YouTube is effectively a Google Podcasts platform already.
Paying for YouTube Premium to avoid ads is some of the best money I spend each month. I wish I could do the same for Spotify podcast ads. I do pay for Spotify already to avoid ads in music, but I can't seem to avoid them for the Joe Rogan Experience.
Lots of podcasts do not exist on YouTube. There is no way to subscribe to feeds or auto-download episodes or any of the dozens of quality of life features that podcast users have been enjoying for over a decade.
I subscribe to YouTube Premium but to consider it a replacement to a proper podcasting app seems naive to me.
> Paying for YouTube Premium to avoid ads is some of the best money I spend each month.
It’s a ridiculous amount of money to spend to financially support Google’s exploitation of content creators and abusive “copyright” system, just so you can watch content they (a) already stream for free and (b) is already full of product placements, stealth marketing, sponsored segments, etc.
No way in hell I’m paying a huge premium for that.
I loved the idea of Youtube Premium at first, but I feel €15/month is exorbitant amount for what we're getting in return. Same for Facebook/Instagram which will have a similar cost starting from February.
The entire podcasts industry seems to be on a downward spiral. I feel like the days are numbered for Spotify's podcast dreams as well, looking at how little they are promoting them now in app or outside. What on earth happened? It was the hottest new thing in media, and then...everyone just collectively lost interest? Was it just the Covid bubble, or something else?
Making premium users listen to ads on podcasts was the primary reason I stopped using Spotify
The podcasts I listen to are available on all the major platforms
I think what we might be seeing is that the walled garden approach to content is not working out. People don't want to have to subscribe to a ton of services just to get access to a few pieces of unique content. There was a recent Disney+ thing to this effect recently too
> The entire podcasts industry seems to be on a downward spiral.
I think the podcast market got ridiculously inflated when COVID hit, with every remotely known person starting a own podcast. Many more podcasts were created, so more of them also fade away now.
For the media industry it was fantastic. It was so damn cheap because everything was taken care of by the podcaster himself. They just had to observe if it can gain momentum on its own and then randomly decide to accelerate it with some additional ad-money or exclusivity contract.
This was shortly interrupted by a "let's acquire every media in the world / let's pay Joe Rogan 200 MILLION dollars for his podcast" hype, now it's back to "let's see which ones of chicklets will make it"...
Advertisers lost interest, so there's no resources to promote some random podcast. If you listen to something like "Coder Radio" from Jupiter Networks you will hear the hosts talk about there being a lack of ads and Leo Laportes TWIT network is expressing the same concerns. Both of those two podcast producers will survive, because their audience is willing to pay for the content, and because they have a few niche podcasts where advertisers are able to target a narrow group of people with the right messages.
Large podcast aggregators like Spotify have no real business model, they produce way to many shows with to fewer advertisers and subscribers to cover the cost and their audience isn't nearly as loyal those of TWIT.
Partly I believe that there's simply to many podcasts available, with to low content quality.
It strikes me as a similar situation to Meta and the whole VR/metaverse thing. A company takes an ecosystem that's gaining popularity, makes a big bet on it in the hopes that it fuels the growth that Wall Street constantly demands and tries to turn it into a market of a size that the ecosystem was not ready for, and possibly never was going to be.
Their moat didn’t pay off. Pulling podcasts behind their paywall didn’t convert to subscribers nearly enough for it to justify the price in acquiring the source material.
There are so many great podcasts that when gimlet shows went to Spotify, I missed them, but listened to other shows instead.
> What on earth happened? It was the hottest new thing in media, and then...everyone just collectively lost interest?
Spotify tried to acquire the biggest whales in the podcast market, thinking that it would be a revenue stream that wouldn't require paying massive royalties to record labels, which is why they've never made a profit on the music streaming side.
They overspent, buying up celebrity podcasts and creating some of their own, all financed with super-cheap capital that lasted until 2022 when interest rates rose globally. Interest in podcasts have also fallen since the stay-at-home peak, but Spotify added a layer of enshittification by splicing in ads into podcasts dynamically.
This is a massive UX fail because podcasts are supposed to be static audio files without additional monetization. But Spotify spent so much acquiring Rogan et al, they have no choice but to saturate podcasts with ads.
I feel like the issue is exactly that capitalists ruined it by making an industry out of it.
Also if there is no rss feed I can subscribe to to get the releases, I don't consider it a podcast. So Spotify doesn't offer podcasts in my view...
Available on Google Play and F-Droid. I switched to it many years ago anticipating this exact Google product shutdown, and I've been very happy with it :)
Unrelated, but does anyone have any good options for listening to a podcast with someone simultaneously? I know in spotify you can do shared listening sessions, but that requires a spotify premium subscription.
Any good self hosted podcast streaming options, or other options that allow shared listening?
While I am sure this is likely to push people towards YouTube premium subscriptions, I feel like Podcasts are unique in the way they are consumed that they need a dedicated app.
Otherwise we end up with either a bloated YouTube app or an even more confusing "Youtube Podcasts" app (then YouTube music, YouTube videos, and YouTube whatever google decides to abandon next).
Would be a good time for Apple to maybe advertise Apple Podcasts some more.
Edit: Also why isnt this migration just done for you? So your data is there if/when you decide to try youtube podcasts.
When I first heard this news I started using https://pocketcasts.com/ which I have been very happy with. In case anyone else was looking for a Google Podcasts alternative.
There's no good common category beyond just "sound media" for music and podcasts I think. They play together on radio obviously, but there's something weird to me about them sharing the same app. The sorting, filtering, playback controls, and presentation all feels like its too different.
Seems to be the way the big tech music apps are going though.
Is youtube finally going to raise playback speed up to 3x from 2x? Feels like every popular podcast and audiobook player supports at least 3x now, it's not some niche feature. That alone makes youtube useless as a podcast platform for me. On the other hand, sponsorblocking podcasts... chefs kiss.
I started using google podcasts because beyondPod started acting weird. Guess I'm going back because there's absolutely* no way I'm moving to youtube music given their ads.
I think we will remember back podcasts as one of those nice things that we collectively didn't pay for. Hell, even Googles and Spotifies are giving up.
[+] [-] pvg|2 years ago|reply
https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=38573378
and a couple of months ago
https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=37659482
https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=37664710
[+] [-] ChrisArchitect|2 years ago|reply
[+] [-] vecplane|2 years ago|reply
Paying for YouTube Premium to avoid ads is some of the best money I spend each month. I wish I could do the same for Spotify podcast ads. I do pay for Spotify already to avoid ads in music, but I can't seem to avoid them for the Joe Rogan Experience.
[+] [-] notRobot|2 years ago|reply
I subscribe to YouTube Premium but to consider it a replacement to a proper podcasting app seems naive to me.
[+] [-] kahnclusions|2 years ago|reply
It’s a ridiculous amount of money to spend to financially support Google’s exploitation of content creators and abusive “copyright” system, just so you can watch content they (a) already stream for free and (b) is already full of product placements, stealth marketing, sponsored segments, etc.
No way in hell I’m paying a huge premium for that.
[+] [-] isodev|2 years ago|reply
[+] [-] verdverm|2 years ago|reply
[+] [-] tambourine_man|2 years ago|reply
[+] [-] unsupp0rted|2 years ago|reply
On mobile they’re not auto-skippable.
[+] [-] doubleg72|2 years ago|reply
[+] [-] gentleman11|2 years ago|reply
[deleted]
[+] [-] paxys|2 years ago|reply
[+] [-] verdverm|2 years ago|reply
The podcasts I listen to are available on all the major platforms
I think what we might be seeing is that the walled garden approach to content is not working out. People don't want to have to subscribe to a ton of services just to get access to a few pieces of unique content. There was a recent Disney+ thing to this effect recently too
[+] [-] rickdeckard|2 years ago|reply
I think the podcast market got ridiculously inflated when COVID hit, with every remotely known person starting a own podcast. Many more podcasts were created, so more of them also fade away now.
For the media industry it was fantastic. It was so damn cheap because everything was taken care of by the podcaster himself. They just had to observe if it can gain momentum on its own and then randomly decide to accelerate it with some additional ad-money or exclusivity contract.
This was shortly interrupted by a "let's acquire every media in the world / let's pay Joe Rogan 200 MILLION dollars for his podcast" hype, now it's back to "let's see which ones of chicklets will make it"...
[+] [-] mrweasel|2 years ago|reply
Large podcast aggregators like Spotify have no real business model, they produce way to many shows with to fewer advertisers and subscribers to cover the cost and their audience isn't nearly as loyal those of TWIT.
Partly I believe that there's simply to many podcasts available, with to low content quality.
[+] [-] bane|2 years ago|reply
[+] [-] enumjorge|2 years ago|reply
[+] [-] Zetobal|2 years ago|reply
[+] [-] upon_drumhead|2 years ago|reply
There are so many great podcasts that when gimlet shows went to Spotify, I missed them, but listened to other shows instead.
[+] [-] rchaud|2 years ago|reply
Spotify tried to acquire the biggest whales in the podcast market, thinking that it would be a revenue stream that wouldn't require paying massive royalties to record labels, which is why they've never made a profit on the music streaming side.
They overspent, buying up celebrity podcasts and creating some of their own, all financed with super-cheap capital that lasted until 2022 when interest rates rose globally. Interest in podcasts have also fallen since the stay-at-home peak, but Spotify added a layer of enshittification by splicing in ads into podcasts dynamically.
This is a massive UX fail because podcasts are supposed to be static audio files without additional monetization. But Spotify spent so much acquiring Rogan et al, they have no choice but to saturate podcasts with ads.
[+] [-] master-lincoln|2 years ago|reply
[+] [-] notRobot|2 years ago|reply
Antennapod:
https://antennapod.org/
https://antennapod.org/download/
Available on Google Play and F-Droid. I switched to it many years ago anticipating this exact Google product shutdown, and I've been very happy with it :)
[+] [-] bane|2 years ago|reply
[+] [-] tshannon|2 years ago|reply
Any good self hosted podcast streaming options, or other options that allow shared listening?
[+] [-] oaththrowaway|2 years ago|reply
[+] [-] unknown|2 years ago|reply
[deleted]
[+] [-] nerdjon|2 years ago|reply
Otherwise we end up with either a bloated YouTube app or an even more confusing "Youtube Podcasts" app (then YouTube music, YouTube videos, and YouTube whatever google decides to abandon next).
Would be a good time for Apple to maybe advertise Apple Podcasts some more.
Edit: Also why isnt this migration just done for you? So your data is there if/when you decide to try youtube podcasts.
[+] [-] rickdeckard|2 years ago|reply
I seriously wonder if anyone would really _PAY_ for the user experience of YT Music.
It is one of the weirdest media apps I've used in a long time. Never fully fit for purpose, always "okay, somehow works".
[+] [-] infamouscow|2 years ago|reply
https://podcastindex.org/
[+] [-] dopeboy|2 years ago|reply
[+] [-] smithza|2 years ago|reply
[+] [-] iso8859-1|2 years ago|reply
[+] [-] rchaud|2 years ago|reply
[+] [-] matthewfelgate|2 years ago|reply
[+] [-] pelagicAustral|2 years ago|reply
> https://www.theverge.com/23891397/google-podcasts-youtube-sp...
[+] [-] andyjohnson0|2 years ago|reply
[+] [-] verdverm|2 years ago|reply
[+] [-] rickdeckard|2 years ago|reply
So far it seems to be where Google Media apps migrate their users to when they decide to retire a media service. ANY kind of media service...
[+] [-] unknown|2 years ago|reply
[deleted]
[+] [-] throw7|2 years ago|reply
I haven't decided where to migrate to, but it's definitely NOT Youtube Music.
[+] [-] graypegg|2 years ago|reply
Seems to be the way the big tech music apps are going though.
[+] [-] maxglute|2 years ago|reply
[+] [-] unknown|2 years ago|reply
[deleted]
[+] [-] pmichaud|2 years ago|reply
[+] [-] unknown|2 years ago|reply
[deleted]
[+] [-] wing-_-nuts|2 years ago|reply
I started using google podcasts because beyondPod started acting weird. Guess I'm going back because there's absolutely* no way I'm moving to youtube music given their ads.
[+] [-] crossroadsguy|2 years ago|reply
[+] [-] pelagicAustral|2 years ago|reply
[+] [-] eviks|2 years ago|reply
[+] [-] unknown|2 years ago|reply
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