Conan signs a seven figure deal, apparently driving the podcast revolution

• Conan O’Brien’s Team Coco has signed a seven figure deal with Midroll for more seasons of Conan O’Brien needs a friend. Team Coco has also has launched two new podcasts on Luminary. Frontier Tween is a scripted podcast featuring the life of Tilly Mulch on the untamed prairie; Smartr is a look at the tech world with VC Noa Lukas, as he helps companies grow.

  • A Variety article announcing the deal, claiming that Conan O’Brien is driving the podcast revolution, has come into quite some snarky criticism online, with people claiming that Conan turned up ten years late. Mind - that’s not the worst mistake. Variety put Conan on its cover with the words “Audio Boom!” when everyone knows Conan’s podcasts are actually hosted by ART19. (<-- weak podcast joke)

• Podcast episodes within Google Search are now appearing again in Australia and the UK, and also in France, Germany and Sweden. The search engine has 63,000 searches every second.

  • Your podcast host will probably mark these as a play from a browser, rather than from Google Podcasts. (Developers: use the referrer.)

• Why don’t podcasts work on smart speakers? Steve Goldstein highlights reasons why, from his panel at Podcast Movement.

  
  This link is no longer available, as at Aug 16 2023

• The Great British Podcast Tracker has been launched by research company Kantar. It will “give a clear picture of who podcast listeners are, what other media they engage with and even where they last shopped”.

• Here’s what Resonate Recordings’ Colby Schemm got from Podcast Movement.

• Available in London and Brighton, Pod Bible calls itself the UK’s first-ever magazine dedicated to podcasts. It gives away 5,000 print copies of every issue. Here’s this month’s, in digital form.

  
  Aug 16 2023: This broken link now points to the Internet Archive.

• Spotify’s plans for podcasting are the subject of this article in E-Commerce Times. (I must have had a Simplecast press release in front of me at the time!)

• The Audio Production Awards are open for entries. The UK awards are designed to recognise the creativity of individuals, teams, organisations and companies, involved in the craft of audio production. You have until 20 September; nominations will be announced in late October.

• Wondery’s Dr Death is coming to the TV. It’ll star Jamie Dornan, Alec Baldwin and Christian Slater.

• StreamGuys are announcing new features in their SGRecast podcast management system, including dynamic ad insertion. They’ll be at IBC in Amsterdam to show off their new services.

• Elsie Escobar sees podcasting as a tool to capture our legacies for the world to hear.

  
  This link is no longer available, as at Aug 16 2023

• The New York Times reports on branded podcasts as if they’re a new thing.

• Adnan Syed’s lawyers have asked the Supreme Court to examine the case. (Serial, obv.)

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Podcasts

Spreaker Prime: Every day, there are stories that are Unresolved. Micheal Whelan tries to determine why these stories - unsolved crimes and other unexplained phenomena - have no ending. He uses Spreaker Prime to earn money and save on his hosting costs.

Pod Bible describes itself as “is the podcast podcast where podcasters talk to podcasters about podcasts and podcasting.” Based in the UK, it’s run by Pod Bible, the UK’s first ever magazine dedicated to podcasts. (Acast)
Live from Saturn is a brand new podcast from the Academy of Science Fiction, Fantasy and Horror, which has presented the Saturn Awards for 44 years. The podcast contains interviews with some of the biggest names in sci-fi, fantasy and horror: Zachary Levi (Shazam!) is the latest guest. (Saturn Media / ART19)