fort Worth area.
And Well, the
the normal ticket that a creator if you
came in as a creator Yeah.
They
if you got, let's say,
you know, like a discount
code or something like that, they got you
a discount in into the event. It got
the price down to just a little bit

(03:54):
over $300
for So
significant discount then for the Dallas Fort Worth
area, but to be honest with you, I'm
glad they did it.
It it made the show be you know,
and we'll talk about that here in a
second. But Yeah.
It it really tells you something about what
what they need to do in the future.
Yeah. Right.
And, of course, Tuesday morning,
the first or maybe

(04:16):
when they made the announcement, there was an
announcement that Podcast Movement had acquired
Sounds Profitable.
And, of course, there was much discussion about
was it actually sounds proper acquiring podcast movement,
but after we heard the
explanation
Well, it was also said it was a
merger, which Yeah. Confuses it even more. Right?
Yeah. So there was some conflicting language, but

(04:39):
my understanding is is that Podcast Movement did
acquire
Sounds Profitable.
Mhmm. They made,
Brian Barletta of Sounds Prof Proposal the president
of
Podcast Movement and everything else.
Dan, who was he was I it's first
time I ever seen Dan smiling at a
an event. I mean, he was he's always

(05:00):
running around. He was giddy. Yeah. We were
always running around, like, with a scowl. You
know? So Dan now is in charge of
their
events division. Side of the Yeah. Events side.
Right. So the events side.
And then so now
Brian
and Sounds Profitable,
and Tom is still gonna do Tom's stuff.
It sounds profitable. That's my understanding.

(05:22):
Mhmm. So now you've got
Brian in charge of
podcast movement.
And
And sounds profitable. And sounds profitable.
Continue its brand and its presence out there.
Right.
So our initial my initial reaction was interesting.

(05:42):
And, you know, I I give everybody
the benefit of the doubt. I'm just trying
to, you know and then so I guess
it was Monday
night,
or maybe it was Tuesday night. I don't
know. I ran into they had,
Sound Possible actually had a
open bar event,
and,
I ran into Tom real quick and, you

(06:03):
know, and then everyone's got a cocktail on
hand. Of course, Tom's not drinking. He's drinking
water,
or instant death, whatever that thing he you
know, that whatever that drink he drinks. Yeah.
And
and Liquid death. Liquid death. Yeah. There you
go. Right. And I didn't wanna talk too
much business,
you know, because I grabbed a cocktail too.

(06:24):
And I I basically said, hey, Tom. You
know, congratulations
and,
you know, gotta get my main thing is
get the creators back. That was my, really,
my
thirty second or sixty second interaction with him.
And and,
Tuesday,
when the event started,
you know, I was I had low, low,

(06:46):
low expectations, and we had already
decided internally
before the event Coming back. That we weren't
coming back.
We weren't going to renew. And,
it was evident that a lot of the
people already made that decision because there wasn't
a lot of people there.
But lo and behold, at least from my
perspective,

(07:07):
we started getting people to the we weren't
in the old days, we'd be four or
five deep, and I'd have three or four
people there, and we would be talk we'd
walk away from the event with 250,
300
contacts.
So we weren't
we might be one or two. There might
be one or two people at the table.

(07:28):
And again and again, creators,
new creators,
looking to create content. And again, where are
you from? Dallas, Houston,
Dallas, Fort Worth,
and then the surrounding, Waco. It's all surrounding
the metroplex
within about an hour. Of course, Houston's five
hours away. But,

(07:48):
so anyway, we had
and and it was
again, the people coming to the booth were
some were relatively new, and there was some
that were there that were looking to leave.
Matter of fact, there was a a definite
winner on who's losing
customers. I won't talk about that
certain company. It was different from the event

(08:08):
before.
And, you know, so we we know where
there's weakness now based upon those conversations. But,
so, you know,
I walked away from the two days of
you know, we had our slow times, but
I walked away from the event thinking
that we would have maybe 50 badges scanned.
And it turned out to be about double

(08:30):
that. I think we had
84.
And I there were some people I couldn't
scan, so I had cards or contact information.
So between the intermix, probably about a
100. That was all. Was it a balance
of people that already had a podcast that
wanted to
shift their hosts, or was it entirely
new podcast It was balance of the two?

(08:51):
There was, of course, some people that had
some, like, we talked to one gentleman. He
has 80 shows. He's looking for a new
home. Oh, on a network site. On a
network site. So, you know, that if we'd
had that conversation with just that guy alone
Yeah. And and if that converted, that that
takes care of the whole
show. You know, that that's a big deal.
That's a big move client.

(09:12):
But the rest of them are just getting
started or some people on Spotify, and they
didn't know what they're doing or you know?
So the conversation was good. Now there was
some BDB stuff intermixed in there,
but not as much. And then, we've talked
to almost all those vendors in the past.
Someone was complaining on my LinkedIn post that
we weren't being friendly to other vendors, but,

(09:34):
you know, you're you're staying focused. You're trying
to talk to people. It isn't my job
to go and talk to other businesses unless
I think there's a business opportunity.
Right. And some of the businesses, you couldn't
even tell what they did because they had
nothing on their
table. You'd see just a name, you know,
like, what is this? And there's there was,
of course, we've always been known for having

(09:54):
a lot of paper and swag, but,
the, the traffic was you know, I and
then when I got done, I I'd seen
Tom in the hallway just passing out, same
floor of my hotel, and he was on
his way somewhere. And I was on the
way to my room. I said, hey, Tom.
I'm satisfied.
That's that's the word I use. I'm satisfied
with the show. We had good traffic.

(10:15):
You know, excited to see what this potential
for
for the next
show. And Saturday
no. Friday morning, sitting in the,
waiting for the airplane because they changed my
flight and, anyway, I have some extra time.
And I typed up a LinkedIn post that
got quite a bit of

(10:36):
I think it's still getting traffic
and basically say podcast movement twenty twenty five,
reflection point, and
and Brian weighed in and took the input,
and a lot of other people did too.
And I think there's a lot of good
stuff in there for them.
But
podcasting,
at least
up
until today,

(10:59):
they it has shifted from its grassroots beginnings,
and it's definitely
largely mainstream.
Yeah. We've grown up, Todd. Yeah.
And so I think and again, my my
biggest

(11:19):
gripe has always been
that
cost
Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday show. Yeah. This is nothing
new. I've talked about this a million times.
Yeah. So have you.
So
I think they'll take into consideration wherever they
decide to go in New York. And that's
nothing. They can't said, no. It's San Diego.
We're not going to San Diego. We're going

(11:40):
to New York. From my perspective, going to
New York was probably
well, it's probably the smart thing that they
they should have done
because or have done because there's a that's
a that's a you know, the what what's
New York? The third largest city in the
world or something is or maybe the it's
huge. Right? Yeah. All the boroughs around and

(12:00):
all that stuff. And in Boston, and you
got Jersey, and, you know, you've got this
huge metroplex.
They're gonna draw
people just because,
you know, they're gonna make the numbers probably
worth it
just because of the
where the show is gonna go.
I don't think you'll draw people outside of

(12:21):
the metroplex because if, you know, September in
New York and well, it doesn't matter when
you go to New York.
I think that they definitely need to do,
like, what you you suggest. They need to
have one day passes. Yeah. One day passes.
They need to have a a three state
marketing outreach
campaign Yep. To get local people aware of

(12:43):
the event Yep. And
and with a decent price ticket Yep. They
can come in kind of like what the
podcast show does. I think there's a lot
of lessons from Oh, there's for sure.
But it podcast movement needs to learn. Now
the the challenge that they've got to balance,
and I understand this, business people don't like
to be at a show on Saturday. They
don't.

(13:04):
They wanna be home. They they wanna be
home with
their family.
They wanna work they wanna work nine whatever
the hours are, Monday through Friday. They wanna
fly on Monday, fly on Friday, be at
the show in the middle of the week.
That's perfect for business people.
Whereas creators, we're working. And I'm a creator,
and I'm working too. So I have to
take, I don't take time off of work
because I work for a company, but work

(13:26):
doesn't get done.
You know? So I understand the PTO situation
because I, you know, I balanced that for
years and, you know, so, you know, you
work the industry. So you you know, not
not necessarily I had to take PTO to
go to the event. But the majority,
95% of the people that will be attending
will have to if they're working a regular
nine to five.

(13:48):
They would prefer not to have to take
a vacation time to Right. To do that.
So If you have creator events Friday, Saturday
Yep.
People can get into New York Thursday.
Friday, Saturday, go home Sunday, or even fly
out late Saturday.
And then
the business people, you could do a

(14:09):
For Thursday, Friday for the business people. Thursday,
Friday for the business people.
Saturday again so, you know, you you go
heavy on business on Thursday,
mix track on Friday,
and then
Saturday is all creator track. And then I
think you'll have a good mix. Now that's
gonna piss the vendors off that have to
be there because they're gonna not, you know,

(14:29):
their people are gonna have to be there
on on Saturday. But for me, I'd rather
be Saturday, Sunday. But, you know, that's I
don't think I'll get Sunday.
Well, that's why
that's why splitting the difference on a Saturday
Yeah. Basically allows everybody to go. Yeah. And
then Go home on Sunday. Right. And then
so hotel cost, though, the only good thing

(14:50):
about being in New York City is you
do have options.
I think
the last time I was in
Manhattan,
I stayed at, like, a Hampton Inn, Midtown.
I think it was, like, a $180
a night.
If you shop, you can find a place
to stay. Now I don't think

(15:13):
and I might be wrong.
Especially if you do a Friday, Saturday, people
can then do something on a Sunday.
They can maybe Saturday night and go to
a play.
Sunday,
go, you know, go shopping, go to the
World Trade Center,
Memorial. There's lots of things to do in
New York. I mean, more than you could

(15:34):
ever accomplish in a day. So you could
leave on a Sunday night and still,
in most cases, get back because you're on
the East Coast. So even if you're in
California, you leave Sunday night. It's still Sunday
afternoon. You get back home in California Sunday
evening with a direct flight.
And A lot of people are gonna come
in from the the Tristate area here via

(15:57):
train. Right. That's true too. And just do
do a one day in and out. Yeah.
Or if you're coming from another coast, it
makes it easier. See, when you when I
was, like, leaving Dallas,
I left Dallas Friday morning bright and early,
and I didn't get home until 04:00 in
the afternoon
here on the East Coast even though it's
a one hour time change because

(16:18):
I'm going against the sun. So, anyway, being
in New York is smart. We'll see where
they hopefully, it's not in Brooklyn or something.
Hopefully, they can
have it in
in Midtown or find something like that. It
just makes it more convenient from Uber and
everything else. But
There is a venue that the Advertising Week
folks use. It's an old,

(16:40):
multi story
shopping mall Yeah. In in Manhattan that they
take over, and that's where they hold all
their sessions.
And it's
it's it would be great for podcast movement
to do that. It may not have that
big,
like ballroom type of big stage or something

(17:01):
like that, but it would create this situation
where there would be separate rooms instead of
putting everything in one room, which I think
is
I don't really like that anymore. I mean
Yeah. I mean, I think it's
they thought it was a good idea. It
will. It it worked pretty good. It worked
pretty good this year.
And and, actually, some people liked it because

(17:21):
people were on headphones. And for those who
don't know, everyone was wearing headphones. You I
saw more people paying attention
wearing the headphones
than
if they were just sitting in a room
and they're looking at their laptop. Well, that's
true.
Actually,
people work in booths had headphones on
listening to their sessions. We had stuff. Yeah.

(17:42):
Yeah. And it does create a a little
bit of an antisocial environment. Yeah. A little
bit.
That's the only problem is, you know, everybody's
walking around with headphones on, not talking to
each other.
So, you know, it I don't know. I
have mixed feelings about it, Todd. I mean,
I don't
I'm not a big fan of everybody walking
around with headphones on. So I think Brian

(18:03):
can even if they do let's say they
do a Wednesday,
and it's media day. That's just media day.
All the media buyers can come in.
They can have meetings.
They could do that on Wednesday. See, they
could make this a Wednesday, Thursday, Friday, Saturday
event.
Well, Todd, they already announced that they're gonna
do a companion upfront.

(18:25):
Oh, at the same time?
At at the same time is what I
heard. Now the other announcement about that I
don't know if that that that's been publicly
announced. Oh, maybe I heard I heard something
about that.
But the Right. So that could be on
Wednesday. Right. It could be. Yeah. Right. So
the other situation
is going they're doing South by Southwest.
And South by Southwest whole another bag of

(18:46):
water. That's,
more expensive than even New York.
Oh, yeah. And if you don't have a
hotel room now for South by twenty twenty
six, good luck. You're 30 miles out of
town. Or you're paying $500
a night and a South by ticket.
If you get, I think
I haven't been there in a while, but
I remember spending at least a thousand dollars

(19:08):
for a south by ticket for the digital
portion of the event.
Yeah. I don't know that I agree with
them making that event,
sounds profitable
or the podcast movement evolutions event, I think.
I won't we won't go. It needs to
be the
the sounds profitable event. It's it's it's just
it's South Buy is just too expensive.

(19:29):
Again, I'm serious. It'll be more expensive to
not necessarily fly in, but the hotel accommodations
Oh, yeah. In Austin is is
it's bad, You know?
And, you know, great entertainment,
lots of liquor. There's a party atmosphere. That's
my problem too at South by Southwest.

(19:50):
If you if you have eight hours of
stuff, but a lot of business gets done
outside, but you've got eight hours.
Everyone scatters after that.
So when was the last time you went
to Southwest Southwest? It's been six or seven
years,
at least.
It's been longer for me. May maybe me
too. I'll have to go back and look,
but and maybe it's changed, but still

(20:13):
crazy expensive.
Oh, it is. It's a very popular event.
It's a music Yep. As well as a
technology
of event. And it's a film or
video event too. So this whole podcast piece
of it is just one piece of the
puzzle and it's an all week long event.
It's not,
like through two or three or four days

(20:35):
or something. It's a full, like, maybe week
and a half. Yeah. Well, it's it's two
weeks for the full event or ten I
think it's ten straight days or something. But
Yeah. But, you know, we we did have
some interesting meetings at Podcast Movement.
The podcast,
the PSP,
Podcast Standards Project had a room.
We had meetings every single day. The biggest

(20:57):
one attended was HLS.
And this I kinda got a funny story
about this, Rob. So
we're talking about we're well,
Justin from Transistor
was
demonstrating
on the Fountain app the ability to switch
between audio and video.
Yes. And I'm kinda over in the corner
and, you know, I'm doing Ad Lib, you

(21:18):
know, open RSS.
Susie supported video from the beginning.
You know, did you know Apple Podcasts supported
video? And, you know, I'm kinda and lo
and behold, Ted was outside the room.
I didn't know it. So I'm like, you
guys need to run Ted down. Look look
for Ted here from Apple. Look at the
badge. If they don't have it turned around,

(21:38):
I said he he's got a beard. Keep
an eye out for him. And,
so I little did I know Ted was
outside the room, and I'm, you know, I'm
rallying the troops to go. Well, he couldn't
couldn't get in, actually, is what he told
me. It was full.
The door was blocked, so they couldn't get
in. Well, the door was full. We had
a full room. That's what I mean. He

(21:58):
couldn't walk walk into the room. So, anyway,
so Ted kinda caught me later. He said,
I heard you. You know? So it's a
little bit of a a little bit of
fun time there. But,
the HLS thing is, I think, a great
way forward,
but it's so early
for that piece.

(22:20):
Well, it is, but it's that conversation has
gotta start sometime. Yeah. And it started.
So Blueberry is gonna support HLS in the
alter enclosure. That'll be out in a couple
of weeks.
We're not gonna do the HLS encoding, though.
So if you wanna do HLS encoding, you
can do that on your own. You'll just
create a a form pathway to We're gonna
Yeah. To provide the URL in. Yeah. Right.

(22:42):
Yeah. And then we'll see.
You know? And, again, I I I know
how many video shows I have. We'll send
a mailing out to them and let them
know,
and then we'll start doing some education.
But I hate to say it.
I know what it's gonna cost me now.

(23:03):
The cost is not as bad as we
originally thought if you're
doing small scale And just, you know, spin
up a couple of servers, do the FFM
encoding, whatever is done. There's a process
to create the HLS file, then it's just
data. It's just, you know, then it's just
stuff that moves via the CDN.
It's all good until it gets really good,

(23:23):
then it becomes expensive. This is a thing.
You get a Rogan that's doing HLS and
people move to an alternative app. It could
get very expensive very fast. So, you know,
if we decide to do HLS at some
point, there's gonna have to be a limit.
There's gonna be no way I can just
say, okay. For $20, you you get all
this for free.
So is the cost escalation really just the

(23:45):
bandwidth? Yeah. The escalation is the bandwidth. There
is initial upfront encoding long as you don't.
As long as I don't use
Amazon to do the encoding.
If I use Amazon do the encoding, it's
about a dollar
to per video to do the encoding.
And then it's, like, I think it's actually
85¢.
And then it's bandwidth.

(24:08):
And the bandwidth
Yeah. So what's the spectrum on the encoding?
Are you creating a, like, a the equivalent
of a a variable
bit rate playback? Yeah.
Type of And you have to decide the
settings they're in.
So depending and that that file could get
pretty big. But again, if you're just doing
small numbers,

(24:29):
let's say under a thousand shows a month,
a thousand episodes a month, you you can
just do this encoding on
a on a couple of small boxes, $20
boxes, and they'll you know, incur that dollar
fee. And you just then just drop the
and then you get storage and the bandwidth
that's involved. But, again, if if let's let's

(24:50):
just say there was a thousand shows. I
can scale that today. That's gonna be that's
no problem.
The problem is is okay. So now we've
got all this HLS done, then
three, four apps. Support the playback. Right.
So
if if Apple in one or two years,
because I don't foresee anything coming any sooner
than that.

(25:10):
Well, I said when I I actually told
the Apple folks, I said hell will freeze
over before you support alternate enclosure.
Now I've already been proven wrong because my
fiber got blown in,
in front of the house. So I'm waiting
to get my fiber hookup here probably be
a couple months. So hell did freeze over
once already because I said hell would freeze
over before I got fiber.

(25:32):
And,
so, you know, I'd love to see lightning
strike twice in that regard.
Bad news for Elon. Right? Is that what
that is? No. I'll keep one Starlink up
once we get fiber. Oh, yeah. I've always
had a backup
connection.
You you never know until it's trusted, and
it's Frontier.
Frontier doesn't have the biggest reputation. But

(25:55):
so
the video conversation was just, you know, that.
And then
the podcast standards project, again, had a couple
more meetings. We actually had a PSP meeting
or we had, I think, there's 20 people
in there.
Adam Curry was there for a little bit.
He had to bug out early. He says,
oh, you guys are crazy. You know? Basically,
you should he said, you should be ignoring
video.

(26:16):
And, you know,
it is what it is. You know, Adam
is not in the podcast hosting business, and,
you know, I have to do what my
customers want,
but
at the same time, there's certain things I
can't do because I can't do it for
five people or 20 or 30. I have
to do it for a 100.
Well, time will tell on the videos. Yeah.

(26:37):
Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. You know, I think, you
know, podcasting has had a deep history Yeah.
With video. It's run, you know, parallel to
some degree with YouTube. Yeah. So it's
you know,
as I've said many times, it's, you know,
it's been always a part of this medium.
It's just we we went through ten years
where it it wasn't. Yeah. It wasn't. So

(26:59):
right. And people forgot, you know. I think
it was more than ten years. But, you
know, I think Yeah. I think it yeah.
I think too is
the
the HLS discussion
goes beyond just
delivery video. Could be HLS delivery audio. Audio
too. And then what it really then does
is could open up a whole new realm

(27:21):
of
retention graphics
because I can very well tell then retention
data. We're we're we're doing some experience right
now in chapter files to look at retention
data from chapter file data,
hiding little bits in there on a couple
of feeds, test feeds,
and, you know, seeing what kind of signaling

(27:41):
we get. But, again, if you're if you
only got three or four or 5%
maximum
of apps supporting chapter playback,
Again, and it's one thing James had said
to me in a chat session. He says,
hey. You know, there people have different habits
on different apps. And, oh, I agree. We
see that dramatically.
You know, people consume data differently on

(28:03):
when they get off the Apple Podcast app,
that's an intentional
switch to a different device to consume a
show on a different app.
So a fountain
or a Podverse
or any of the other podcasting two point
is, if I've moved a listener
to those apps, that that that listener is

(28:24):
a p one. They're gonna listen all the
way through.
Mhmm. Because
this is their into it. Whereas an Apple
Podcast subscriber
may not have the same
retention, and I I don't know if I
can get a true picture. You'd have to
disclose that, okay, these 10 these six apps
support what we're showing you for a retention

(28:44):
graph.
Mhmm. And it's 3% of your total download.
So
is is that valuable? Again, we don't know.
But, again, if more if Pocket Cast and
other apps start adopting, we could get up
eight, nine, 10%
maybe.
Mhmm. Maybe.
Yeah. At least we have a fighting chance

(29:06):
of pushing back against
the
the,
data that's gonna be available
on on YouTube as well as Spotify
around playback
that, could at least keep,
RSS in the game around,
you know, this where's the money theme here
today around
monetization. And it could get it could get

(29:28):
real crazy. You could have an app that
would support HLS audio, but also at the
same time support download of an m p
three.
Yeah. You know, someone comes into the app
and they're connected and they go play, it
could grab the HLS. But if they have
no connection again, there's all kinds of crazy
scenarios. But Well, even even YouTube supports that

(29:50):
Oh, yeah. Today. Oh, yeah. Right? That's what
they well, everything on YouTube is HLS.
Well, no. But I you can check a
box and have it store Oh, really? A
copy of it locally. I wonder what format
that's stored in. I wonder if that's stored
in Doesn't matter as long as it plays
back. Right? Yeah. I guess so.
I've never done
that. Well, that's that's the bigger issue, Todd.

(30:11):
How many people are really going to do
that? Yeah. Yeah.
And that's,
you know,
you know, over the years, we we put
this argument on this show that, you know,
that download thing needs to be there just
in case you're not able to connect to
the Internet. Right. But now I'm I'm on
I had Starlink
on a flight from San Francisco

(30:31):
to
Chicago.
Mhmm. No cost to hook up,
and I was getting speed test of a
120 megs down and 20 megs up on
a United Airlines flight.
Yeah.
Well, I get you know, whenever I fly
on Alaska Airlines, I get free Wi Fi

(30:52):
on board. So But it wouldn't watch watch
videos or listen to Are they connected to
Starlink or who they connected to? I don't
know. Idea what the Yeah. What the connection
is. Well, up to this point, you have
them there to watch
videos
on on you know, video is no way
we're gonna I couldn't do that in United,
but it when Starlink was in, they I

(31:14):
was able to play stuff back videos back.
So
it I could on the air airlines
on Alaska. I could play any content. So
maybe they're using Starlink already. You know, maybe
they've made Possible. Yeah. Possibly. I know that
they have a close
partnership.
At least Alaska Airlines has a close partnership
with, T Mobile. Oh. And I know T

(31:35):
Mobile did a integration deal with,
SpaceX. Yeah. So maybe that's all tied together.
Who knows? Could be. Yeah.
But if you read through the comments, you
did. You got involved in
the back and forth on the LinkedIn post.
Yeah. There is a
There's a blowback.

(31:57):
Some people don't like this,
acquisition.
This merger well, it gets back to, like,
what what what I kinda let off with
this thing too. It's the
it feels like, you know, it's all about
the the money now. It's all about you
know? And we're moving down this path. Like
you said earlier, we're
podcasting is now the mainstream media, so

(32:20):
expectations have escalated,
and the desires to
make revenue and profits have escalated,
and expectations of creators that have escalated
Although which
may may explain why we don't have as
many new creators coming into the medium. Although,
you'll be this will be curious. And I
asked Mike about this. I said, did any

(32:42):
of the people, the new creators, talk to
us about
monetization?
Not a one.
Oh. So but they're early.
So, you know, if they haven't launched a
show yet or they've just getting started, two
or three things, they're still trying to figure
out what the hell they're doing.
So,
you know, maybe that you know, we you

(33:03):
know, we went through the spiel. Yep. We
offer monetization, blah blah blah blah blah.
But you look at that commentary in that
LinkedIn thread, and
there's people that said, oh, I want the
business part of the you know, this is
an integral part. I'm there to that show
because of the business aspect, and I respect

(33:24):
that. Sure. You know? But I think there's
a way It's kind of always been there.
I thought from day one. It's just
people I I don't know what it is
now. It's just this
it's it it seems like it's every year,
there's been this tension between independent creators and
more professional creators.
Right? There's like this I don't know what

(33:45):
it is. It's jealousy, envy,
anger, being
being upset at celebrities being involved in celebrities
have been involved in podcasting
since 02/2004.
You know? So
there's really nothing new going on here. It's
just people are are, you know,
got their panties all bent, you know, folded

(34:07):
up and
are upset about things that are
that are not new,
but it bothers them still. Yeah. So,
someone sent me a text today. Someone's just
well known.
They sent me a message. It says, hey.
During your presentation, you talked about there only
being
300,000
active shows. And where did you get that?

(34:29):
Is it he he didn't believe me, and
I sent him the link. Let me see
if I can bring this up.
I brought the you know, the I sent
him this link. I said, here's the podcast
index. 314,000
shown in the last thirty days. Now this
this number has gotten scary.
Three ninety five in the last sixty, that
was well in the and four sixty one

(34:49):
in the last ninety days?
Yeah. That number was well in the upper
six hundreds. Right.
Not that long ago. Not that long ago.
So,
that's just the question that the industry needs
to be This is the question. Really focused
on. Right. Why are we not
getting new creators? Right. And why are people
pod fading? Yeah.

(35:12):
That's what we need to get to the
bottom of, but I didn't hear anybody talk
about that. Nobody. Nobody's willing to talk about
it. Everything's good now. I did I I'll
be honest with you.
I heard some stuff coming from some
host
that I have never heard before.
And,

(35:33):
you know, I've been saying for a year
things have been flat, year and a half.
And
some other hosts are seeing the same thing,
you know? That what?
It's flat. Flat? Flatter than a pancake. Well,
all you have to do is look at
that. Alright.
That
that chart of where the industry is right

(35:54):
now. Now The
I think we also
there was a, and if you're watching live,
make sure you say hello and and let
us know you're here.
There was a
I lost my train of thought here. We're
talking about, number of podcast

(36:16):
shit.
Yeah.
What's causing that,
that to happen?
I don't know that, you know, that's maybe
what
Edison Research needs to do. Maybe that's maybe
maybe we've already done this. That's why, you
know, Tom hasn't dug into this.

(36:37):
But that's the number I I think that's
the number one issue in the space right
right now. So Why? I got a little
clue.
I told my entire team. I said, you
guys gotta listen to the first forty five
minutes of podcasting two point o, episode two
two nine.
Mhmm.
And in that, Adam Curry talked about how
he had been at a I think it

(36:59):
was a church event. I think there was
a bunch of,
either was a convention. I don't know. There
was a lot of people there from,
faith based, and they were all talking about
content. And Adam was talking about Godcaster and
everything they're doing there. And about the virtues
of open podcasting and how you can intermix
stuff and not to open and you can't
be deplatformed. Well, you know, all the spiel

(37:20):
we've been saying for twenty years.
And
they were
shocked.
They didn't know.
So
here's what I think
step one. And I said this during the
PSP, but I think it just went over
everyone's head.
We need to start again

(37:41):
as a community.
Host,
creators,
anyone that is dependent upon the ecosystem. That's
everybody.
Maybe not creators.
Everyone nights need to go out and shout
from the top of their lungs the values
of Open
RSS and retrain

(38:03):
a new generation of people of the value
that Open RSS brings. Now
is it gonna help make people realize,
oh, I can do this on my own?
Book authors, as an example, are tired of
getting screwed
by Amazon and everyone else taking I mean,

(38:23):
taking, like, 80¢ on the dollar of every
penny earned. I mean, it's crazy the amount
of money that
gets and and they're looking for new so
podcasting
can help with audiobooks.
Podcast can can help with with content. I
mean, you you just we don't have to
be just talk.
Right.

(38:44):
So I think we have to start
resharing
why this space
is important.
Well, I think we've lost that.
Everyone said, oh, YouTube, Facebook,
Spotify.
We'll just do it over there,
and
it's become the norm.
That's because this conversation is true. It's because

(39:04):
the conversation has shifted a lot to video.
There has not been an avenue that people
understood or thought was even available on the
podcasting side for video. We had creator after
creator come up to the table
and who were video first that were,
like, doing back flips. We set people up
in the booth when to for Vidapod.

(39:25):
Vidapod. Right. I mean, you mean I don't
have to do nothing? All I have to
do is set this up tied to my
playlist and it happens? Yep.
And
they were But you have to make sure
that what you create with your video is
gonna be podcast friendly. Right. And then I
always added that. I said, just remember, people
are listening too, so you need to think
about that. Or you're gonna hear a feedback
from those audio listeners that they're gonna say,

(39:46):
what the hell are you talking about? But,
again, going back to
the RSS thing,
you know, podcasting two point o is fantastic,
but we didn't make sure people understand what
RSS is
and why it's so valuable
and start these stop these naysayers from saying,
oh, we need to get rid of RSS.
You know? And finally, I did hear someone

(40:07):
steal one of my lines saying that, you
know, Open RSS was the last bastion of
free speech. I was like, yeah. We got
one. You know? Someone else
copied my line.
But yet at the same time, Todd, RSS
is disappearing from the listeners.
We don't care about the listeners. We don't
care. We we want people that are thinking
about becoming a creator

(40:28):
to understand there is an option for them.
But a podcast listener is usually the the
entry door into becoming a podcast. And therein
lies the reason why we need to educate
everyone. So you set the seed. All you
gotta do is set the seed, and they
only need to be said once. This just
shows available because of Open RSS
and distributed everywhere because of Open RSS. And

(40:49):
they get person, oh, is that?
And later on, they start their YouTube channel
and say, what is I heard about this
thing called Open RSS and, you know, distribution.
What what is that? That's all we need
to do.
Yeah. And they can Google what is Open
RSS and they can learn, you know, because
if you have a room full of
faith based
ministries that are creating content,

(41:11):
and they didn't understand
the value of Open RSS or what's possible
today, there's a problem.
Yeah.
It's just the conversation has shifted away from
the technical distribution
side of things. We don't have

(41:33):
again, you don't have to talk about the
technical. Just talk about the values of
open RSS. We don't have to talk about
the mumbo jumbo
and the stuff that causes people to their
eyes to glaze over. Glaze over. Right. They
don't have to That's always been the problem.
Yeah. We don't we don't need to talk
about that.
You know? Just set the seed
of here's the value

(41:54):
of what this provides.
But most people don't even know what RSS
means,
what it is, how it works,
why it's important to even care about. My
point exactly.
Yeah.
So just because it's been it's been
removed from the kind of modern zeitgeist. Yeah.
It's

(42:15):
something that's old and outdated. You know why?
Because we made it easy for listeners to
get the content via Apple Podcasts, Spotify Which
is a good thing. Everything. It's it's good.
But they
if again, if we're again, like you said
center anymore like it used to. Right. Like
you said, a lot of creators are born
out of listening to shows like this.

(42:35):
My tech show talk to lots of podcasters
that, you know, you say,
can you send me your RSS feed? Oh,
yeah. They're like, what?
They go, what what's that? Yeah. Even the
Libsyn's even got it almost buried. Oh, it's
oh, it's definitely buried. You know? So we
just have and and, again, if we just
start this and work on this over the

(42:56):
next year or two,
I think it'll be good. And it doesn't
have to be like this big in your
face, you know,
you know, this orange logo thing. No. No.
No. Just
we just need to talk on a here's
the reason why it's important, and just softly
drop it in there so that it sets
a trigger in people's brain that they get

(43:17):
a little more
creative. But
and going back to what you're talking about,
this tension between independent creators and professional media,
I don't even know.
It's here's where the tension is.
Some don't give a shit about money.

(43:38):
It's those that don't care about making money
for their show
against those that are hell bent on
making money for the show. That's where there's
the little rub.
And there's others that have this kind of
generalization
that those that are focused on prophets are
somehow corrupt or evil or, you know, it's

(43:59):
this
demonization
that happens.
And we saw it in your thread Right.
Of of people that are seen as maybe
hard nosed business people that are considered to
be kind of evil. Right?
And they can't be trusted. And
that is kind of like the under toe

(44:19):
of this conflict is
between people that think of themselves
as a at a higher level of ethics
and values and all this stuff compared to
these evil capitalists over here. And I think
that
that really cuts to the chase of what's
been going on in our culture and our
society too. But but I will say that
if you look at the podcast host

(44:40):
Mhmm. Look at Buzzsprout, look at arsys.com,
look at Libsyn, look at us, look at
all the others.
No.
We love creators.
We're the advocates for creators. We're building tools
for creators to be able to do these
things.
And yet,
I was almost vilified.

(45:02):
You definitely were to a point.
And some of the comments, I'm like, wait
a minute. I'm here.
I'm I'm the I'm the biggest advocate
for
for content creators.
You know, I sorry. I I go to
war for creators. You do too, and so
does the other companies.
And
and sure,

(45:23):
there's things that happen that are not not
always good.
Humans make mistakes. Yeah. Humans do things and
then regret them later, and but you can't
really hold on to that. I mean, some
of the things that I was accused of
in your thread were things I had nothing
to do with. You know, and if if
I was in this for the money, I'd
have sold the company three mergers and acquisition

(45:45):
attempts already. I would have sold the company
already. I'd have cashed out.
Yeah.
You know?
Mhmm. So am am I getting rich? No.
I get a salary.
You know?
So
But you can't work full time on something
or more than full time on something and

(46:06):
not make any money from it. Not have
I shoulda, you know,
live and breathe this thing. You know? So
and I know a lot of other people
do too.
Yeah. It's not just me. You know? There's
this kind of other tension that's going on
that there's been a lot of new people
that have entered the podcast medium, right, at
all levels.
Either they're producers,

(46:26):
they're hosts, they're they're
they're they're creators, and oftentimes these corporations,
you know,
do a clean sweep and lay everybody off
and shut companies down. And and that's seen
as
by a certain,
you know, group of people seeing that as
evil. Right?
And
and that should never happen. And but that's

(46:48):
not the reality of the world. You know?
It's
Well, I wasn't gonna announce it here. I
wasn't even gonna talk about it. But on
Monday,
we sent an email and put a blog
post out for all of our creators. We're
raising prices for the first time in twenty
years.
Yeah.
And why? I think that's smart, Todd, because
we may be coming into a new new

(47:09):
round of inflation here. Well, it's it further
in the future here. It it it's either
that or
well,
why do you raise prices? You have to.
I can't you know, people have no clue
on how that You've resisted, and the whole
industry has resisted Resist. Prices. But I found

(47:30):
out at the show that a couple of
companies have raised prices, and that didn't
it's not been announced.
You know, they've raised prices like, oh, you
did? I raised prices six months ago? Oh,
we just raised prices two months ago? Oh.
Just didn't
make any big call. Kept it very, very
quiet, you know. And
so, you know, here I am

(47:50):
spilling the beans, but,
it's okay. So, you know, it's no secret.
You know, I had a, like, a 14.7%
increase in health care this year.
And I had, like, a 13%
the year before and 17%
the year before and 19 I mean, insane
increases in health care costs.
That doesn't even count. The increased costs and

(48:13):
travel and Pay raises,
everything. You know? And All sorts of stuff.
The only thing that hasn't changed in cost
is paying with.
That price The older you use, the less
you pay. Right. That price has stayed the
same for the last ten or fifteen years.
Right. And, you know, and then I'm like,
but everything else. Holy crap.

(48:36):
Yeah.
So
I did it reluctantly.
I didn't be didn't do it because I
wanted to.
I have to.
Yeah. You know?
Then you can't
service your customers if you're out of business.
Right. Right. Right. And, you know, and it's
it's like,

(48:57):
I could've went more, but I didn't go
more. I did what we needed to do.
And,
thus far, the feedback hasn't been too bad.
Well, if you have to raise it,
in the future, then you'll address that one.
Yeah. We'll we'll go there. But, yeah, I
hope to not have to.
Right.
You know, but some of the biggest podcast

(49:17):
hosts in space have raised their prices. You
never you didn't know it.
Yeah. Well, I'm sure they're not out there
No. They're not advertising. You know. Screaming about
it on a podcast.
So but anyway, it's it's,
you know, but
things have changed. People are, you know, they
need to make an income. Yeah. People need

(49:39):
to,
you know, people are have thought of over
the last few years that podcasting could be
like a I hate to use the term,
the side hustle or whatever, but Yeah. I
think I think a lot of people found
out that it's a lot of work, and
it's not
going to generate a lot of money for
you quickly. So,
you know, that's the and then people get

(50:00):
disenchanted with it because maybe they don't grow
their audience as fast as the expectations are,
and so people puff fade. Yeah.
We we do this show with vow of
poverty. You know, we we make not we've
made some money from this show. We've had
a couple of great donations.
You know, thank you rss.com
in the past and few others that have
sent us, you know, a nice

(50:21):
a nice,
a nice, you know, a nice little bonus.
But, you know, we and, you know, Adam
has you know, his,
you know, no agenda show is doing pretty
good, you know, but he works really hard
at it. Well, he's also on a donation
mark. Yeah. Right. From the beginning. And he's,
you know, he's got a he's got a
system, and it works for that show.

(50:43):
People just don't write you a $3,000
check.
They don't love your show.
If you're not getting value
or $5,000
or, you know, $333
or whatever the number may be, you you
don't get those types of donations
weekly
that,
and again, they're not making millions of dollars.

(51:05):
There's two families are being taken care of,
but they don't. They have a very, very
small, small, small team.
So what does that say, Todd, long term
about the advertising market in podcasting?
I
I just wonder. You can make it with
advertising

(51:25):
if
you have
a big audience and a small team.
You can do well. You can have,
house payment money. Keep your costs down. If
you if you stay small. And what I
mean by small, a team of one or
two.
Which is what,

(51:46):
Marc Maron did, Joe Rogan did for a
long time when he got started. And,
you know,
I think a lot of this stuff is
proven
in the history of podcasting. It's that most
people don't know the history. So At my
at my session, there was at least 50%
of the people there had team had team
had a team outside their podcast. And these
are new podcasts. I'm like, how are you

(52:07):
doing it?
How are how are you?
They're investing is what they are taught. Well,
then it must be the same thing I
did when I said on my show. I'm
looking for a lawyer. I'm looking for an
MBA. I'm looking for a graphics guy, and
I'm looking for a programmer.
We had no money. And what did we
do? We started a business and
build it out of our back of our
pocket.

(52:28):
So
luckily That's what a lot of people in
this industry are doing right now. And luckily,
I had enough of a base of
already pre established business that we were able
to
well, none none none of us went full
time for, like, three years.
Yeah. We all had regular jobs.
So,

(52:50):
you know, sweat equity twenty hours a day.
So, Todd, let's let's shift and talk about
podcast movement versus podcast and what that means.
Chris,
you have an opportunity, my friend.
You you got to promote, promote, promote, promote,
promote. People still don't know what podcast is.

(53:10):
What is podcast? I was asked that at
least 10 times.
Yeah. I talked to Chris just a couple
days ago,
and that was his first question
was about what happened at podcast movement. So
so he's What did you tell? He's paying
attention. Well, that's good. So he needs to
double down on promotional, whatever he can do
to get the word out. Well, Well, he's

(53:31):
already
doing his pod pod tour. Yep. He's
he just finished up last week with his
was his his Vidpod event down in
was it in,
Atlanta? Atlanta or some place. Yeah. Yeah.
And so he's he's trying to diversify what
he's doing and to be more relevant
and get out and connect with creators locally.

(53:53):
And I think that's that's really the massive
theme that I wanna take out of this
show today in relation to what happened at
podcast movement is
if you have an event,
the local
people around you at that event are going
to be where you're gonna be more likely
to pull your creators from. Yeah. And so

(54:13):
that's what,
Chris is trying to do. He's going going
to people having local events Yep.
All over the country. I mean, he's doing
more cities this year than he did last
year. Yeah. They did like 20 or something
last year. Yeah.
I don't know if that approach is gonna
get people to Orlando,
but, you know, he's gonna he's gonna chip

(54:35):
away at it. And some people will will
go there to say, well, I'm gonna get
out of the the icy cold January and
go to where it's a little bit warmer
maybe. At the same time
Right.
With the economic situation the way it is
Yeah. Local, I think, is gonna reemerge as
kind of a a thing.
I think we're already seeing I got invited

(54:55):
to be a keynote at,
at a podcasting a new podcasting event down
in Houston. So that's coming up here in
October, and I'm doing another event, small event
down in New Jersey.
And, you know, they're they're short in a
bubble, you know. I think back to the
early days of podcasting with the pod camps.
Yeah. Yeah. And I did a lot of

(55:16):
podcast. Me too. A lot.
And those were just fantastic events. Yep. You
just walk into these,
these events. 400 people. Yep. Yeah. You write
the the title of the session that you
wanna put on, and you go find a
room and Yep. Gather people up for it.
Or they voted, and then they decided who
was gonna speak right on the spot. And

(55:37):
he had three, four hundred people in the
local area.
It's a lot of work. Angela was doing
Pod Camp
Ohio or whatever it was. Mhmm. And, you
know, it took, you know
so whoever holds these,
it's it's a huge, huge amount of risk.
Talking with a gal that does military spouses,
and they're having an event in,

(55:58):
in,
Washington, DC in in October. And, you know,
basically, they just they don't need a lot
of money. They just need a little bit
of money.
And Yeah. And I did a lot of
them at,
the big universities. I did one at
the the University of North Carolina at Chapel
Hill one time. I flew all the way
from Seattle to North Carolina to do this

(56:20):
podcast. And, you know, and the thing that
I keep asking on Small Events is what's
your agenda?
If your agenda is 75%
video podcasting, well, maybe
it's not a podcast
event.
Yeah. And I I wonder sometimes if that
that term podcast is being increasingly interchanged with

(56:43):
the word creator now. Yeah.
And because people are thinking themselves as content
creators now because the expectation in the market
is that you're creating all sorts of different
kinds of content,
not just podcasts. But,
yeah. So this balance between creator,
show, and podcast Yeah. Is is kind of
at the at the inflection point of what's

(57:04):
happening with people's perceptions.
You guys are quiet on YouTube today
and Facebook. I see you there. You guys
aren't making any comments.
Well, we haven't been too controversial
on the show. No. No. No. No. And,
when when people are, quiet in the chat,

(57:24):
that's usually indication that we have people that
are ear dropping
or eavesdropping.
You know, and to be and to be
honest with you, I hope
that Podcast Movement comes up with one hell
of a plan for New York.
I hope they come up with,
something that's gonna be spectacular and wanted to
be attended by many people.

(57:47):
I jokingly
said to,
one of the Sounds Proper members, I said,
well, we know who they who you're gonna
get hit up to help support podcast movement.
I said it jokingly.
But I am sure the Sounds Profitable
members
will all be you know, there'll be some
sort of deal probably put together, said, you
know.

(58:08):
And, of course, then what is that? That's,
again, all business. So,
you know, I kind of jokingly said, but
it it's gonna take more than that to
make
a
event very, very successful.
And and maybe it's impossible. Maybe maybe podcast
movement can't draw
new creators. And maybe it becomes an event

(58:29):
where
we don't attend as a exhibitor, but we
attend as, you know, just attendees
and
and talk to people.
Well, yeah. I think the big question is
how much of Sounds Profitable is going to
be a part of podcast movement, you know.
Oh, I'm sure there's gonna be a huge
bleed over. Is
is sounds profitable and all their partners going

(58:49):
to be the primary sponsors of podcast movement
going forward.
And what's the
how does that influence the the programming too?
I know,
you know I think if they split it,
it will probably
be okay.
If they split it and and, of course,
I I'm not at liberty to say who's
been put in charge of,

(59:11):
well, who's gonna be reviewing the creator track
because
that person asked us not to say who
that is. And when he announces it himself,
it's gonna be fine. But Well, he already
did. Oh. Did he already publicly say? Yeah.
Yeah. It's already been in a couple different
posts in the newsletter already that he's
gonna be
I think the question is, well, what's the

(59:32):
scope of the work that he's gonna be
doing?
I think is the big question.
Now, is he gonna be booking individual
speakers
to
to panels and all that kind of stuff?
Probably not. Well, one thing's for sure, because
I was watching the panel across from me,
a lot of people you know,

(59:54):
I refrain.
I I when I go and have a
deck of course or stuff that Blueberry does
that I talk about, but I also say,
okay. You can get the same feature at
x, y, and z, naming my competitors,
not and putting stuff up on, you know,
I
I try to be as transparent as possible
and give credit where credit's due. But, boy,
some of those presentations were just outright.

(01:00:16):
This is what we do. This is how
you do it on our platform
and a whole pitch.
And I was just like,
that has to be eliminated.
Outright eliminated
so that we can have true training.
Right. What's the purpose of
educational content
if if it's

(01:00:36):
not educational content, if it's just
pitching a particular platform
or a brand,
and the people that are up on stage
are not really
educators.
Maybe they're just business people,
but they're not really, you know, skilled at
education.
Maybe they don't belong up on stage. Yeah.

(01:00:59):
I I think that's I think you you
have to have
strict agreements. It's and, again, even if Blueberry
is hosting
a booth,
doesn't mean Blueberry should qualify
to have a Blueberry team member speak the
the
the topic
and the content of the

(01:01:22):
training
Yeah.
Needs to be such that people get value
of it, and you're not promoting
your product.
Or you're not even talking about it. Right.
Exactly.
I did that for and I know you
did too, Todd, for many years at Podcast
Movement. We would I'd moderate panels and

(01:01:44):
and and do all sorts of stuff. And,
and, you know, to moderate a panel, put
you in a position where you need to,
you know, kind of
be,
all inclusive, right? Not so much driving a
certain company or brand or
ideology or something like that. It was more
about,
you know, how do I extract value out

(01:02:04):
of this panelist
that is helpful to the audience? I gave
creator track for one event on the previous
show before podcast movement.
And David said, how do I navigate this?
And I said, Dave, everyone has an agenda.
Uh-huh. Doesn't matter who they are.

(01:02:24):
When you when you get a presentation
pitch,
you gotta think of what is the agenda
of Blueberry for telling this
submitting this, a Blueberry employee. What is what
is the agenda?
Is there agenda or is there training? I
said, everyone's gonna have an agenda. I don't
care who you are.
Yeah. It's gonna slip in. It's gonna slip

(01:02:45):
in. But if you long as that person
is understanding
that they're not up there to promote their
product
and say we have a special for you
this month for $29.95
Mhmm.
I might use examples,
but I try to just
give to it tie it to my own

(01:03:06):
show
on the benefit of doing x, y, and
z.
So
Todd, do you happen to know what
the history has been that sounds profitable events?
No. Has it been kind of a pay
for play kind of a thing? I would
imagine it, to some degree, it would be.
I don't know. I haven't attended their event.
I'm not a member.

(01:03:27):
Yeah. I've been to one of them,
and it it did come across as a
little bit of
a pay to play. Now an upfront an
upfront will be a pay to play for
an upfront. That's all the way all upfront's
work. Yeah. But it's not catering to creators.
No. That's, you know, that's selling to media
buyers. So they're buying a spot to promote

(01:03:48):
their shows.
So that's a different Right. Expectations
of the audience. And I've you know, we
we've never done an upfront. I first of
all, I couldn't afford $10,000
for ten minutes or whatever they give you
at the IB one.
So
It's expensive. It's expensive.
But if, you know, if you have a
big show or two or three
that you can get on a media buyer's

(01:04:09):
buying block and they're big big enough, well,
that's just that's, you know, a rounding error
for them. That's just doing business. Right.
Right. So
Yeah. I'd like to see
a return
more of this concept of a podcast festival.
Not so much in the pod fest type

(01:04:30):
of orientation,
but,
kinda like what we saw many years ago
where
there would be live on stage,
podcast recordings, right, that people could either buy
tickets to or buy a block,
and and have those shows be available to
fans too. So you have kind of this

(01:04:52):
full spectrum. You get the the fans, the
audience involved
in podcast movement. That's where you could have
a and then you get the business people.
Yeah. I don't know how you but New
York's big enough to support that.
Mhmm. I I don't know. We'll see.
We're already over time here, Rob.
I realize that. Yeah. Yeah. So

(01:05:15):
is the idea that podcast is purely about
revenue,
or is there a way that we can
stay true to its original roots while embracing
the future future? Have we done that here?
I think we've talked about it. I I
don't think we're done talking about this friction
between
profit,
revenue,

(01:05:36):
and content creators, but there is a lot
of friction there.
So we're not done. Yeah.
I don't know if we're gonna answer the
question forever. There's always gonna be a certain
segment of people that are gonna be pissed
off.
Right.
But I think
well, it's gonna be interesting to see what

(01:05:57):
the next year is,
and what Brian decides to do. So, Brian,
we're watching.
No pressure.
But, you know And also,
Chris Karmetsos too. Yeah. Chris too. How is
he gonna respond to this?

(01:06:19):
Yeah.
So
yeah. Chris, I'd love I'd I'd love to
see I'd I know Orlando is your home,
but I would love to see an event
somewhere else too.
But that's just Todd's thought. But, you know,
he's got such ties to Orlando, and it
makes such good sense bringing families in.

(01:06:39):
And I understand.
And it taps into that element that we're
talking about here, Todd, is pulling from your
local community Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. With creators. And
if you can expand that window of creators
coming in and when someone says, yeah. I'm
from Texas. Yeah. I'm from
I'm from,
I'm here from LA or
wherever.
Because there is definitely

(01:07:00):
it's pretty regional.
At least that's the way it's been. And
it's it's gotten better.
Well, and also is is podcast movement,
going to
be in New York every year now?
That's that's a big question. Or or is
it gonna bounce between New York, Chicago, and
LA?
Is that the game? Or Well, we'll see.

(01:07:21):
That
that we don't have an answer to yet.
No. But, again, it's all dependent upon how
they're able to get enough outreach to see
if how many people are willing to come
from New York that are not a train
ride away
or an Uber away.
So
because you can go in come in from
Upstate. You come in from Boston. There's a

(01:07:42):
pretty that's, you know, that's a you look
where you live. You can get how long
does it take you get in the city
from where you live?
About an hour and a half. See. So
you're you know, you're in striking distance. You
can leave in the morning and be there
and come to a one day event. You
could come
back home that evening.
Yeah. I do. Be a long day.
Yeah. I go
I jump on the train and head down,

(01:08:03):
and it takes me to Grand Central, and
then I just go wherever I need to
go from there. Yeah. I'm, you know, I
got a two hour drive to Detroit and
two hours to New York.
So,
you know, and then
the cost of a bed for a couple
of nights
and the ticket cost and, you know
yeah. So it'll be it's gonna be interesting.

(01:08:24):
So, anyway, there's our
there's our feedback
on, podcast movement and everything that happened there.
Overall, again,
we'll see what happens. And I was I
I've got close to a 100 people to
follow-up with, and
I'd love to have it been two fifty
or 300 like it used to be. But

(01:08:45):
I'll take a 100 because last year was
37
the year before.
That that doesn't pay the bills. That does
not pay the bills.
Right.
Yeah. Yeah. Alright, Todd. So okay. Anyway,
if you guys have, questions or comments, you
guys have been really quiet today.
Todd,

(01:09:06):
well, just, you know, [e-mail],
blubrry.com@geeknewsonx.
And by the way, those of you who
watched SpaceX thing last night, wow. Pretty exciting.
And then on Mastodon at [e-mail]
on Mastodon.
Rob?
I can be found, you know, pretty much
in all the social platforms. I I think

(01:09:28):
that's that's where I'm at under Rob Greenlee.
And, so I'm on x at Rob Greenlee
and
LinkedIn and Facebook
and Facebook and all that stuff so you
can easily find me. So if you wanna
send an email to to me about the
show or if you have a any kind
of topic suggestion or
any kind of feedback, we'd love to hear
from you. That's it. [e-mail]

(01:09:50):
is a great place to send me an
email. And Chris and,
Brian and
Tom, you guys are welcome to come on
anytime.
And, you know, let's let's give James? Yep.
James, we'll we'll give you guys some time
to get because I know you guys are
trying to figure out a venue. You're probably
very, very busy. But when you get a
plan,

(01:10:11):
come on and talk about it. So Yeah.
Alright, everyone. Thank you for being here. We'll
see you next week. Thanks, Rob. And,
we'll see everyone here on the new media
show. Everyone take care. We'll see you next
time. Okay. Bye bye. Bye.