Global puts podcasts and radio in the driving seat

• Global, which owns radio and podcast companies including Captivate in the UK and ad exchange DAX, has launched its Global Player app directly in cars, through Android Automotive. It means that podcasts and radio stations are available in cars from BMW, MINI Volvo, Polestar, Renault and Nissan - without fiddling with your phone. The app includes many third-party podcasts; indeed, you can enjoy our daily podcast update directly on Global Player.

• More people are writing about Apple Podcasts video, and what it means for the industry. There’s a lot to think about.

  • “Another proprietary take on the otherwise open standards world of podcasting … a lock-in strategy to a format based on open standards” writes Nick Heer.
  • “The real story isn’t that Apple added video. The real story is that Apple is choosing how video enters the podcasting ecosystem,” writes Rob Greenlee.

• Something else to look forward to when your iPhone gets iOS 26.4, apart from video podcasts, is a new feature called “Audio Zoom” in the camera app. It causes audio to be focused on the subject of your video when the camera is zoomed in. (Appearing in the developer beta is no guarantee it’ll be launched in its current form).

• DW (Deutsche Welle), Germany’s public international broadcaster, is having to make savings of €21mn (US $25mn), and around 160 full-time positions will be affected. It’s a 5% saving. This comes after the BBC announced 10% cuts totalling “hundreds of millions of pounds” last week. Both organisations make a number of podcasts.

• Apple Podcasts has changed its terms of service. Except for adding the word “video” in there, there’s nothing significant in our opinion - we’ve detailed all the changes.

• ART19 and Acast have both recertified to v2.2 of the IAB Podcast Measurement Guidelines.

• TikTok has made another new podcast… episode. TikTok In The Mix is a 'podcast’ that is only available on TikTok (somehow - after five minutes looking, your 54-year-old editor has no clue how to watch the thing, other than a trailer). TikTok has announced that episode two has just dropped, with “breakout country star” Megan Moroney. Music website Digital Music News covers the story with the breathless headline “TikTok Is Suddenly a Serious Competitor In Long-Form Podcasting”. No they’re not.

People News

• Nick Pitman has been promoted at the New York Times; he’s now Studio Engineer for the Audio team. The promotion takes place “as Audio continues to expand into video.”

Podcast News - with Airwave

With Airwave: IGN Daily Update is IGN’s daily update on the world of video games, movies, and television, featuring the latest news, previews, and reviews. Today - It Seems Like the AI Apocalypse Has Come for Hard Drives.

City of Lights is a true crime podcast about real life after the crime. It follows the lives of Al and Mary Ann Signorelli in the years after the 2002 murder of their son, which remains unsolved, and examines how their efforts to make their city safer put them at odds with the mayor and police. Instead of asking “whodunnit?” or “how?” or “why?”, the question the podcast seeks to answer is “what now?”

Today, on the anniversary of Executive Order 9066 (signed by President Franklin Roosevelt in 1942), which “authorized the forced removal of all persons deemed a threat to national security from the West Coast to ‘relocation centers’ further inland,” History For The Reckoning launches. Hosted by writer and theater maker Spencer Ford, this new audio series confronts difficult periods of history by incorporating personal recollections and firsthand testimony.