Time to rethink the podcast app?

• “Podcast apps today still feel like hacked music players. Podcasts are great and open, but they’re also kind of stuck in the past.” So says Morten Just, the author of as-yet unnamed podcast app, which breaks conventions by not allowing you to subscribe to shows, changes its look and feel for each show, and just plays a never-ending stream of podcasts. It has captions, uses Google to find more information about what you’re listening to, a bookmarking system, and a service called “Mix With Music”, which uses your own music service. Perhaps a worthy reinvention of the podcast app - or at least containing some neat ideas - it appears iOS only for now, and in private beta.

• How much ad revenue is The Joe Rogan Experience expected to generate in the next few years? Magellan AI does the maths, based on their own data: and gives you a Google Spreadsheet to work it out for yourself.

• AdLarge has extended its partnership with Crime Junkie and the audiochuck Network. Crime Junkie gets more than 31m downloads a month, according to the press release.

• The future of podcasting is a virtual event tomorrow. Speakers include Jason Phipps, the Commissioning Editor of Podcasts for BBC Sounds, Kara Swisher, tech journalist and podcaster from the New York Times, and our Editor, James Cridland.

• Omny Studio now offers podcast hosts the ability to offer “analytics-only access” to users.

• Adam Carolla managed to “make history” with 1.1m video streams of a live episode of his podcast. The stream of the PodcastOne show was with LiveXLive, who are also the new owners of Podcast One. (Tip for podcasters: it’s pronounced Live by Live, we belatedly learn.)

• Pocket Casts has released Pocket Casts 7.9 in beta for Android. It offers new icons, and themes; properly supports Android’s inbuilt account manager system; and bug fixes.

• 0work is a new website which promises to “turn your podcast into video”. Yhe basic plan is $17/month. You can test it for free with short videos - our podcast is short, so we gave it a go. Not sure it understands our aloof British accent.

• Another day, another podcast app. LSTN promises “a new podcast listening app focusing on discoverability and privacy”, and appears to use Podchaser data for reviews. It’s iOS only for now.

Tips and tricks

• Top things to do after releasing your first podcast episode (Blubrry)

Podcast News

Pindrop is a new podcast from TED, which travels the world to find the creativity and ideas that each place produces. It launches today.

Call Her Daddy restarts today, with a sole host, Alex Cooper, after a well-publicised contract fight. Rockwater posts the lessons from the controversy - editing tips, talent incubation, and fan power.

Planet Normal is a new podcast from the UK’s Telegraph newspaper, which calls itself a podcast that talks how normal people talk. “We’ve made progress in terms of gender and ethnic diversity, but there’s now far less diversity in terms of opinion – with much of the broadcast media, in particular, dominated by privileged insiders holding the same approved views”, says co-host Liam Halligan, sounding like no normal person we’ve ever met.

Uncommon has an interview today with our Editor, James Cridland, on how pandemics are affecting podcasting and radio. Here’s a YouTube clip.