Apollo: a podcast app just for fiction podcasts

• Apollo is a new podcast app just for fiction podcasts. Boasting a human-curated library of more than 7,500 shows, it promises “shows sorted by season, and episodes in the correct order”, and has launched in beta for both iOS and Android. We think it’s a great example of a niche podcast app that could help raise the profile of fiction podcasting (and, perhaps, lead to new business models).

• Triton Digital’s January Podcast Report for the US tells us that US podcast listeners downloaded 4 podcasts per week on average. NPR News Now is the new #1 podcast; SXM Media remains #1 for publishers.

• NPR has been given a grant of $500,000 to support its coverage in the Ukraine.

• Audioboom has launched three new shows. Two are true crime; the other combines dating and food.

• The Edison Research Infinite Dial South Africa has been released. Covering metro South Africa, the data shows monthly podcast listening has more than doubled in two years to 26% of the population. (We’ve updated our market data slides).

• Meanwhile, PRX has announced Africa Podcast Lab, a podcast development program for health journalists, producers and storytellers. Participants are from Kenya, Nigeria, and South Africa.

• In Spain, the winners of the Ondas Globales Podcast Awards were announced, including winners from fifteen Spanish-language countries. The award ceremony will be in Malaga in May. The awards are part of the Ondas Awards, which are in their 69th year.

• In Ireland, podcasters The 2 Johnnies, who became Spotify exclusives in June, began hosting the national RTÉ 2FM afternoon drive radio show on Monday. On Wednesday, they published a “crude and vulgar” video on social media and were promptly suspended from the show after just three days on-air. Oops.

  
  Sep 12 2023: This broken link now points to the Internet Archive.

• In Egypt, PodFest Cairo 2022 is just round the corner: it will be on Mar 5.

• Snipd is an app that lets you highlight and take notes from podcasts. Here’s a video demo. It’s spent the day on ProductHunt.

• Noting that Chartable and Podsights have been bought by Spotify, Podtrac is owned by Authentic, and Triton Digital owned by iHeart, podcast analytics service PodInch has launched, offering “podcast analytics by an independent team which care about user privacy”. (Blubrry remains independent, too).

• Spammer Corner: Two minutes after publishing details of Stockholm-based Acast spamming podcasters who use competing platforms, we got spam from Berlin-based Audry, inviting our test podcast PodClock to their platform. It’s considered illegal to scrape RSS feeds under the GDPR to obtain personal details of EU citizens, like the owner of PodClock.

• Correction Corner: How much did Libsyn pay for PAR? It turns out that we can’t read SEC statements: apologies. The correct figure is $8m cash, plus a further $4m worth of stock and earn-out.

You have only this weekend to fill in the Podnews Report Card. Your feedback will be given to podcast platforms about how they’re doing, as well as reported here in mid March. Please fill it in by Mar 1, and share it with others. Thanks!

Moves and hires

• Ashley Carman is to leave The Verge and HotPod, and will join Bloomberg next week. She’s been writing some excellent stories about podcasting over the last few years; the hype-house from hell was our favourite.

  
  This link is no longer available, as at Sep 12 2023

• Ryan Ladisa has been appointed VP of Sales for DAX in Canada. He was at Media.Monks.

  
  This link is no longer available, as at Sep 12 2023

Tips and tricks

• How to make your podcast a global hit - Podnews Editor James Cridland spoke at the Asia Podcast Festival last year. This talk includes tips around platforms, promotion, and getting the basics right - thanks to the Asia Podcast Festival for letting us share!

• How To Write The Perfect Podcast Description

• How to Use Twitter to Promote Your Podcast

  
  Sep 12 2023: This broken link now points to the Internet Archive.

Podcast News - with Quill

Produced by Quill: Contributors features provoking conversations about how to take your organization one step further by prioritizing more than just the bottom line. Hosts Marnie Niemi Hood and Russell Evans from the CAAT Pension Plan sit down with leaders who are contributing to the well-being of the country and global stage by innovating industries and leading change.

Looking Forward has the first of a two-part series on the future of radio, with Jeff Ostroff talking to James Cridland, a radio futurologist and commentator about the medium. (He’s also Podnews’s Editor).

The Guardian’s Politics Weekly podcast has split into two. Politics Weekly UK, now hosted by John Harris, is now every Thursday, and will feature expert commentary and analysis, with a unique take on the latest goings-on in Westminster and across the UK.

…and The Guardian’s Politics Weekly America, formerly Politics Weekly Extra, launches today with Jonathan Freedland and guests from across the US analysing the latest in American politics.