Bill Simmons podcast to go live on Netflix

• Spotify’s video deal with Netflix will include a live version of The Bill Simmons Podcast, says The Hollywood Reporter. The Sunday episodes will be live starting Jan 11 - the show will stream live at 11.30pm ET (in the US only).

  • The show has previously been live on YouTube, where it gets around 100,000 views per episode - Podscribe suggests the audio podcast gets almost three times as many downloads. It won’t be available on YouTube in full from next year; the Netflix deal is exclusive.
  • Live video podcasts are also available on open RSS. The feature is supported by a number of podcast hosts, and podcast players.

• Everything Everywhere Daily will hit episode 2,000 tomorrow. The daily podcast, which was launched in July 2020, has had over 55 million downloads (and more than 1.3mn in the last thirty days) and has remained a one-person operation, hosted by Gary Arndt, since its inception.

• On Dec 24, we covered Deloitte’s study suggesting that podcasting is becoming more video-centric. “A familiar mistake is being made”, says Doug Downs in a blog post response. “The data does not say that video is replacing audio. What they describe instead is an expansion of formats, not a substitution,” he says, adding that we may be misreading what visibility and attention actually signal about long-term listening behavior, habits and memory.

• Fun tip: if you’re publishing over Christmas, getting the family involved is fun. Here’s the intro to Podnews’s daily podcast from various years back to 2019. Awww!

What’s next: 2026 in podcasting

Greg Glenday, Acast:

2026 is going to be a watershed year for podcasting.

I think there will be some consolidation, lots of great companies that have built meaningful businesses - maybe they’ve taken them as far as they can, and they’re looking for strategic homes. I think all of that will start to shake out.

This might be controversial and a little self-serving, but I think the minimum guarantee marketplace will change. The way it works now is a net negative for the industry: I just don’t think it’s helpful for creators outside of the top one to 200, and I think it’s been fairly destructive to many smaller, mid-sized companies.

As an industry, we are going to sort out who are our core customers. Is it audio buyers, is it subscribers, is it direct response advertisers, big brands, DSPs, small businesses? Will they be video buyers or something new? At Acast, we’re going to invest in all those areas.

And, the idea of podcasting being the best narrative influence platform or media platform that exists is something that really resonates with advertisers.

Podnews: thank you for all you do for the industry. I think you challenge us, and you call us out if you see something that’s not right, and I think you make the industry better every day. So happy holidays, happy new year, and I will see you all on the other side.

• Hear more in the Podnews Weekly Review

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