Apple Plans To Bankroll Original Podcasts To Fend Off Rivals (bloomberg.com) 50
An anonymous reader quotes a report from Bloomberg: Apple plans to fund original podcasts that would be exclusive to its audio service, according to people familiar with the matter, increasing its investment in the industry to keep competitors Spotify and Stitcher at bay. Executives at the company have reached out to media companies and their representatives to discuss buying exclusive rights to podcasts, according to the people, who asked not to be identified because the conversations are preliminary. Apple has yet to outline a clear strategy, but has said it plans to pursue the kind of deals it didn't make before. While Apple doesn't charge for the Podcast app or run its own advertising on the platform, adding exclusives and growing the Podcasts app could give some consumers another reason to stick to their iPhone or subscribe to complementary paid services like Apple Music. "Apple also has an advertising division focused on ads in the App Store, which theoretically could eventually be applied to Podcasts if it continues to increase its user base," the report notes.
What podcasts? (Score:2)
I don't listen to them now?
What podcasts draw a crowd?
Re: What podcasts? (Score:2)
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Plenty of podcasts are very popular. (https://www.podranker.com/most-popular-podcasts/) and you can listen to them while driving, mowing the lawn, jogging, etc.
Personally, I usually listen to my favorite NPR programs via a home-brew podcatcher (to replace the horrible NPR One app).
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I listen to a lot of audio as I spend a lot of time in vehicles of different sorts. I listen exclusively to podcasts and audio books. I haven't regularly listened to broadcast radio in nearly a decade. I still listen to radio network programs but i listen in podcasts, which many radio networks provide, or I turn them into podcasts from their on-line streams similar to what the other poster does with his NPR programs. Most podcasts are supported by ads, but they tend to be much less intrusive than ads els
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But what in simple hell is the goddam CONTENT ?
I didn't ask what platform.
I didn't ask about YouTube.
What are you listening to? What's in the podcasts?
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Apple are attempting to emulate Disney.
Altruistic Editorial letters paywalled (Score:1)
NYT, WP, WSJ often publish letters to editors that are supposed to be on public interests but ironically paywalled. Send them to a free news service.
This is not good (Score:2)
Disturbing, but I guess it was inevitable... (Score:1)
Will all of the pulling of video content into isolated silos, I guess it was only a matter of time before it would happen to audio content as well... but this sure is a lot sooner than I would have expected.
I wonder if this will cause some kind of gold-rush to snap up even mildly popular podcasts as exclusives, or if this madness is slated to Apple caring more about podcasts than others.
As much as I would wish for podcasters to resist, I can imagine Apple might be forking over some pretty desirable cash inc
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Even if the podcasts are exclusive to Apple's platform, it will still raise the tide and float all boats. They will still have to pour money into advertising on non-Apple-only podcasts in order to draw listeners. It also will grow the overall podcast listening group.
For me, the podcast would have to be really good for Apple to get my money. The only way I could see it happening is if they lured away someone that I already know and love. Other than that, no matter how good the show promo sounds, why would I
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Will all of the pulling of video content into isolated silos, I guess it was only a matter of time before it would happen to audio content as well
But this is just Apple going in there and intentionally trying to divide and segregate the market by paying them off. It's not like they've come up with something that podcasters will say "we'll use Apple's platform exclusively because it provides a better experience for us or our listeners that you just can't get anywhere else", there's no innovation or improvement to podcasting in general that they offer here.
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The gold rush will be getting a few popular music artists to commit to using only one platform.
Now THAT would be something, I totally agree. That too seems inevitable, I guess Apple is sneaking up on it from the podcast path instead of directly.
Who in his/her right mind (Score:1)
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Here’s an idea, Apple (Score:4, Insightful)
Perhaps making your app suck less might bring it more users.
I with the standard iOS podcast app for a long time after it launched - I didn’t need a lot of flashy features, and it did the basics reasonably well. But with each iOS iteration it seemed to actually got worse (sorta like Siri, actually). Then, with iOS 11, they're removed a basic feature - the default ability to easily play a bunch of the same podcasts in order. This meant you’d have to manually add individual podcasts to a playlist, which is really annoying for a bunch of 1-2 minute episodes of something like Stardate. So, I dropped that app and moved on.
“Exclusive content” isn’t gonna save your sucky podcast app, Apple. Not to mention that podcast exclusives are pretty much the antithesis of what podcasts are all about anyway.
“Apple has yet to outline a clear strategy&l (Score:2)
Whelp, that’s pretty much 2019 Apple in a nutshell.
Open Podcasts (Score:5, Insightful)
If it is not on an RSS feed then they can go screw themselves. Walled gardens are for slaves.
Wait, I thought Google was the new Monopoly? (Score:2)
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They're not trying to lock anything down into anything. If they were trying to do that, they would've locked the master catalogue years ago. The Apple podcast catalogue is still the de facto list, and it's open.
What Apple is doing—and let's be clear, I think it's a dumb idea—is make additional, exclusive content. Like if they were to bankroll an album from Taylor Swift and it was only available on Apple Music. You could still listen to her other stuff elsewhere, but that one album would be on th