A third of Americans get their news from podcasts

• Pew Research released a new Podcasts and News Fact Sheet. From a survey conducted last month, the study says that 54% of US adults have “listened to a podcast in the past twelve months”, and a third get their news from podcasts “at least sometimes”. Republicans seem to trust podcasts twice as much as Democrats, the data suggests; under 50s, and the more educated, are more likely to listen.

  • Only 6% subscribe or donate to their favourite podcasts. Podnews is free for everyone, thanks to the less-than-6% who are paid supporters. Join them!

• SXSW Sydney will have a full, dedicated podcast stage next month. MIK Studio has revealed a new set of panels and conversations to take place at the event. The Acast Arms, Acast’s pop-up pub, will also make an appearance.

• Congratulations to Quill, which has achieved a place in The Globe and Mail’s top growing companies for the third year in a row.

• Tink Media’s Podcast Marketing Magic is launching a Substack chat for premium subscribers. Co-writers Shreya Sharma and Wil Williams will be among those taking part.

• Station has integrated merch company Certified Crucial into its AI Revenue Assistant, allowing podcasters access to pre-sales, fulfilment, and analytics.

• For the first time, the Black Podcasting Awards ceremony will be held in-person on Fri Oct 17. 71 podcasts are nominated over 43 categories.

• Gumball is expanding its slate of video podcasts, with three sales partnership deals - Clooless Podcast, Pretty, Not Smart and Let’s Get Into It have all signed with the network.

• The Astra Podcast Awards announced its nominations recently. The ceremony will take place in Los Angeles on Monday, Oct 27. The awards are voted on by members of the Hollywood Creative Alliance.

• YouTube announced YouTube Labs - “a new initiative dedicated to exploring the potential of AI on YouTube.” If you’re in the US, you may be able to sign up to “AI music hosts designed to deepen your listening experience by sharing relevant stories, fan trivia, and fun commentary about your favorite music on the YouTube Music app”.

• The US government’s Department of Homeland Security appears to have used a clip of podcaster Theo Von without his consent.

• And, in Variety: How Press-Shy Stars Are Finding Their Voice in Hollywood During the Podcast Era

The Tech Stuff - with RSS.com

• RSS reader Inoreader has added a new audio player with transcripts, topic extraction and support for podcasts and YouTube videos.

• In Podcasting 2.0, Adam Curry and Dave Jones discuss our interview with Jeanine Wright of Inception Point AI; and an announcement by Coinbase and Cloudflare about X402, a potential way to enable micropayments for podcasters. (It’s very much needed, because the existing method of micropayments, keysend, is going away).

• Our RSS download stats from Thurs Sep 23, 2021 vs four years later, Thurs Sep 25, 2025 are an interesting read. Google has increased its call to our RSS feeds almost 7× from 347 a day to 2,387. (Part of that is YouTube’s RSS ingestion). In total, we’ve seen a 37% increase in requests for our podcast RSS feed in that time.

Tips and tricks

• How do you get the most out of being a guest on a podcast? Lyndsay Phillips highlights how to structure your appearance to ensure you get your points over - and get value from your time.

Podcast News

“I just wish he was better at his job.“ Malcolm Gladwell appeared on a recent episode of Semafor’s Mixed Signals, covering things like Joe Rogan and journalism.

The Charlie Kirk Show, which has been #1 in Apple Podcasts for much of the previous few weeks, will continue with a set of rotating hosts, according to an appearance by his widow Erika Kirk.

Astonishingly, there are still some people who have never been on a podcast. On Purpose with Jay Shetty today talks to one of them - Madonna. She will “speak candidly” about the role spirituality has played in her life.

What connects Australia to the Caribbean? A new History Lab narrative series reveals the surprising lives of Caribbean sportsmen and performers who shaped Australia. Meet forgotten Australian boxing star Peter Jackson, who moonlit as an actor and carefully shaped his public image long before Instagram, and Nellie Small, a queer, Caribbean-Australian star who sang in suits, stood up to racism, and made the country laugh.

Dying of Exposure is a monthly, long-form, artist-to-artist interview series hosted by acclaimed Canadian musician Dan Mangan. The show dives into the creative lives of prominent actors, musicians, and writers - and a unique twist: Dan and his guest spotlight an under-appreciated band, listening together and reflecting on the hidden gems that shaped their artistic journeys.

David Senra is a brand new podcast out this week - in the debut episode, David sits down with Spotify CEO and co-founder Daniel Ek.​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​ Senra “studies greatness and understands it”, according to Andrew Huberman, who shared this episode in his feed.