Spotify’s walled garden loses more exclusives

• Spotify is stopping platform exclusivity for some of its Gimlet shows, according to a report. “We are expanding our windowing strategies to increase the audiences and ad sales potential of our shows,” a spokesperson told Semafor.

  Spotify 🇸🇪 

• Traffic at the NAB Show “has been great”, says Blubrry’s CEO Todd Cochrane; the company moved to the central hall this year. The NAB Show is celebrating its centennial year.

  Blubrry 🇺🇸 

• Deals: ARN’s iHeartPodcast Network Australia has renewed its representation deal with Audioboom as a “multi-year partnership”. … PodcastOne has acquired two shows - a hit rewatch show Causing a Scene, previously known as The Netchicks on Libsyn, and I’ve had it, which was formerly on Podbean … Syntax has been acquired by Sentry, a code analytics product, on the occasion of its 600th show. “We personally loved Scott and Wes’ ad reads for Sentry, but going forward the podcast will be free of paid advertising”.

  Audioboom 🇬🇧 Libsyn 🇺🇸 

• PodcastOne’s stock market floatation is still on; but an article at the end of last week didn’t give a date. Previous dates given have been Jan 16 and then before the end of March.

• An audio drama development fund has launched in the UK. The organisers of LOOP claim it’s the country’s first. You’ve until May 19 to apply.

• Want to record a podcast? Live in Los Angeles? Don’t have a studio setup? Can’t be bothered to get in the car and drive to one? The Podcast Bus reckons it’s the only mobile recording studio in LA that comes to you. It’s a professional recording studio inside a converted school bus.

• Author and activist Cory Doctorow has criticised Spotify, the BBC and Apple for operating walled gardens instead of open podcasting. Speaking on The Changelog, Doctorow criticises Apple for a “deliberate piece of engineering that allows Apple to usurp the relationship between audiences and podcasters”.

  Spotify 🇸🇪 Apple 🇺🇸 

Moves and hires

• Paul Kim at Samsung appears to have left the company. Paul was the main contact for Samsung Free’s podcast service, and had worked for the company for twenty years; we also hear other staff will be affected. Samsung saw its lowest profit figure for a decade earlier this month.

Tips and tricks

• In South Africa, audio and podcast strategist Duduzile Masuku gives five reasons why your podcast is going to fail. Among many other faults - you’re boring, she says. Steady on, Duduzile!

The Tech Stuff - with The Podcast Standards Project

• Cross-app comments, a much-desired feature for podcasting, is the subject of a new proposal from Daniel J Lewis. The proposal aims to be a simpler method of achieving cross-app comments from different services, just using a JSON file.

• The proposed podroll tag is now being supported by Podfans, a new podcast player tool.

Podcast News

Ride With Me - The ASMR Cycling Podcast is a cycling podcast with a difference. The podcast captures the unique sounds of bike rides through high-quality binaural field recordings. You can already ride through Jerusalem and Girona.

The Addict Experience has uncut, raw phone interviews with recovering addicts, police, counselors, family members or anyone else affected by the disease of addiction. The host, Chris (a reformed addict for seven years) tells Podnews that the use of phone interviews is deliberate - it makes it easier and more natural to connect with guests.

Linux Matters is brand new, from the people behind the 14 year-old Ubuntu Podcast, which has recently completed its run. We’re promised “3 experienced open source professionals bringing you upbeat and family-friendly chat about open source, technology, gaming, software development and all the Linux matters that matter”, though their email gave no explanation for these hats.

Code Story is kicking off Season 8 of its podcast today, interviewing startup builders about their human stories and experiences in creating something from nothing, the technical tools used, finding product market fit… and building a team that has your back. It’s hosted by Noah Labhart.

Dinky kicked off season three last week - talking about the “double income no kids yet” lifestyle, and helping people navigate what society wants vs what’s best for them. “A lot of people who want children… don’t want children. They want an Instagram feed of children,” says host Jessica Lanyadoo.

LAist’s WILD returns for a new season today, with Megan Tan (“Snooze,” “Millennial”) joining to co-host alongside Erick Galindo. It continues the story in season 1, a partially fictionalized Southeast LA love story which is, we’re told, a powerful and surprising longform story about love. Expect documentary-style conversation and cinematic fictional flashbacks.

Podcast ads in the wild

Podnews reader Heather was in a comedy club recently, and noticed this beer coaster. The QR code goes to a Linktree of Mystic Junkies - “a podcast with six humans obsessed with mysticism, fringe stories, true crimes and conspiracies”.