Publishers “should ignore” new YouTube view numbers

• Yesterday’s announcement from YouTube of a new way to calculate “views” should be ignored by all publishers, says Zachary Boone from YMH Studios. The company will only report on “Engaged Views”, the original view metric from YouTube, which is widely believed to have a 30-second minimum. Boone says the change “opens the door for unsavory actors to misrepresent their numbers,” and calls for other publishers and networks to commit to the same.

• Spotify Creative Lab has shown an example of how they helped UK television channel ITV promote a new spy thriller. The company worked with Goalhanger, with host-read content and a special episode of The Rest is Classified. As a well-produced sizzle reel, this is hard to beat - nice work.

• It appears that Spotify added a support page about the “skip ahead” button on Tues Aug 4, added shortly after Podnews exclusively revealed the unannounced feature. It’s in the style of a Q&A, and remains remarkably coy about where they are testing it (“select markets”). It clarifies that no, you cannot opt out of your show having a “skip ahead” button, and also confirms that Spotify-sold ads are not exempt. New (to us): the page suggests that it works in both audio and video.

• Spotify’s Megaphone is silently adding geographic restrictions to block some publisher-sold advertising campaigns, warns Marques Pfaff of Amplitude Media Partners. The company has told him that it was done for legal reasons: but there is no documentation from Megaphone with any details.

  • Separately, Podnews has learnt that network ads (those sold by Spotify) seem to be preferred by Megaphone’s systems over direct ads (those sold by the podcast publisher). “Any position” ads used to simply rotate: but a support agent told a separate Megaphone customer that multiple orders now “leave placement up to the ad server’s discretion”, and “this can cause some orders to over-deliver while others get skipped or bumped by network spots”. There’s no documentation here, either: another support member admitting “We don’t have any exact information we can provide about which ad will take priority and which one will not.”
  • And, Megaphone’s API recently shipped breaking changes that now require file uploads for new episodes to be served via HTTPS. This change was never announced, has no documentation, and API calls silently failed with no error: causing the non-publication of a number of shows for the customer who contacted us.

• Tom Webster writes for Sounds Profitable today, looking at podcast user interfaces - and highlighting a “stupid product”, but one that perhaps lets us think a little more about how people discover and play our creations.

• Metapodcast is a search engine for podcasts, searching “millions of moments” from top podcasts. It offers 25 free searches a day, it seems.

• Buzzsprout launched Apple Podcasts HLS video in May, and already hosts more than 11,000 video episodes from more than 1,000 shows, the company has said. The average show saw downloads increase by 19%; some have seen even more dramatic growth.

• Transistor has added an MCP server, to allow you to connect it to Claude, ChatGPT, and other AI assistants. Co-founder Justin Jackson has produced a video explaining how it works, with three demos - he suggests that Claude discovered that his podcast’s numbers started increasing when he added a third co-host.

• News of a new podcast conference in the North of England. Podfest North will be held in Liverpool on Nov 13. Expect the people behind The Anfield Wrap, Married to the Machine and other top podcasts. Early bird tickets are £50.

• The Australian Podcast Ranker was released for July 2026. Mamamia Out Loud remains #1; and there are still two smart-speaker news bulletins in the top 5. ABC News Top Stories has overtaken News24 Update, a podcast formerly known as Sky News Australia Update. The ranker measures participating publishers only, and doesn’t measure video on Spotify or YouTube.

People news

• FlightStory is expanding its US brand partnerships team and is hiring an Account Manager based in either NYC or Los Angeles. The role will focus on building US brand partnerships for Steven Bartlett’s Diary of a CEO and Hot Smart Rich with Maggie Sellers, with more titles to come.

Tips and tricks - with Podcast Movement NYC

• View counts aside, Steve McClendon from YouTube asked earlier this year at Podcast Movement Evolutions what is needed for the next one billion users of podcasts?
• Want some random podcasts to listen to? Yeah, we’ve got that.

Podcast News - with Airwave

With Airwave: Engadget News + Next brings you the tech news you need today, and then in the afternoon we showcase stories about the technology, science, and culture that will influence tomorrow. Today: a lawsuit against Grok, and Meta faces legal issues worth $1.4 trillion.

In & Around Podcasting this week starts with analysis of Spotify’s new 'Skip Ahead’ button. Rob Walch’s advice? Stop doing video on Spotify’s app if you don’t want parts of your show to be encouraged to be skipped. (The button is only visible on-screen).

Different, Not Broken, the neurodivergence and mental health podcast, has been renamed, and is now called You’re Not Too Much. The show, produced by Podknows Podcasting, covers neurodivergence, mental health, burnout and, in host Lauren Howard’s framing, being human.

The award-winning comedy podcast Scam Goddess has joined iHeartMedia and Will Ferrell’s Big Money Players Podcast Network. The show is now publishing full length video - “video on YouTube, and audio on the iHeartRadio app and everywhere podcasts are heard”.

Some of the best people in the world are nurses, and the new podcast The Nursing Good pulls back the curtain on the diverse roles in nursing. Hosted by Jessica Oliver, each episode focuses on real nurses making a difference, exploring how the profession extends beyond hospital walls and into the heart of communities. If you’re a nursing student, seasoned nursing professional, or someone who wants to understand the powerful impact nurses have on our world, this podcast is for you. It’s new today.

Everyone has something they wish they could say. The Letterbox Podcast gives people a place to say what they’ve never been able to say out loud. The show is inviting people to send in the letters they’ve written but never sent — to a person, a place, their younger self, someone they’ve lost, or even a version of themselves they’re trying to leave behind.

Music Makes Us from the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame, PRX’s Radiotopia, and Talkhouse features unfiltered conversations with revolutionary musicians. A new season begins August 25, hosted by legendary artist Kathleen Hanna.

The old stories aren’t working. The last century has been shaped by narratives of separation, domination and extraction. You can see the results everywhere; in the soil, in our health and in the fracturing of community. We need new stories to help us navigate what’s coming next. That’s what The Seeds Will Grow says it is about: sharing bold ideas for a world in transition. It’s hosted by Finn Harries.