Call Her Daddy now available everywhere

• Call Her Daddy is no longer a Spotify Exclusive - and is now available on all platforms. Video remains exclusive to Spotify. The podcast had been exclusive since July 2021, in a deal worth $60mn; it’s part of an apparent strategy change by Spotify to open up its programming to all podcast apps to benefit from increased ad sales.

• RadioPublic is to close at the end of March. The public benefit corporation launched in 2016, asking podcasters to support an investment round in 2018. It offered podcast websites and had a listening app. After it was bought by Acast in Feb 2021, our news archives show the disappointing story of what happened next. OP3 reports it currently has a 0.003% share of podcast downloads.

• Audacy is to cut twelve jobs at Pineapple Street Studios - about 25% of the staff - says a report by Bloomberg. The staff union says it’s heartbroken and will fight for an appropriate severance package. The company filed for bankruptcy protection last month.

• Development of podcast app Podverse is “overwhelming”, says its founder Mitch Downey. Suffering from burnout after too many unpaid 10-hour days, he’s calling for an increase in open source contributors.

• Podcast hosting company RSS.com has launched a new version of its dashboard, which is much faster and, the company suggests, will help speed up development of new features.

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• 27% of UK adults aged 15+ listen to podcasts monthly, says new data from RAJAR - that’s 15.2mn people. Here is a lot more detail about the latest radio figures from Matt Deegan. Meanwhile, BBC Sounds has claimed a record of 231mn plays (up 2.2%) to on-demand radio and podcast content in Q4/23. BBC podcast consumption via open RSS dropped again to 222mn (down 1.8%).

• SXM Media has a new logo and a new name: it’s now SiriusXM Media.

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Tips and tricks - with Podpage

• Wondering how other podcasts like yours are doing in downloads? OP3 analytics are open to everyone, and our sister publication Podcast Business Journal publishes a selection of podcasts measured by the service, to help you compare.

• 8 Ways to How to Grow Your Podcast Organically (The Podcast Sessions)

Podcast News

When should you declare use of AI? That’s one of the topics in the Media Roundtable this week; Dan Granger (Oxford Road’s Founder & CEO) is joined by Kristen Duenas, Stew Redwine, and Podnews’s Editor, James Cridland.

The Price of Music launched yesterday: a new weekly podcast about the money behind the music business. It’s co-hosted by Steve Lamacq (of BBC Radio 6 Music) and Stuart Dredge (of Music Ally), who will both use their decades of collective experience to make sense of the latest stories making waves in the music business. It’s created and produced by Dap Dip.

Secrets We Keep is back from LiSTNR with a global story about secrets, power, national security and how countries behave when they think no-one is watching. LiSTNR investigative journalist, Joey Watson, is on a three-year hunt to find the spy who betrayed Australia.