3 Big Changes Every Podcaster Needs to Know This Week

0:05 Good morning podcasting Morning Chat. Today is Wednesday, October 29th, 2025. And today we're talking next level Podcast tool upgrades, add data that favors the underdog and a new major award stirring a big debate in podcast circles. So if you're listening live on Clubhouse, hit the share button, bottom left hand side of the screen and share it. However, Clubhouse lets you. And if you're catching us via podcast chatter YouTube, please share this episode with a fellow podcaster. And now give me about 30 seconds. We'll get things rolling. Thanks for being here.

1:21 Good morning again, podcasting, Morning Chat. Thank you so much for being here. I am your host Mark Ronik, and currently on stage with me we have producer Ashley Feller, Nick Naul, back Jonathan Howard, Dr. Fay and Sid Meadows. We'll see who else joins us from the team throughout the hour. And big shout out to Ralph and Tim both here bright and early in the audience this morning. Thank you both for being here and for continuously showing up pretty much every day or at least whenever you guys can. I genuinely appreciate that. And Val, welcome, Val. I was just welcoming in our audience, so you popped in.

2:01 So good morning to you too, Val. Today is our news and comment day. We've got a lot of headlines to get to first, want to remind you that tomorrow, and I'm reminding our moderators as well, tomorrow, we are evaluating another podcast. Somebody from this community who's a regular listener doesn't get to join us live as often as maybe she'd like, but she does catch the podcast. Her name is Magdalena Joseph. Her podcast, Unbreakable Spirit, a healing Journey, that's what we'll be evaluating tomorrow. The episode specifically that we'll get into of Magdalena's is the Act of letting go. That is the episode.

2:48 It's only like 12 minutes long. So if you want to listen before you join us tomorrow or whenever you're able to join us, yeah, go ahead and check out that episode first. But if you don't, that's fine too because we're going to play some of it for you during the show. She's given us permission to do so. And we're going to talk about a lot of other things about the podcast just to help her revive it because she did take a bit of a break and she is planning on coming back. So this is great timing to have an evaluation when you've got your bunch of episodes that you've kind of let left on the shelf and now you're thinking of coming back and you get a bunch of fellow podcasters giving you their feedback as you prepare to relaunch. So join us tomorrow, 7:00 AM Eastern live or wherever you get your podcasts on your favorite podcast platform. And let's see, we're also streaming to Facebook these days. facebook.com/mark Ronic, Mark with AC Ronic with ACK. You can catch us there.

3:52 You can catch us at YouTube. There was something else I wanted to say and now I can't remember. Darn it. Oh well, say Lovey, let's get right to it, shall we? I'm sure I'll think of whatever it was in a moment. I think what it was is that I am with this new streaming and why I'm using a different app today for Clubhouse, little behind the scenes for you. I wanted to attempt, I think I mentioned this yesterday. I wanted to attempt to share my screen so that our audience who's watching us live on YouTube, on Facebook as well. I wanted to share the screen so you could see what it looks like on the other side with the whole clubhouse community and when people are talking, etcetera. I'm going to attempt it right now. And so if you're listening live, let me update my layout here, OK, So, oh, it doesn't let me do that. This is not going to be an easy thing for me to do. Just being fully transparent here, Let me try once more. And then if it doesn't work, I'm moving on Club Deck. That's the app we're using.

5:00 OK, I should be sharing that now. So now you can kind of see what's going on here on Clubhouse as well. We'll see how this all works out in the end. Podcast data as of 10/28. So this is as of yesterday, the number one podcast on Apple in the United States, The Daily from the New York Times, and I thought I'd throw in another one for you. In the spirit of DRS top Fives, I'm just going to give you the another top one, the number one drama on Apple in Canada, Sherlock Holmes short stories that comes to you from Noiser Total podcast episodes that have been posted over this last week, 311,926. That means those podcasts updated with at least one new episode.

5:52 And here's another stat for you. According to Pod Match and Refonic, of the 2.8 million podcasts out there, only 13.6% of them are active. Again, active being that they are publishing content in some way, shape or form to their podcast to their RSS feed. Pod Match goes on to say that podcast listenership is rapidly increasing, but the number of active podcasts has not changed, making podcasting a non saturated industry as much as some people believe otherwise. Do we know if things picked up in September and October versus August? Because that's something that we always say is that the, you know, the pattern disruption of summer usually is low, but it comes back in September.

6:46 Do we know if there was a an increase in September? So we don't only because, so our resource here, I go to Podcast Business Journal, that's where I get these numbers. And for all of September and most of October, they had some kind of glitch going on. And actually I was working with James Cridland a little bit on that or at least giving him the heads up. And we were going back and forth a little bit and he said they were aware and working on it. So basically for about a month and a half to almost two months, the data was not updated correctly. So I don't know for sure if there was a change. I assume so, but I don't know for sure. You want to give us your top fives?

7:26 I do Spotify top five is #5 this past weekend with Theo von #4. Good hang with Amy Poehler and #3 Tiffany please. The Tucker Carlson show #2 Spotify anniversary and the number one The Joe Rogan Experience. Interesting that number 2 Spotify anniversary. So it's basically a compilation of all their best stuff. It's like behind the scenes stories of it's music based and it's behind the scenes stories of you know of what is what was going on during a song or during a gig.

8:10 It's people playing acoustically. So it's a lot of different things all mixed up together. There you go. OK. And do you have the other top five list? And what is the category? I do. OK, so this week's random chart of the week is Pets and Animals. Didn't even know that was the. Category. Yeah, crazy. And so I will say that this really, really is up to date because this morning I pulled the chart, I put it in our rundown, and I took one last look to see if I could read like what something was about and it had changed. So this really, really is hot off the press. Very up to date.

8:51 OK so #5 is dogs and coffee with Kelly and Rocky Kanaka. OK #4 is no bad dogs podcast. Podcast #3 is Pet Candy radio #2 is the Fur Fur Real pod. I forgot the timpani. Go ahead, the fur sorry number. Two Fur Real podcast and #1 is vet candy, veterinary lifestyle news and learning. OK, so all you pet lovers out there and now you've got your top five if you want to go check out these different shows. Mostly dogs it seems in this lineup.

9:33 Fine by me. I'm more of a dog person, love cats, but I am more definitely favored dogs a little bit more. Whatever, Doctor. It's I love my dogs. Oh, there's Jonathan. But I wouldn't listen to them podcasting. Fairpoint, Fairpoint Dr. It's funny how we are friends because it's like Android versus iPhone, dog versus cats. We seem to be opposite sides of the spectrum, OK. My boy. Thank you, Dr. for your top fives and let me share just a few events for everyone today. It seems like there's a bit of a lull in some of the at least the major events going on around the world of podcasting. But first there is Protect Your Podcast. This is a virtual event November 6th. It's a free workshop from Gordon Firemark, AKA The Podcast Lawyer, that provides the essential skills, strategies and support you need to catapult your podcast to new levels of success.

10:35 And it is all around protecting your podcast legally. Also from this next one, from invisible to discoverable. Optimizing podcast content for AI search recommendations. This is an episode we're trying to work on for you in the next week or two. Discover how to grow your audience and turn your podcast into a business asset by being discovered, recommended, and trusted by both AI search platforms and humans. This comes from Alchemy for podcast hosts and guests. Again, that's November 6th, and we'll put links in our show notes. And of course, Pod Fest, that's in January, January 15th through the 18th in Orlando, FL. I'll be speaking there.

11:23 And if you want to save 10% off, I believe all you got to do is use code Mark Marc and you can get 10% off your tickets. And more to come. I'll have a more detailed announcement about Pod Fest because Podfest is is has asked the empowered podcasting conference community to host a meet up at their event. So it will be on the official lineup at Podfest. And I would love to see your face, people's faces in person for once, or at least for once in a while. So yeah, I can't wait for that. Yeah. And then Dr. What about your virtual networking event? So this is one that's kind of close to my heart. Podcasters Directory, virtual networking. It's where podcasters and people who want to be on podcast meet up virtually every single Thursday and they change topics every week.

12:22 It's between 4:00 and 5:30 Eastern Time, 5:30 PM Eastern Time. You're not going to meet at 4:00 in the morning Eastern Time. So this week's topics are health, fitness, purpose, life, religion and spirituality. So those are this week's. And if you put PMC, the initials of our show PMC into the coupon part of it, then you'll get in for free. All right, so PMC is the code and again, we will share a link in the show notes and also we can probably grab a link and share it with you here live as well. We'll do that for you. Kitchen time for me. All right, Dr. is off to the kitchen. Let me cover some more news for you in case you missed it. Riverside users, they're continuing to sneak some new features into the platform.

13:16 I noticed these over the past couple of days. First, I think it was Monday when I logged into Riverside, I saw a big pop up that says you can now upload directly to YouTube. So I will also share a link on how to do that. But you know they have added Spotify and I believe Apple. So now you can upload your shows directly to those platforms. And now most recently you can upload the video that you record and edit directly to the YouTube platform. Also, I don't know if anyone's noticed magic clips on Riverside. That's where it goes through your long form content and pulls out what it believes are your strongest highlights from that episode and even edits those for you as well if you wish.

14:06 They now have added a rankings system. I believe Opus Clips does this where now you can. You can see a number rating one through 101 hundred being the strongest content of your batch of clips. So check that out. You'll see those numbers there. I saw a few from yesterday that I haven't been able to to do anything with. But when Ralph joined us yesterday, Ralph, you seemed to trigger the Riverside Magic clips quite a bit. We had several highlights from you yesterday. Hopefully I will be on top of that and be able to share some of those on social media. The other major update from Riverside, it allows creators to record in person with two USB or XLR mics.

14:54 So again in person, meaning this isn't your typical Riverside recording an interview, this is you sitting next to somebody in the same room and plugging your microphones directly into your computer, your whatever device you're using. So this upgrade supports hybrid recording, meaning podcasters can now seamlessly blend local and remote guests into one session. It also even whether you're using USB mics and audio interface or mixing formats, Riverside gives full multi track control even in person, including tools for cleaning up crosstalk and adjusting speaker volume. It's a big step in my opinion toward making pro level studio quality podcasting more accessible. I'm excited about that because that's honestly a major update for a lot of us in the podcasting industry. For years, there was really no way if you were just, let's say using a computer, there was no way, not an easy way that you could plug in more than one microphone into the computer and not only the computer, just understand that you're using two different mics.

16:12 But more importantly, it was not able to do multi tracking. And yes, you could use a mixer, Ashley, but I saw that in the chat. And I think that this is helpful for those people who don't want to invest in a mixer right now. It's basically creating a virtual mixer for them. So big move from Riverside. Kudos to them. I think that's awesome. OK, let me keep things moving. And I'm curious what people think about this. It's been a long time since we've had this discussion and it popped up in the news. Swearing or silence Over half of Bugle listeners say ditch the bleeps. This is a new new survey data from the Bugle shows that more than half of its audience wants unfiltered, uncensored language, revealing surprising divides on swear words, content, style, and listener expectations. 53.5% of all respondents voted to remove censorship completely. Meaning if you're bleeping out those words, they want those bleeps gone, they want to hear those words. This is indicating a strong preference for hearing unfiltered language on the show.

17:25 Among paid subscribers, opinions were more split, with a noticeable tilt toward keeping the bleeps suggesting a tone or brand alignment difference between free and paid audiences. So surprisingly, I would have thought and suspected the opposite. A lot of times when people are paying for the content, they want it uncensored, unfiltered, in some cases unedited. But what this particular survey was suggesting, by the way, over 1000 listeners in 39 countries surveyed, the paid subscribers say they they actually kind of prefer bleeping out the swear words.

18:06 The bugle has a long running bit of bleeping explicitives for comedic effect. So this result isn't just about taste. It's also about how listeners perceive tone, satire and comedic timing. Like I said, 1000 listeners, 39 countries. It highlights how audience expectations around language and comedy are evolving even in long established shows. So what say you? What's your stance on swear words for your podcast? Do you prefer cleaning, clean language or full raw, no beeps? Or maybe there's something in between? Jonathan, I go.

18:48 Full language, because that's who I am and I curse like a trucker. And actually I will. I'll put a beep in if I want to actually draw attention to it and make it more impactful. OK. I'll take the yeah, I'll take it out because they expect to hear it from me. That's interesting. Yeah. And not surprising. And Jonathan couldn't help himself and dropped, I think an F bomb or two at the Empowered Podcasting Conference during his presentation. And I don't care. No problem. Just it was an observation. Dr. Did you have some thoughts? Just like Jonathan, you know, I swear I cussed like I invented the F word. So I am full on and you know that beep sound, it's it is attention getting. However, the tone in my ear is so disturbing. I would rather cover it up with like several different sounds, like a bell or a Aruga or something, something else, you know, it's just kind of grating on my ear. Besides this, yes.

19:55 Besides that. There are some, I'll call them entertainers, whether they're DJs, podcasters, etcetera, that really know how to use that well in tongue in cheek, you know, if you just say, oh, you know, like they, they do it really well. I can't do that. And so I get it like for comedic purposes doing it that way. I hear lots of radio shows shows doing it that way. I'm looking in the chat here and Janae says he likes to keep it PG. Tim is saying he's in between. It depends on the situation. Ashley is agreeing that she doesn't like the bleep sound either and makes her think of the Steve Wilkos show.

20:37 And Ralph is saying he can't talk right now, but he'll do it in the chat here. He says his Christian show. He keeps it clean. I respect that and certainly I understand that to. And he does that to respect his audience. And he feels that using too many swear words actually reduces their impact and points to a smaller vocabulary. I think that there's also sometimes using swear words is a way of expressing an emotion or putting an exclamation point on a point you're trying to make. Definitely. But some some DJs have gotten around it by they let the sound of the F bomb out, they will bleep it and then let the sound of the F bomb out.

21:22 So they put it in between those letters, which is some finagling that is some some kind of editing then I'm telling. You I kind of was that kind of editor when I was doing more of my own editing. Yeah, I'm that kind of editor. I enjoy being a little creative with those words and so that you can really understand what the word is without actually getting the full word out. All right. Well, yeah, I think that really it's up to you. I think that if you're a person that does use swear words, I think, you know, we talk a lot about being authentic and true to yourself. And we also talk about that when you are that way, you will attract the audience that gravitates to that kind of thing.

22:03 And you just have to be OK knowing that it might upset some people and you may not keep them around. It's just the way it is. And I think it's up to you to decide how you want to handle that. OK, let's keep it moving and just for palate cleanse. Nick wanted. Nick wanted to say something. OK. Hey, Nick, what's going on? What did you want to? Add Hey, good morning. I was just going to say, I think it's important, like when you're thinking about this for your show, it's probably a good idea to re evaluate the way that times who your listeners are. Because just over the last couple of years, I mean, we've seen a huge uptick in younger podcast listeners, like from 13 to 16 year old people jumping on the podcast bandwagon.

22:53 And just something to be conscious about as we have this discussion. Yeah. And I would be willing to bet, and we'll actually talk a little bit about that if there's time, about the ages of podcast listeners. But in some ways, I think that audience may want you to swear a little bit. That's true too, you know. Yeah. All right, let me keep things moving. NPR has just launched something called Pod Club, a new weekly podcast recommendation newsletter spotlighting stand out episodes from across its vast network. So I think that this is specific to NPR shows, from heavy hitters like This American Life to fresh voices such as Kqeds.

23:35 Close all close all tabs. The newsletter is designed to help listeners cut through the noise and discover both legacy content and emerging gems. It's curated, easy to skim guide that appeals to podcast fans looking for trusted, high quality listens each week. So if you're a fan of NPR, this is definitely a newsletter you may be interested in. So go check that out. Again, it's NP Rs Pod Club. I love a good newsletter. Yes, I know. You do you. You subscribe to as many newsletters as you buy apps, Sumo apps. And yeah, do you want to take the next one, Dr. OK, so according to pod news Toymaker Mattel, you know what?

24:21 We talked about this several months ago. Toymaker Mattel Incorporated has dropped its trademark opposition to the podcast Coffee with Ken. Does anyone else remember our story about this? Yeah. So hosted by Ken. Help me with the last name. Mark Bieber. Bieber. Bieber. OK. Bieber. OK, On the condition that the show steer clear of discussing toys, dolls are fictional characters Based on them. The multinational company initially challenged the show's name, arguing potential confusion with its Ken doll line, especially with Ken Barista. Oh, Ken was a barista, But ultimately settled after six months of dispute, allowing the podcast to move forward and towards federal trademark registration. Probably six months of dispute and actual shame. I can't even, I can't even imagine people sitting around a conference table with ties and books and everything saying, you know, we can really stick it to this. Oh, yeah, yeah.

25:39 I mean, they, these companies, once they get a hold of something like this, they can be ruthless. And I have a friend of mine, Johnny Gian Gregorio, who has visited us here on the morning chat. And he was also at the Empowered Podcasting conferences, both of them. He was in a dispute with Nike because he had created and trademarked temporarily just be it instead of just do it, which I thought was a brilliant term. And they came after him. They came after him said he can't use it and he had some legal consults and he could fight it if he really wanted to. But and.

26:22 If he had the money too. Right. They're just a huge giant and he just decided this was not worth it for him. But that So that's why I look at this as a really big win for coffee with Ken because a lot of times these companies will not back down. So good for them. I'm glad that that worked out. I. Just can't believe that they would do something so petty. OK you or me on the next one, go for it OK? Pod News has reported that a Cast Studios New York has officially opened in the heart of Soho, New York, and it opened in style, with none other than Ariana Grande stepping in as the very first guest on the live recorded episode of shut up shut up Evan with host Evan Ross.

27:10 Pat. I just love saying that, OK. The facility is described as a fully multimedia top tier studio offering high quality audio and video production plus custom branding opportunities available to creators across the Acast network. It is interesting. So if you're in the New York area, yeah, go check that out. By the way, got a shout out James Cridlin from Pod News, who's in the audience right now. Good morning to you, James. And you're always welcome to come up on stage where we are talking news. And we do get some of the stories from you from Pod News that we like to talk about.

27:51 So yeah, you're by all means welcome to join us. And if you're just listening, that's OK too. Let me keep things moving in a bold marketing move that blurs the line between podcasts and movies. This I did get from I did hear from pod news. Curt Co promoted its award-winning audio sci-fi series called Solar. And this is starring some names many of us may know, Helen Hunt, Alan Cumming and Stephanie Beatrice. It'll be directly in theaters from September 12th to the 25th. Trailers for this podcast ran before films at all Maya Cinema locations, alongside custom lobby posters with QR codes to the show's landing page.

28:38 And as reported by Pod News, the cinema based campaign aimed to reframe podcasting as an immersive cinematic experience. Quote movies for the ears and what I'd like to do is play that clip for you. Play that trailer. Now you may say, but Mark, it's a movie trailer. Yes. And as I just shared, this is designed to be an audio experience, this trailer. So imagine you have a big screen in front of you and I believe they have like a nice space scape and more or less there isn't much going on on the screen other than the title of the podcast. So with that I will go ahead as soon as oh here it is, I will go ahead and play that trailer for you. close your eyes as the trailer opens up and text comes across the screen and says close your eyes.

29:31 Let's see what you guys think of this trailer. Solar from Kurtco Media. Nask located the aethon 2 days ago, however we have not established contact. What was that I do? Not detect any abnormalities. The lights are getting brighter. Is the electricity overloading? Everything is nominal. What? Are the odds of survival for the Aethon crew. We won't speculate on those circumstances. I'm sure you can understand. Solar, a fully immersive Sonic adventure with revolutionary sound from Dolby Atmos in coming message from. German except, except. It's coming in through the airline. Get away from the airline. Hurry starring Academy Award winner Helen Hunt. If we deviate from the plan, even by an hour, we lose everything.

30:13 Tony Award winner Alan Cumming. I'm simply not willing to risk the lives of any crew members for the sake of an experiment. Stephanie, Beatrice. I'm going to save you, Jamal. And Jonathan Bangs. One problem at a time, Ren. Solar shadows are darker this close to the sun. Available wherever you listen to podcasts. There you go. What did we? What do we think gang? Do you enjoy? Did you enjoy this? Do you think this is a cool idea? Yeah. Let's see what Ashley has to say. Wow. I just like Helen Hunt. I think I would listen to it just for Hunt too.

30:53 Hilarious. And James Cridland did heed the call. He is on stage. Good morning to you James. Do you want to comment at all on this? Good evening to you. Yes, I really enjoyed it actually. I thought it was AI thought it was a really interesting idea to put essentially a movie for the ears into a cinema. So that's why it was a it was a headline story they're on in the week. But what a great idea to promote a podcast in somewhere other than another podcast. It's always nice, isn't it? Yes it is. I love the idea and I know that there are also theaters that sell local ads in trailers as well. So people could consider this maybe even for themselves if they don't have quite as big of a budget as this particular program. But you may be able to do some things like this with your local theater.

31:39 I say, why not like that? That seems like a creative and different idea. And I could see people sitting waiting for the movie to start, see an interesting podcast pop up and, you know, put their phone up for that QR code and, and follow that along. I think that's a cool idea and Dr. doesn't I'm I'm by the way, I'm gathering. You know, it's not my genre. I think that's it. Well. That's could be too. Yeah. But as far As for the for the world of podcasting, I'm with James. I think that this is a creative and fresh idea, and I hope to see more of it. Even whether it's the big name podcasts or independent podcasts. I think this would be an interesting and creative way of promoting your show. Do you want to take story #9?

32:23 So. The Golden Globes add best podcast, and Hollywood's calling it a Stam. All right. We've seen podcasting land on time covers when Pulitzer Prizes dominate Spotify charts, and recently we've shared that it's now stepping into the red carpet. The Golden Globes just made a bold addition to their awards category, and not everyone's popping champagne. The brand new Best Podcast category has dropped, but behind the scenes inside Letters are saying it's less about celebrating creators and more about stacking the deck. We'll let The Daily Show's Johnny Mack explain the the rest, because this story has got some Hollywood drama, media monopoly moves, and just a pinch of podcast chaos. Let's go to that clip.

33:14 Here we go. There seems to be some kerfuffle with the Golden Globes. I read several stories about it and I didn't really understand the story, so I asked AI to summarize this and explain it to me so I can explain it to you. So hopefully this information is correct. So the AI wrote. Here's where it gets messy. The Golden Globes are owned by Penske Media. Penske Media owns Variety, The Hollywood Reporter, and Deadline. Penske also owns Luminate, which is the analytics company that supposedly created the list of the 25 eligible podcast for Golden Globes. OK, so we're going to give an award. Luminate made the list. They're owned by Penske. And then there were the three main trades.

33:55 Variety, Hollywood Reporter, Deadline, also all owned by Penske, which is a fun fact that most people don't know. The AI wrote the Globes that said an outside company would determine the list. And technically they weren't lying. It's just that their outside company is another company they also own. But then came the real bombshell. Penske Media is reportedly selling marketing packages for up to 75 grand, basically for your consideration ads to help podcasts promote themselves to Globe voters. So if I'm understanding this right, you're being encouraged to buy an ad in one of the three trades to promote yourself to Globe voters for an award controlled by the people who are selling you the ads, right? The AI wrote. So to recap, Penske owns the awards, owns the data company choosing who's eligible, owns the media outlets covering the awards, and is now allegedly selling ad packages to the very people who want to win those awards.

34:45 As George Carlin said, it's a big club and you ain't in it. One industry insider said the Penske thing is out of control. They said an outside company would handle it. It's all a racket. All right, we'll keep an eye on that one. OK, there you go. Thanks to The Daily Show. And I'm curious, maybe I'll go to James. If James, any comments on this? What are your thoughts on this? I'm always interested in your opinions of industry news, So what say you, Sir? I'm always really interested in what the the Golden Globes are going to do with podcasts. So all they've basically done is they've taken the top 25 shows, I think in terms of total audience and they've said all of you, you're, you're eligible.

35:27 Nobody else is. So Joe Budden, for example, has done a lot of shouting over the weekend about why can't I even be even be able to enter, let alone anything else. That's one thing is the type of show which can be entered. None of the beautiful short features, none of the really nice shows that will normally win an Ambi award or the British Podcast Awards or the Canadian Podcast Awards, None of those will ever be eligible. In terms of the Golden Globes, it's just the Joe Rogan's of this world. And that sort of thing. So is it going to be exciting? I'm not so sure it's going to be that thrilling, to be honest.

36:08 But I suppose we should thank our lucky stars that the Golden Globes, you know, are talking about podcasts, I suppose. Yeah, that's the way I'm looking at it, is that they're continuing the conversation of podcasting forward by doing this. And I do agree with what what you're saying and others are saying too. It doesn't feel quite legitimate the way that they've decided to do this. And by only really acknowledging eligibility for the top 25 shows. Yeah, yeah, yeah. So there's the there's the eligibility list. And then on the other side, there's the whole thing about it cost you $500 to enter if you are eligible, but then you're being highly recommended to buy $75,000. You get an award for that, the Variety Creative Impact Awards. Well, that's nice.

36:58 It will give you a glowing interview. That's about as much as you get. There's some conversation around does Joe Rogan need that sort of thing, or Megyn Kelly or Ben Shapiro or Tucker Carlson? You know, do they need that the thing? But I think it it says bad things about awards and there are some awards which are really good which are not bought. And these awards seem to me to be bought rather than chosen on the quality of the shows, sadly. James is right. You know Penske is essentially building a monopoly on credibility for podcasters. This raises a big question. When the gatekeepers own both the charts and the trophies, what does best, quote UN quote best even mean anymore? People in the nose say that you can expect a fierce backlash from independent creators and media watchdogs at Penske becomes an industry punchline.

37:57 On the flipside, major podcasters with mass marketing appeal might embrace it because for them, it's just another spotlight. Either way, this move cements pod. This move cements podcasting mainstream legitimacy, even as it risks alienating the very voices that made the medium powerful first place. Thank you, Dr. and thank you, James. So glad you're here this morning to add on to what we're talking about. I'm going to keep things moving. Zoom P4 now also Zoom P4 next studio power in your backpack, the all in one portable podcast rig.

38:39 So Chris Baglio actually hipped me to this before Pod news did. Sorry, James. Chris had actually reached out to me and he probably actually heard it from pod news. He had reached out to me last week right after we wrapped up the news and shared a link to the pod track P4 Next. So if you're a listener of this show, you've heard I use that often the the regular P4. I use this device when I'm traveling. I used it as recently as September at the Empowered Podcasting Conference. And I know Ashley has some experience with the P42. I know she uses that as well. And the P4 Next is the latest update. It features new stuff, for example, AI noise reduction. This adapts in real time to different environments, eliminating the hums and buzzes, the ambient sounds. That's a really cool feature, especially for someone like me, again, who's using it on the go a lot and using empowered podcasting as an example.

39:42 It was noisy. I was doing it in the granted it was 7:00 AM in the morning, but I was still doing it in their bar area. So you're hearing all sorts of all the employees doing all sorts of work and clinking and clanking plates and dishes and glasses and all that kind of thing. So this would be interesting to put to the test. It also has tone and compressor buttons which gives hosts an instant polished radio sound without needing a lot of post production or plugins. It supports just like the original P4. It supports 4 XLR mic inputs with up to. 70 DB clean gain, meaning it's got some big power to it allowing high end dynamic mics like the Shure SM7B to shine without preamps.

40:31 Those of you who have a have experience with the SM7B knows that it it takes up a lot of power when you plug it into devices, especially smaller ones. So it's cool to hear that P4 Next has come up with a solution for that. It also has dual remote call in options. It has the TRRS cable. That's the cable that plugs into more or less a headphone Jack on your phone. If you don't have an iPhone, you can plug it right in. That's the way that I do it with an adapter on my iPhone. It also has a Bluetooth adapter or USB. This will allow you to do interviews pretty much from anywhere with automatic mix minus to prevent echoing. It also has the four headphone outs. It has sound pads just like the old one. I think it has four or five buttons on there and it has the SD card slot just like its predecessor. And it can, let's see, it says here can double as a USB audio interface for live streaming or DAW recording, and it also has a voice guidance system for seeing impaired and low vision users. It's compact battery powered design means creators can record in a coffee shop, tour bus or event hall, making professional sound truly mobile.

41:52 I admit it, I had no business making the purchase, but I have pre-ordered it. I mean, I shouldn't say no business because as I just said, I do use it, but after spending quite a bit of money on, you know, the investment of the Empowered Podcasting Conference, I really have no business dropping. And the Apple phone. Yes, and the Apple phone. Stop it. Don't let my wife listen to this, please. By the way, Yvonne, I see you were flashing the emoji. The laughing emoji. And thank you for being on stage. I totally admit I missed it. I didn't see you come up here. Was there something you wanted to add or ask? Floor is yours.

42:33 Oh my goodness. Old news going back to that trailer, Actually, yeah. OK. I think overall I like the idea. I think it's really cool for podcasting to have something like that happen. And I'm a sci-fi fan. I love Helen Hunt, I love Alan Cummings, but the whole thing sounded really stilted and overblown to me. So I'll give it a listen when it comes out. But that trailer was not. I was not getting the feels on that one. OK, interesting. And Billy had asked in the chat while I was talking about it earlier, so since we're back on the topic, he was saying, was there a visual with that ad?

43:14 And as I had said, really, no. I mean, there was a visual, but there was very few visuals. Very few. Yeah. There wasn't a lot going on. It was more or less a space scape with the the name of the podcast on the screen for the most part. And sometimes it would just flash the names of the actors as they were being spoken. But it really was not a terribly dynamic trailer. And again, we'll link to it so you can go and see that Ralph is on stage. Good morning to you, Sir. Did you want to add anything to any of the conversations we've been having this morning? Yeah, absolutely. Good morning everybody. I just thought, hey, while we're talking about gear, I'll put my tax hat on for a second, OK? It's a great time to be making some year end purchases. If you've got a a business for your podcast and you're showing some revenue, might be a great idea to make some purchases. So maybe that pod track next is a good option. But don't overlook that year end tax planning. If you're a content creator and you're showing some profit, it's a great idea to spend some money before the year closes out so you don't have to pay the IRS.

44:17 Yes, thank you, Ralph. Appreciate that tip and let me keep this moving. DRD want to take the next one? Yes, I'm just putting something in the chat here. Sorry. That's OK. Hold on. Just. I'll read the headline Dr. is going to tell us about from Capture to upload, Adobe and YouTube Shorts partner and they're bringing pro editing tools to short form creators. That's right, so Adobe and YouTube are teaming up to merge Premieres mobile editing power with YouTube Shorts, making it possible for creators to film, edit and prograde.

44:58 You'll have to explain to me later what Prograde needs. By the way, Prograde effects and publish all in one streamlined app. Now the key points here is creators will gain access to exclusive templates, transitions, title presets, and other effects designed specifically for short form content. The workflow can be launched directly from YouTube Shorts via an edit in Adobe Premiere icon, lowering the barrier between posting and professional editing. The move is aimed at empowering creators of all levels to produce higher quality short videos and tapping into Adobe's editing tools and YouTube's massive reach.

45:45 Well, this is a mobile first roll out currently on iOS with Android planned later. OK, it signals growing convergence of professional tools with casual creator workflows. What did I ask before? What was what was the word that I had a problem with? Pro grade. Yeah, pro grade effects. I actually when you said that I was like, I hope she forgets about that question because I don't know what to say other than pro grade effects. I'm assuming it just means there are some additional filters effects that you can use during your post production process and they're just calling them pro level pro grade effects. That's the way I see it.

46:31 Anyone else see it differently? OK, I think that everybody agrees. There you go. OK, let me keep things moving. And by the way, I do recognize that I say there you go a lot. It is one of my crutch phrases and it's been driving me crazy but. Let's change it. Let's change it to OK, and now you have it something. What can I change it to I? Need to create a library of terms alternate terms to. There you go. Yes, I recognize it and calling it out publicly like I am will help me reduce that. I believe it has in the past. With other crutch words. We shall see. Next story. Niche wins. Oxford Road's Orbit unlocks which podcasts actually drive sales.

47:20 A major move from Oxford Rd. reveals the first ever rankings of podcasts by Real Campaign Performance, and it turns the usual big name approach on its head. By the way, I think I saw this headline originally from Pod News as well. Think fewer mega shows, more passion. I'm sorry, more passionate niche audiences and surprising winners in AD conversation. I will explain. Oxford Rd. processed $1.6 billion in campaign data across hundreds of advertisers to build its new Orbit Top 15 podcasts, measured by ad performance.

48:01 It's a long name, but an important one. The tool ranks pods not by downloads or impressions, but by actual customer acquisition costs, return on ad spend and real sales outcomes. Surprisingly, 11 of the top 15 performers, or maybe not so surprisingly, are in comedy or news, politics, government categories despite But despite brand safety concerns around those genres, big name shows didn't dominate. Only three tier one, meaning three quote tier one podcasts made the cut, indicating that smaller or more engaged audiences may yield better ROI.

48:46 The number one performing show Critical Role with a niche, highly engaged community of tabletop gamers. Although to be more specific, I believe it's Dungeons and Dragons and this. Is they don't say dungeons drag. Yes, beating many mainstream programs. Going forward, Oxford Road will release monthly genre and vertical specific rankings to give marketers more actionable data. And the press release suggests the quote downloads era is over marketers now want which shows drive conversations, not how many listen, I think that this is a really eye opening to some people study and I really hope it's one that people, especially corporate people take seriously.

49:35 And James, I'm going to come back to you just because you are pod news any anything you want to add to the story? Any opinions on the story? Are you excited to hear it? Do you think that this is going to have some legitimacy among? The industry, it's very helpful to have a list of shows that have worked the best in terms of advertising. I mean, that's all this list of shows really is. There is only one show which is a big show in there, which is the Megyn Kelly show. That is a top 20 show, I think, in the US. The rest of these are not. They're large shows, I'm sure, but they're not anywhere in the top 50s. So I think that probably goes to show, as you say, that niche niches brings riches.

50:19 What was that phrase? Niches, niches. Main riches. The riches are in the niches. Yeah, correct. Yeah, that's, that's exactly it. So I think from that point of view, that's really interesting. All of this comes down to two things. It comes down to firstly how good the podcast is at selling stuff and quite a lot of these were host reads. And the other thing though is it comes down to how good the actual offer was. And having done quite a lot of host reads recently, you know, I think, I think you also have to bear in mind that, you know, if the offer is just come to our website and have a look around that is a that is going to give you very different results than get a year's worth of this amazing product for free. So I think we need to bear that part in mind as well. But more data is always good data. So that's always a good thing.

51:08 Yeah. Thank you. You know, I got to say I don't think I have ever heard of Oxford Road before. Is that AUS based or is that AUK based? It's US based. They are the biggest and they were the first actually the first podcast advertising agency and they're the biggest podcast advertising agency in terms of spending money with podcast. They're a very large company. They also sell terrestrial radio. They do create a based video as well and all of that kind of stuff. But now they're they're a pretty big deal based hidden away in Sherman Oaks in California. Oh no, it will.

51:49 OK, excellent. I know Sherman Oaks very well. Yeah. Thank you, James. So good to have you here to add a lot more to what we do on Wednesdays. Thank you. I appreciate you. I appreciate you just showing up every so often. It's great to to have you a part of this community as well. The secret? The secret is that pod news goes out when this show goes on. Whenever I'm sitting there and I see the alert that's come up and said it's time for podcasting morning chat and I haven't actually sent it out, then I know that I'm running late. So it's it's always nice to get that going. The big news today, by the way, if you are a video podcaster, and perhaps you are, perhaps you think that video is a dreadful thing and you'll never get involved in it.

52:32 And power to you if you think that. But if you are a video podcaster, then Spotify has added video to it's Apple TV app. It was a big surprise to me that the Apple TV app that Spotify had didn't actually have video on it, given that it was connected to ATV. Anyway, they fixed all of that now. So you will now be able to watch your favorite podcast in video on your TV using your Apple TV. If you use Spotify, so that is. Yeah, we had a discussion. Yeah, we had a discussion yesterday about watching TV on your phone, on your 6 inch phone versus your, you know, 52 inch TV. So that was kind of a lively discussion yesterday, yeah. And thank you.

53:18 Well, actually, go. Ahead, James. Yeah, I was just going to say, well, actually getting it onto the big screen in your house is probably a good thing. And apparently YouTube incredibly popular for that sort of thing. So yeah. So it'll be interesting to see whether that drives any more any more consumption to video podcasts through the brand new Apple TV app. But how bizarre they've they launched video podcasting last year, more than a year ago, and they never had video on the Apple TV app seems to be very strange. But anyway, there we are. Thank you, James. And James, I'm very glad that we can be your accountability partner for your website every Wednesday. I, I, I'm glad to hear it.

54:04 Anything we can do to help you? Thank you, James, thanks for being here. And I think this is a great place to wrap up. I do want to remind everyone, come join us tomorrow, 7:00 AM Eastern. We are evaluating someone else's podcast per their request. So we come join us for that. Again, that show is called Unbreakable Spirit, a Healing Journey by Magdalena Joseph, and we will link to that in the show notes. If you want to get a sneak peek of the specific episode will review Act of Letting Go, we'd love to have you check that out. And even if you don't, no worries, we will play some clips so you can be up to speed with us while we're doing the evaluation. So until tomorrow, make it a great day everybody take care.