Last week in Chicago I (pictured above) attended Podcast Movement Evolutions. Even though I have hosted more than 950 episodes in my eleven-plus years of podcasting, there’s always more to learn. It’s about getting better at what I do and some intensive days of finding out what’s new.
I remember back in my days working in the Olympic Movement when the person who at the time was in charge of communications for the International Olympic Committee was doing a presentation at a gathering of the International Sports Press Association. I’m going to date myself here, but this was probably twenty years ago. He was talking about the Internet and expressed his dislike for the fact that some people were still calling it ‘new media.’ He essentially implied that we should do away with that expression.
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| Eleven Years Today - Let's Keep Podcasting |
There are some ironies in all this.
Back then, podcasting had just begun, even though it looked nothing at all like what it does today. How do I know that? Well, last week in Chicago, Rob Walch, Head of Podcaster Relations at Libsyn, gave a talk during Podcast Movement Evolutions and said that he was celebrating twenty years in podcasting.
In other words, in 2005, we had someone in a distinguished position saying that the World Wide Web – which had been invented in 1989 – should not be called ‘new’ anymore. That’s 16 years, for those of you who don’t want to do the math.
If, for podcasting, we just go with twenty years, then that’s four years longer/older. Yet here we are in 2025, and I still hear people say things like this about the medium:
“There are no rules.”
“It’s the wild, wild west.”
“This is all still new.”
“You can just do whatever you want.”
If there are no rules and it’s the wild, wild west, then why are there podcasting conferences aimed at educating attendees on best practices? Why do traditional media report on podcasting? If podcasting were in an alleged infancy, would companies like Spotify be reporting related earnings that would make our head spin?
And then there’s the regulatory body known as IAB (Interactive Advertising Bureau) who has worked to standardize what a download is. Not to mention that there are companies, reputable agencies, who devote significant time, manpower, and money towards research and studies. These would be the likes of Edison Research and Triton Digital, to name just two.
Furthermore, with podcasting having become such big business – see comparisons to terrestrial radio and the exorbitant sums of money that brands are spending on podcast advertising – doesn’t it seem counterproductive to refer to it as though we’re still just figuring out what we’re going to do with it?
Understandably, for the individual who decides he or she is going to start up a podcast, yes, absolutely, it’s new to them and they can apologetically say to their audience, “Sorry, I’m new at this.”
But the medium itself is clearly here to stay. And we will continue to learn and grow, but isn’t terrestrial radio learning and growing based on the way that podcasting has, in fact, become such a significant fixture on the landscape of information dissemination and providing entertainment and education?
You could make the argument that everything is shifting. How many of you actually are still loyal to network TV programming, catering to the schedule of when they will put your show(s) on? I’d love to see the percentage of people that say, “No. I’ll sit down to watch TV when I’m ready, and then when I do, I want to be in control of what I watch.” Hmm, wait, I know you’re drifting off and thinking of Netflix, Hulu, and HBO, but doesn’t that sound just like podcast consumption, albeit (despite what some will try to tell you) more audio than video?
You will sometimes hear people say that they’re going to wait to see if something sticks around before they give it a try. I would venture to guess that they’re not saying that about podcasting because 20-plus years is plenty of time to admit that, okay, it’s obviously sticking around.
For more than twenty years I have been helping indie music artists, authors, actors, entrepreneurs, podcasters, filmmakers, small business owners, and more. What challenges are you having in your creator career that I can lend some insight to? Connect with me so you can take advantage of all my experience, and I can help and keep you moving forward.