The most, and least, crowded active podcast categories

• Research from Amplifi Media and Podnews recently showed that there are only 155,000 regularly-updated podcasts (more than 10 episodes, updated in the last ten days): but what category are they in? We worked on the data to show the most, and least, crowded active categories.

  • Amplifi Media has also announced it is to work with the Radio Advertising Bureau in the US to benchmark local podcast ad revenue for stations.

• A new version of AI voice tool Veritone Voice has been released. The press release that we publish includes an AI-voice rendition; you can watch a Sounds Profitable deep-dive into how the tool works, with Bryan Barletta and Fisher Robison of Veritone.

• Podimo, the European subscription podcast service, has raised €58.6m ($58.5m) in funding. It had previously raised more than $116m.

• Audio recording and collaboration company Nomono has announced NOK 35m ($3.6m) in funding. The company launched a Wi-Fi enabled recorder that combines fourwireless lavalier mics with a 360-degree spatial audio microphone array, and AI-powered dialogue enhancement processing.

• Baltimore City’s state attorney has asked for a new trial for Adnan Syed, after new information has come to light that points to alternative suspects. Cell phone tower information has also been shown to be unreliable. The case was highlighted in the first season of Serial.

• Podcast Day 24, Oct 4 in Sydney, London and NYC, has announced more of their speakers. We hear that Sounds Profitable’s Tom Webster will be revealing more data from The Creators in NYC; London will feature the Podcast of the Year, Dear Daughter; and Sydney will include a focus on new and emerging formats from LiSTNR’s Jen Goggin. The code PODN1215 gets in-person tickets at around half-price, and includes full video catchup of all three events.

• Australia has a new #1 for podcasting, kind of: Triton Digital’s ranker says LiSTNR is the #1 sales representation podcast network, now representing 5.9m monthly listeners and claiming an 81% month-on-month growth in audience. The network added Stitcher and Audiochuck’s content to its numbers.

  • However, ARN’s iHeartPodcast Network Australia remains the #1 podcast publisher, and saw a 6.5% growth in total downloads.

• The Infinite Dial, a study of media habits including podcast listening from Edison Research, is coming to New Zealand later this year.

• Patreon is to lay off 80 employees.

• Podcast information tool Podkite has released a number of updates, including a dashboard to access Apple and Spotify ratings; an improved chart rankings panel, and integrated prefix tools. The company claims the fastest prefix redirect in the industry.

  • Podkite research shows big differences in ratings scores for each country. 30% of all ratings given in Afghanistan are 1-star, more than double the second-most grumpy country, Brunei (at 14%). Places that are most positive are Costa Rica, Guatemala, and Slovenia doles out the most 5-star ratings: hardly surprising, given it’s the only country with 'love’ in its name.

• AdTonos is preparing to launch something they call YoursTruly™, “giving brands the power of real conversation in their advertising by interacting with listeners just by voice.” The launch was due today, but has been postponed.

• Why is every podcast seemingly sponsored by a VPN? Michael Girdley had access to one company’s profit and loss sheet.

• Third Ear Studio, a podcast studio making subscription content in Sweden, claims more than 20,000 subscribers (each paying SEK 49 ($5) per month). It’s just gained a SEK 10m ($1m) investment.

Moves and hires - with Sugar23 Audio

• Allyson Marino is now Sr Director of Revenue Partnerships at SiriusXM. She moves from iHeartMedia, where she was Podcast Slate Lead.

Tips and tricks

• Gumball has posted a glossary of podcast advertising terms.

• A search optimisation website, SEJ, has posted “how to make your podcast rank”. One of its tips is to read Spotify’s guide on how to optimise your podcast pages on Spotify.

Podcast News - with Lemonada Media

From Lemonada Media: Raised by Ricki looks back on and re-examines the groundbreaking Ricki Lake Show. Hosted by award-winning talk show host Ricki Lake and television personality and digital creator Kalen Allen.

Need a new show to listen to? New Podcast Trailers is available in your favourite RSS podcast app, and contains trailers from lots of new shows.