The Lewitt Ray microphone has laser-focused sound

• A brand new microphone, the Lewitt Audio Ray, has been launched… with a laser. The microphone has what it calls “autofocus” for sound, tuning the voice depending on how close, or far away, the person is from the microphone. It’s a new and novel idea; our review says it could be an excellent guest microphone, or for use on camera.

• Rephonic has started rolling out details of Spotify follower numbers for every podcast in its directory. The data appeared in some users’ apps a few weeks ago.

• Seems that the HotPod “hiatus” will be longer than first thought: all subscribers to the newsletter have had their paid subscriptions refunded. (If that refund is burning a hole in your pocket and you’d like to support us…)

• How many podcasts make it to 5 or more episodes? Only half of them, says data from the Podcast Index.

• Libsyn Ads has announced a partnership to represent the Toronto Star’s podcasts for ad sales.

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• Hit true crime show One Minute Remaining is to be made available to Spanish speakers. The Acast show is using Wondercraft to introduce the show to Spanish speakers globally. Uno Minuto Restante is now available in all major podcast apps.

• AdsWizz has successfully recertified for v2.1 of the IAB Podcast Measurement program. Podtrac and Simplecast also recertified in March. On the IAB TechLab website, there are still a number of companies only certified to v2.0, who haven’t recertified in more than three years: Anchor (now Spotify), Buzzsprout, Captivate, Chartable, Libsyn, Megaphone and Podbean.

100 Latina Birthdays

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In 100 Latina Birthdays, from Peabody-nominated LWC Studios, reporters investigate the health and lifetime outcomes of Latinas in the United States from birth to age 100. Season 1 chronicles Latinas’ health during pregnancy, childhood, adolescence, and up until age 20. Listen here, on Apple Podcasts or Spotify.

Moves and hires

• Lotten Skeppstedt has been hired as Director of Platform Services at Swedish podcast platform Podspace.

Tips and tricks - with Memberful

• What do you do with your audio files after you’ve produced an episode? Here’s how to store your podcast files - at least, the decisions you should make, and the way we do things. We’d love your feedback.

• Descript shares The best prompt for AI brainstorming, according to a study

Podcast News - with New Podcast Trailers - the podcast

Ahead of this year’s BAFTA Television Awards in the UK, the Countdown To The BAFTAs podcast returns again today - hosted by Alex Zane and made by Rethink Audio, the show will feature “informed and entertaining behind-the-scenes chat about the making of the most popular and critically acclaimed shows from the past 12 months”.

The Podcast Gurus podcast this week has our Editor, James Cridland, as a guest. The show is also available in video form. Developing sustainable content creation and distribution practices, James says, is essential to prevent burnout and maintain quality.