Apple Meets With Podcasters to Hear Wide-Ranging Community Grievances

[6749974]

Apple is sounding more and more like a failing enterprise.

I'd be interested to know what your criteria is for categorizing Apple as failing.

The only data they'd have is on the initial point of subscription subscription, and as I said earlier, even that is problematic, as my daughter (if I had one) could subscribe to a podcast and Apple would see that as a 47 yr-old male... and in addition to the Barbie Dream House Podcast, the same person like No Agenda, The Dividing Line (a Christian apologetics podcast) and This American Life (my wife). (i.e.: not really all that meaningful anymore, and actually deceptive from a marketing standpoint.)

Im not an expert, nor make a living podcasting, nor an engineer. But I was just speculating that people are thinking it's possible for Apple to lead the way in Podcasting 2.0, in progressing analytics and control just as they are in apps and web. For example, even though you're right about the app pulling the audio file from other web servers, the app itself is logging its own meta-data (user id, location data) and could be programmed to log more data (eg user behavior). Such data could be captured in app, and on Apple's servers, even though the audio file is coming from elsewhere.

Also, currently listeners can skip adds easier than video (30s skip button). This is no Bueno for advertisers. Maybe Apple could lock ads via app.

And even if you and hypothetical daughter share the same podcast app, that's an anomaly accounted for in these kinds of analytics/ statistics (just like television/web/ad tracking).

I'm just speculating on possibilities, though. I'm on the side of "this is not likely and not appealing." But who knows what was discussed.

An interesting read: https://marco.org/2016/05/07/apple-role-in-podcasting

 

[daniel1948]

... currently listeners can skip adds easier than video (30s skip button). This is no Bueno for advertisers. Maybe Apple could lock ads via app. ...

Yes, Apple could create an app that prevents the skipping of ads. And nobody would use that app. I would certainly refuse to use an app that did that.

Yes, it's a problem for podcasters, just as ad blockers in web browsers are a problem for web sites. But there is a solution: make ads that people enjoy listening to. I've mentioned before that one of my favorite podcasts makes its ads fun, while another makes them obnoxious, even though they sometimes advertise the same products.

One of the best things about podcasting is precisely that it's not dominated by a central serving institution. Podcasters don't need a government license, like over-the-air broadcasters; they don't need to convince a cable or satellite company to carry their shows; and if you have the technical savvy, which is not that hard to learn if you have a mind to, it's relatively cheap and easy to produce and distribute a podcast. The last thing we need or want is a gate-keeper for podcasting.

Apple has made the right choice in limiting itself to offering a listing service, and keeping its built-in iOS Podcast app so worthless that many (most?) listeners will look elsewhere for their podcast apps, thereby keeping the field of apps diverse. The less centralized the medium is, the more democratic it is.

 

[manu chao]

Most search engines recognize that the word horseman also contains the string horse

Which Apple's search also does.

And, obviously, you'd prioritize the title over the description, unless you give the user the ability to refine the search.

And you know that Apple doesn't?

No, not expecting miracles at all... just search technology a bit better than the initial days of the Internet or what's built into my text editor. And, yes, Google actually can do much of this. While I'm not a big fan of much of what Google is up to, they do have very good search algorithms.

Well, no. Type 'horse' and 'podcast' into Google and it will not find the 'horseman podcast' as one of the first picks unless the 'horseman podcast' is vastly more popular than other podcasts with 'horse' in their name. And as I said before this only works because Google reads blogs, articles, tweets and so on and can thus determine how valued a podcast is. Apple only has a tiny fraction of such data (via reviews people leave on their site).

If Google is so much better, could you provide some real-life podcast searches that Google finds but Apple doesn't?

 

[santaliqueur]

Correct!

And there were MP3 players before the iPod expanded the industry, and personal computers before the Apple II exploded the category.. and tablets before.... and Handspring shipped a smartphone before....

I feel Apple critics like to say "You know Apple didn't invent MP3 players, or the smartphone, or the tablet..." When nobody claimed they did.

Yes, we all know Apple wasn't first to market with any of these things (except a full touchscreen smartphone). I don't want Apple to rush to be first in every market. As I type this with my Apple Watch on my wrist, I wish they hadn't released it so soon. It's not a finished product.

 

[SteveW928]

But I was just speculating that people are thinking it's possible for Apple to lead the way in Podcasting 2.0, in progressing analytics and control just as they are in apps and web. For example, even though you're right about the app pulling the audio file from other web servers, the app itself is logging its own meta-data (user id, location data) and could be programmed to log more data (eg user behavior). Such data could be captured in app, and on Apple's servers, even though the audio file is coming from elsewhere.

Also, currently listeners can skip adds easier than video (30s skip button). This is no Bueno for advertisers. Maybe Apple could lock ads via app.

And even if you and hypothetical daughter share the same podcast app, that's an anomaly accounted for in these kinds of analytics/ statistics (just like television/web/ad tracking).

I hear what you're saying, but we just don't need a Podcasting 2.0, at least not in this way. Due to Apple's huge size in terms of iTunes being a podcast directory, they have a lot of influence for better or worse. While they can't control it, they could damage it if they made the wrong decision (i.e.: what these 'podcasters' seem to be wanting).

As others have said, if Apple did that (to the app), a lot of people would just switch to some other app. And, I'm not sure how they could tell me from my hypothetical daughter, aside from other apps we might have installed (which would require a lot of analytics and guessing). We both use the same Apple ID.

The fact of the matter is that we're just not in the old traditional advertising model anymore with new media. It's taking the big dinosaurs a long time to figure this out, and this power-play attempt on their part is part of the death-pangs.

Paul Collegian put it really well in a session in the recent (actually ongoing) Podcast Success Summit:

"If I gave a podcast away for free, most people will walk away going, 'thanks.' But, some will buy my product, and do these things, and that kind of stuff. Exactly it! ... I love my Casper mattress, I love my domains from Go-Daddy, I love my Audible books, but the thing is ... if I listen to a show, I have some debt to the person I'm listening to. If I listen to an ad, subconsciously in my brain, oop, they got the ad money, there's my debt, debt paid, we're done. If it's pure service, the debt comes later. ... This is the model, don't treat it like old media. Treat it like new media. If you think you're in this game to sell ads and make a bunch of money, you're in the wrong game."

Well, no. Type 'horse' and 'podcast' into Google and it will not find the 'horseman podcast' as one of the first picks unless the 'horseman podcast' is vastly more popular than other podcasts with 'horse' in their name. And as I said before this only works because Google reads blogs, articles, tweets and so on and can thus determine how valued a podcast is. Apple only has a tiny fraction of such data (via reviews people leave on their site).

Ahh, yea, 'one of the first picks' is a whole different story with Google, which has a *LOT* more sophistication than Apple's search... like orders of magnitude more! But, yes, the Google search engine *would* find it, and it would be displayed somewhere in the list. While a search engine that doesn't realize 'horse' is contained within the word 'horseman' would not.

And, maybe Apple's search would now find 'horse' in 'horseman'.... that was just an example of the level of capability of a search. Apple has traditionally been bad, both at indexing, what they index, and the capability of the search. That's something Google has been really good at (despite all their other shortcomings).

What I was saying, is that Apple's search in the App Store and Podcast area (at least in the past) have been so bad that one could almost perfectly type *the name* of the podcast and still not find it. That would almost never happen with a good search engine. When we're talking about stuff like judging quality and finding associated content, that's a whole other level, which I don't think Apple has even attempted yet.