Todd Cochrane and Rob Greenlee examine why YouTube's podcast section shows only a handful of shows, arguing the platform acts as kingmaker while most creators see minimal visibility. They discuss video-first alternatives like StreamYard and Rumble, and note that monetization on YouTube requires watch-time thresholds most podcasters never reach.
Chapters
Welcome to the New Media Show.
We're back doing the New Media Show again.
People are actually going to listen to this junk.
We do it live.
We're live right now. We'll just do it live. We're going live. We're doing live.
We just can't get enough. The New Media Show.
Let's go. Just do it live. We're doing live. We're doing live. Bada bing, bada boom.
The New Media Show. We do it live. Just do it live. We're doing live. We're doing live. The New Media Show. I'm like Adam Curry and you're more like John C. De Vorak.
I think I am Adam Curry and you're the old curmudgeon.
We do it live. Doing the New Media Show again.
The New Media Show. Technology. We make it sound so special. And we were talked about, Rob. They didn't like our other intro music.
Yeah, I'm not sure I'm entirely surprised, Todd.
You know, they didn't like the AI monotone, no emotion.
Right.
Oh my God, you can't make it.
I think it's time to just do it like we've always done it, Todd. Right.
You can't make anyone happy. Meanwhile, Rob, I am going to highly recommend that you buy a Heil, H-E-I-L, Heil microphone holder because as we're getting ready to go to live today, yours broke. How many?
My SM7B just kind of fell in my hand.
We're saying this looks loose and it just kind of just like fell apart. So that's an OC White. How many years did it last?
I bought this, this boom stand back in probably 2000.
Oh, so 20, 24 years. 24 years. Pretty good.
So almost as long as I've been a podcaster.
How many times have you replaced the springs on it?
Uh, never.
See, I had one and maybe Mike was a much heavier but it would just sag on me and I was replacing springs every year. And I bought a, I bought a Heil. I still say this is the best boom arm known to man. It's— I, I've had mine for 20 years too. So of course I'm looking to see, I got a little rust on there. Mine will be the one to fall apart next. But anyway, so you are now having to revert in an emergency. I may have an OC White around here. I'll look around because I don't throw anything away. Matter of fact, I know I, I bet I have two of them. If I can find one—
I haven't actually— you know what, Todd, I think I have another one in a box over here.
So if you don't, let me know. I'll send you the one I've got in the closet over here. So, you know, because I used to own three of them.
So, so, plus, if you go and try and buy one of these OC White Boom arms now, they're, they're like $250 or something.
Yeah, I think they were like $60 or $70 before, and I thought I was going out on a stretch.
Of course, you know, the boom back in 2000, they were like $79 or $80. That was a long time ago.
The, the, uh, the boom arms that I probably should put up here is the fancy one that we— because we took all the Blueberry equipment and distributed it, and we had very, very, very nice boom arms that were very, very expensive that got no use. So anyway, anyway, boom arm or not, you are using a mic stand, so don't bump the table too hard.
Yeah, actually, I don't mind this. Actually, it's actually nice to have the full frame around me up here and then just the mic is down here.
So, okay. Well, I will say We— this has been a week for me where I have been— what's the word I want to say? Tweaking. And not from a— not a drug-induced tweak or dancing, twerking, nothing like that. But it's been one of those weeks where I just had been nitpicking every little thing. And I tell you, I talked to Dave over at Mac Geek Gab, and I blamed him. Him and I had a meeting today, and I blamed him for costing me money. And for years, everything's been the status quo here. I haven't touched really infrastructure since 2019. Same thing at my loft. And now in my loft, my speeds, my internet speeds are getting better. And I have two connections there. And anyway, I'm running some very, very old routers. And he was talking on his show about this, this product from UniFi. And, you know, I don't know about you, but it seems to me about every 3 to 4 years, the cable modem— not the cable modem, the router that attaches to the cable modem It seems like those things just, just, you know, start causing you problems and gives you the middle finger. And I'm just like, it's not started to happen here yet, but it definitely is happening at the house. So I kind of did the plunge and bought some Unify gear. Oh my God. Hurt my wallet just a little bit. And so lo and behold, unbeknownst to me, I get a call from my, uh, my tolerated cable provider here, Spectrum, and they said, hey, we got a deal for you. And I'm like, really? What's the deal? How much more money you want out, you know, having a business line? And, uh, hey, you can go to 1 gig. I said, 1 gig symmetrical? Oh no, that's coming, but we can get you 1 gig and 35 up. I said, well, how much more is that going to cost me? Another $300 or something? And he says, well, he says it's $50 more a month. I said, ain't worth it. I said, I'm not doing it. I said, most of the country can get 1 gig symmetrical in markets for $50 or $60. I said, I don't need it. Well, let me, let me talk to my supervisor. So I go talk to the car salesman. He got it down.
Oh, what's the latency on it is the bigger question.
Well, he got it down to 30. So tomorrow I'll have 1 gig.
Oh, $30?
$30 more than what I'm paying currently.
Oh, got it.
Which, you know, do I need it? I need the up speed more, right? And I said to him, I said, so when is this 1 gigabit symmetrical going to happen? 1 gig down. I said, I don't care about the down. I got enough down. I need the up. And he said, sometime this year. I'm like, how much more is that going to cost? He said, it's going to be free. We're just going to turn it on. I'm like, huh, hmm, $30, maybe 1 gig symmetrical. Uh, the geek in me, okay.
Yeah, but is that like a year in the future?
No, yeah, exactly, you know, or is it, you know, 18 months? And, uh, so anyway, the guy comes tomorrow, replace the modem. So then I'm thinking, yeah, I wired this place for on Cat6. Uh, thinking someday I would have more speed, and I have 1 gig switches on everything. I'm thinking, now I start— my fingers start twitching because of this, buying this UniFi gear for the house, which is totally overkill. I'm thinking, do I take this stuff I bought for the house and bring it in here? And do I take the stuff I have here and take it home? And where's the trade? And so anyway, thanks Dave over at Geek Gab Weekly. Uh, you know, all said and done, I'm, you know, gonna be out probably two big ones, uh, you know, to do all these upgrades, which, you know, probably are not needed, but what geeks do, right? We, we upgrade stuff. But it's been a while since I invested in, uh, Backbone here, and maybe, maybe time. So hey Dave, uh, in chat— this is not the same Dave, different Dave— but, uh, anyway, happy podcasting. Welcome to New Media Show. So yeah, tweaking has been the thing and it's like spring cleaning, you know, it's April. So, you know, if you're a podcaster, I think it's a good time to do some housekeeping. And what does that mean? Means upgrade, you know, look at your show flow. It's a good opportunity to tweak. And by the way, we are live, lit and live. So if anybody's streaming the show on one of those bang-bang new podcast apps at podcastapps.com, please do it. And no, no, I will not impact you anymore. It was Adam. He was complaining about our pot on fire. Yeah, he was complaining about fire and complaining about the fire.
So Mr. Curry, is that who that— who Adam is?
Yeah, yeah, yeah. Adam was complaining about that. So anyway, um, here we go.
Would you say he's, he's fairly anti-AI, or is it just that the music was bad?
No, he thought the music was bad, and he's kind of anti-AI for general purpose. I think, you know, he's been pretty, uh, you know, for targeted solutions like we did, I think he's, you know, I don't know, I think jury's out. I think He's okay with it. But, um, and I've had to really tell the team, you know, to, to be honest with you, been a few things that have come across my desk lately. I said, nah, that, that one, we're going to throw that one away. You know, that, that, that didn't have enough human editing in it. And it sounded too, you know, in conclusion. You know, it sounded like, you know, we've been trying to be very, very careful and not to, you know, in product that we're putting out and pages and websites and stuff like that. But I did do something unique the other day. I had a little fun, but I won't talk about it on the show because I don't want to turn this into an AI show again today.
So, I mean, Are there any topics that are top of mind with you in the industry right now? I've got a couple that I wanted to mention and kind of explore a little bit that have come up in the last couple days, especially on Twitter. I don't know if you've been—
uh, I, I saw your little— I saw your little spat. Um, let's—
I will say, is it a spat or is it just a kind of calling out an obvious thing?
Well, it's, it's interesting, but I will say this: we did launch just a little toot toot of our own horn here. Um, we did launch a 50% discount for students. So if you have a college student that's looking to start a podcast, 50% off for a year. All you gotta do is validate you're, you're a student and we'll give you a discount over at Blueberry now. So anyway, no one covered that news. We sent that information out and, you know, no one covered it. Wasn't in— I, I don't know what happened.
Uh, how dare you, James Cridland!
How? So I don't know why it didn't happen in pod news, but I guess it was, you know, not worthy of mention.
I have a feeling that context of James is going to continue to come up on the episode today.
So, well, it looked to me like, you know, you, you step, Rob, you know, when you're going to step into a pile of dew Do, do make sure you put on your waders because it looked—
I did.
You did. You stepped into it. So do share your observation.
Well, it's one of those things that's been going on for a couple of years now between Pod News and the upcoming kind of community slash kind of, as Brian Barletta says, it's a trade organization. Right, um, is, is what he— and Brian's contention is, is that Sounds Profitable is not competitive to PodNews, um, and it isn't a competitive thing, which I don't agree with. But he seems to think that it's something different than what PodNews is doing. And there are elements that are different, I would say. But really, this whole conversation, this primarily happened on, on X, Twitter, and was Tom Webster posted a post about his, his keynote that he gave at Podcast Movement Evolutions just here recently and made a little comment in the Twitter thread saying, if you weren't at PME this year, here's the keynote PodNews didn't want you to know about. So Tom kind of opened the Pandora's box on that one. Um, And, and I just posed a couple of questions after that and kind of wondered if, if, you know, Sounds Profitable had mentioned James Cridland's keynote.
Oh, right.
I mean, it's an obvious question, right? And so I guess they had not.
Oh.
So you have this kind of situation, and I was pretty clear in my comments back and forth about it being, you know, these two communities, whatever you want to say, news sources for podcasting industry have their constituents. There's a lot of crossover between people that follow PodNews and people that follow Sounds Profitable. I think that's obvious for everyone to see. So, you know, to think that somehow they're not competitive with each other is maybe a little—
I don't think Sounds Profitable is a news— there is news about their members. I, you know, we don't get mentioned in Sounds Profitable because we're currently not a, a member of Sounds Profitable. So I don't expect to be covered in Sounds Profitable's newsletters because, you know, they're talking about their industry topics and generally about their members, which is which is fine. Um, so I don't think I would have personally necessarily expected, um, both to be talking about each other. I, I—
yeah, and I made that clear in here too. But I think what, what went over the line was I think Tom's mentioned that somehow James, um, was kind of wrong for not listing his because what had happened is, is Podcast Movement has published most of their keynotes, which is really the first time that they've ever really done that onto YouTube. So I believe there were 6 keynotes that were posted.
Sounds like, sounds, sounds like they need my vid2pod project to make it available as a podcast. Yeah, right.
And, and so anyway, I guess when James posted all of the keynotes, which he actually listed all in Pod News. He only listed 5 out of the 6. And so, oh, I guess, you know, it makes sense. But for Tom to object to that, I asked him if they had run in their newsletter all the keynotes either. And as it, as it turns out, they had not run any of the keynotes. But then subsequent on Monday, they ran primarily Tom's mention of his keynote. So, so, so that's why it was a little bit of a back and forth around, you know, and I fully acknowledged in the thread stream that I, I think it's fair that both of them don't cover each other. I think that's perfectly, you know, acceptable. But I don't see either— I don't see James upset at Sounds Profitable for not running his keynote, but Tom was being upset at James for not running his. So it was a little bit of a, you know, trying to throw somebody under the bus when I don't think it was really the right thing to do. I mean, Tom doesn't think that he was throwing James under the bus, but I think clearly if you read that tweet, it definitely—
I missed the tweet.
And I, you know, to be honest with you, I just read it to you.
I attended two keynotes. What two keynotes did I attend? Well, actually, yeah, it's a YouTube thing considered a keynote. Um, I attended three. I attended, uh, I attended James's keynote, uh, Tom's, and the YouTube Nothing Burger. So, you know, I— those are the only three that I had time and specifically went and listened to. And I did go to a couple of sessions because I was expecting fireworks at a couple that turned out to be No fireworks at all, which was, you know, first. But, um, well, you know, I'm not going to get into the politics of why one company does over what another company does, you know. And, uh, it's, um, it is, it is what it is.
I know some of you hate that phrase, but, uh, well, it kind of raised Another issue is, you know, Tom wrote back and said that, you know, that the community needs to support Sounds Profitable. And because kind of my bigger objective was this is kind of not good for the podcast industry as a whole to have these different communities kind of, you know, and bashing each other or playing this from an unfair perspective.
And, you know, forgive me if I'm wrong, Tom, but, you know, my— and I've talked to Tom about Sounds Profitable and, you know, we've We've been, you know, had conversations about whether we should be in a group. We are not advertising focused, right, at Blueberry. And that is, you know, that is a big, big, big, big part of Sounds Profitable's sound profitable, um, business model is that they are largely, um, you know, on the advertising side. And in regards to it being a trade association, you know, that that's what they want to become or angling towards, that's fine too. But in my opinion, there's more to the podcasting space than advertising.
Right. So this kind of raises, I think, Todd, a very important distinction here. And I think that's, that's maybe part of a little bit of where this is coming from, at least with me, is is this, this assumption that, that like it sounds profitable as an organization or as Tom referenced, the Podcast Academy is somehow representative of two organizations that the whole industry needs to rally around. Right. And be center for, for this medium. I'm not sure that it encapsulates the whole, whole medium or is even welcoming to the whole media.
Podcast Academy is doing nothing. For podcasters that don't have $250 to submit to an award show, right? Well, I mean, to me, I'm, I'm in the group and I probably will not pay my dues again over at the Podcast Academy. I, I'm really thinking about not continuing because they never did what they said they were going to do. You know, they have mentorship They have promotion of certain shows and they have the awards. What else are they doing? And to me, the average podcaster, it gets no value, no value for the Podcast Academy. And now it's their big event of the year is an award show. And yes, they, they did recognize some independent content creators. This time around. But again, I, you know, what news are they making that helps podcasters?
So, well, and Todd, to add another layer to that, uh, I heard many people comment at— I mean, I wasn't at Podcast Movement, but I, I, I heard on the live show I did from people from the event telling me that They were amazed at how many people were at the Ambies Awards that were not part of Podcast Movement or that anybody in the community that was attending Podcast Movement were even aware of.
Yeah, there was like, there was like maybe 5%, right? They all came in for the evening and left.
Yeah, that's indicative of kind of what I'm trying to say here about these niche groups that are in the podcasting space. They are not representative groups of the broader, um, kind of community of podcasts. They are subgroups amongst the community of podcasts, but I wouldn't point everybody to the Podcast Academy and Sounds Profitable as the foundation of the medium.
As, as a, as a business, there is definitely You know, as a company, as running a company, there is definitely, um, some to, you know, and maybe more, maybe more than less, and, uh, benefit of, of being a member of Sounds Profitable, you know, um, for sure. But it's—
yeah, no, I mean, there's benefits that are out there for being a part of all these organizations if, if you happen to align with those benefits, you know.
And I look at the amount of money that I have to send IAB and the amount of money that I have to send to renew my certification every year, um, that, that's, that's a, that's a big number. You know, that's probably just under $20,000 a year. So, and I won't get into what it costs to be a member of Sounds Profitable. That's probably publicly available on their website. I'm not going to quote that, but you add that another amount. And, you know, at some point you have to say, okay, where's— where am I going to get this much of value? You know, I have— I have to get— I have to be certified at this point. I have to be as a business, you know, until something changes. I have to, you know, I have to pay that every year to get that recertification. Then if I pay another membership, another membership, there's a lot of— we have a— there's another trade organization that's starting for producers. And if I add that, so, you know, how again, I have to, I have to go back and say, okay, if I spend X number of dollars, is that those relationships, is those— is that value going to increase my bottom line. And right now, we, again, we're not advertising focused and our third parties are, you know, our partner is, you know, so they, they, they're members over there as I would expect them to be. And someone I'm getting ready to do a partnership with, they're not. So, you know, it's there's a whole plethora of things here. And again, I— what they're doing over there is great. I have no— nothing negative whatsoever to say about—
about actually what they're doing.
But even this show and the audience that we reach, me and then 99% of podcasters don't have a clue who Todd and Rob is and probably could care less. They don't know who the New Media Show is. They don't follow any of this stuff. This is where I keep going back and telling people 50% of podcasters don't care a iota about making a single penny on their show. They're not, they're not, they're not worried. And those that are are looking at multitudes of ways of making money for their shows. So, um, it's not all—
yeah, in my comment back to, to Tom on this thread about this whole thing of a trade organization, and, and Tom just pointing to the Podcast Academy and Sounds profitable as the, as the industry kind of focus of a, like a trade organization or an association of sorts, is that it's leaving off the table other organizations that are active out there too. I don't know if you saw the announcement of the Podcast Professionals Association.
Yeah, that's what I was referring to.
Right, right. They're ramping up, you know, Tracy and whatever, trying to ramp up that. And, and then there's, you know, Pod News is, is a 30,000-member community out there that's aggregating attention. So, you know, there's other groups out there that are having an impact that are broader than just those two groups, which cater to a very niche part of the podcast industry.
Right. You know, my job is to help podcasters grow their show. That's, that's my, that's my mission, give them the tools and services they need to grow their show. In whatever way they want and connect them with whatever methods of if they need to make money or not, you know. And, um, so for me, we, yeah, we could have a trade association, a podcast hosting company. Well, you know, that we could—
well, to some degree there is a little bit of formation. Yeah, they got the PSP with the Podcast Standards Project. So, you know, Sam Sethi is now kind of the spokesperson for it. Right.
So, you know, and again, I think there's so many dichotomies of populations of podcasters. Right.
And that's, you know, that's kind of my bigger point here is that, you know, if I think back to, you know, the entire time span of this medium, there's always been different groups in the medium that have had an interest in a certain aspect of it. But I don't think that we've ever had, well, hey, by the way, by the way, one group that everybody can point to and say, this is the group that you have to join if you're doing podcasting.
Gee, if only Tom was a listener and could be asked about this. But hey, great show. You want to come on, Tom? I'll fire it up so you can come on. We can make this happen. If you've got Skype, Tom, GNC Pod 2. We'll leave it open, see if Tom comes in. You know, again, I think every organization has value for that audience of which it's a member of. But again, I'm—
And it's perfectly fine if they all compete with each other.
You have definitely put your waders on today, Rob. So, you know, you definitely stepped in the doo-doo a little bit.
I don't think so. I think I'm calling out what is plainly there.
I didn't see it. So I wasn't, you know, and how many people actually saw that?
Well, probably not that many.
Right. You know, and here you are.
But I think it—
You're stirring the pot today, not me.
Well, it's, it's because I think it's an important topic to talk about in the industry around the different subgroups and the different interest groups that exist in this medium. And I think we have yet to have like one overriding like association.
There will never be. There'll never be, right? There's too many different groups.
But yet we've seen all that happen in, in other media types, right? Like television and in radio, and, and those have had—
no, you've got, you've got the NAB. Well, but you, what you have is, yeah, you've got the NAB, but which is the overriding group for the broadcasting industry.
Podcasting doesn't have that.
Yeah, I— the NAB doesn't really facilitate that much for the broadcaster, the person on the mic. Do they? They're mostly about the industry, the radio stations. So they have a segment of people. So they don't cover everybody. So there's no way to lump everybody into one pot.
Yeah. And I think that also is an important component here too, I guess, is that there are subgroups and these groups pop up that cater to a particular interest area. And that's the direction that we go. There's been this constant conversation around having a, you know, a standards body for podcasting. So that's kind of what we're seeing bubble up here is we've seen separate groups form that are taking on specific tasks or roles in the industry to go after these, these needs that are out there. And that's— I mean, certainly sounds profitable, takes care of a certain need in the industry around monetization and advertising and and those kind of strategy conversations that, you know, are helpful to companies and, and podcasters, right? And then there's the Podcast Academy, which has the awards stuff. And then now there's PSP, which is taking care of the RSS syndication.
But, but you got people that are podcast hosts that want nothing to do with PSP that you think—
think that— I don't think there's a lot of reasons for a podcast talent to be involved in the—
no, no, no. You have a podcast hosting company wants nothing to do with PSP because they think unless Apple does it, it's not worth doing it.
So, you know, I think that's, that's going to change. I, I don't see long-term podcast hosts wanting to be removed from that discussion, uh, for very long. It's clear that Podcasting 2.0 has legs now. And that the industry is starting to take it seriously.
Well, you know, um, good. But we, you know, we knew it was going to take a while, and the PSP is by far this, you know, super organized group. You know, we meet like once a year or something, you know, and kind of agree on some things we're going to do. And, you know, this thing with SAM is, you know, the next step. You know, folks have laid out money to build the website, you know, so, you know, there's Again, it's under— industries do not run on, uh, organizations, trade organizations. Any organization has to have cash. And, you know, and that's always the challenge. And I don't— and again, and I— again, it's a, it's a strategic decision on my part on who we give our money to, what value it's going to bring to the company. And sometimes you have to be there. It's just like going to Podcast Movement in August. We have to be there. We have to be there and wave the flag and say, hey, we're still in business, we're still here. But I maybe don't need to go to Evolutions. You know, maybe I just need to go to Podcast. Maybe I just need to go to the podcast show. Maybe, you know, maybe I do 3 podcasting events a year and that's it. And then focus on other events that we've been investigating that, believe me, attending most of the podcast, uh, events are a lot cheaper than a lot of the other shows that are out there in the creator space. Um, you know, one, one, one event we talked to, a minimum 10 by 20 booth, $12,000 for just for the booth. And, you know, and that probably covers my whole bill for, um, Podcast— Podfest or Podcast Evolutions, including hotels, travel, you know. So if you're just talking $12,000 for a booth and, you know, that in a high-cost area, etc., etc., etc. So it's just like events that we go to. We have to be careful. And again, I think they all bring value. Mm-hmm. You know, but at the same time, my head's down. We're busy.
There's clearly far less events going on these days.
But, but it's not just events, it's business is hard right now. It is very, very hard, you know. And, uh, in getting information out about what you have available is hard. Uh, right. So unless you're spending $100,000 in AdWords every month, uh, which 2 or 3 companies are spending, you know, gobs of money to get a, you know, a $20 a month hosting customers.
You know, I don't see it getting any better anytime soon.
No, no, no, no, no, no.
I mean, I mean, I think we're talking multiple years before things improve, and I don't even know if it's going to improve at that point. So it just depends a lot. You know, I think that the podcasting market is in a transition right now, and I think it's, it's soft. There's no question the companies are not investing money. If anything, they're pulling back and cutting expenses. And I don't know. I mean, Todd, what are you seeing in the market? Is there any kind of a glimmer of kind of, I hate to use the word hope here, but—
2024 is going to continue to be flat.
Yeah. Yeah, I tend to have that gut feeling too.
So we'll see, you know, see what happens. Um, you know, I look at the, you know, are we in the black or are we in the red? And, uh, you know, where does that line draw? And, uh, yeah, you know, and, you know, the quick look is, let's look how much is in the checking account. You know, I hate to say it's kind of like that, but it is kind of like that.
There's a lot of restructuring with companies, um, are going on now, you know. I mean, it's— people are shuffling the, the deck on the boat, you know, the chairs on the deck of a boat, you know. It's, it's definitely a transition time.
Well, I think what it is is that the listening audience obviously hasn't went anywhere. They're here, they're here, they're here, right?
It's still growing, and it's— it is remarkable that we've reached 95% awareness of what a podcast is and the population.
Sustained superior content will always win the day, no matter what. The cream will always rise to the top, and there'll always be room for anyone that has an idea, has a message, has a story, has a passion. We're here, and the doors and lights is on for you. Not left on, is on for you. And I think it's, uh, it continues to be an incredible time to be a podcaster. We are closely watching some of the stuff in our statistics on what shows are doing, and shows are, are doing very well right now from a, from a growth standpoint. Those that are consistent, putting on a show every week, they're doing it the bare minimum, the stuff that they need to do to promote their podcast, that they're, they're growing. And I see very few shows on a this, you know, a downward slope. Most of the shows are, you know, they're, they're up. They may not be straight up, but they're, they're up, right? You know, I look at my personal show, I look at the Geek News Central. I, I'm actually kind of surprised. I've seen growth. That show's been flat for years, maintaining, but I'm actually seeing, you know, peaks of interest. Um, and I don't know, let me— I haven't been in our stats in a long time. I just don't look. I should, but I don't. Um, what's going on here? Oh, I was pushing— screen was jumping all over the place. And let me, let me look. Uh, show. I gotta go in there. Let's see the, see the big number. You know, even this show, let's look at the past 90 days. What's it been doing the past 90? Yeah, even this show is, is gradually up, not dramatically, but it's, you know, that we're picking up listeners. Um, you know, some shows peak more than others.
Sure.
Um, so Yeah, and it's the same thing.
It's the same thing I see in my YouTube stats for the show too. It's some episodes like, like I think, um, an episode that we did just on my account, just with my version of this show, um, I think picked up 4,000 views like about a month and a half ago.
Again, you're talking about YouTube, so YouTube only.
That's just YouTube, right?
Yeah, I don't get anywhere that near number. Whatever your magic is you're doing over there. You paying people to play that button or something?
No, I'm just creating thumbnail artwork that's unique for each episode.
Well, I've been doing that here as well, so I guess I don't have magic touch.
But it doesn't sell the episode, Todd. It doesn't sell the episode because you're not putting text on it. You're just doing an AI image.
Yeah, yeah, yeah. I don't have time for the rest of that. Well.
It's, it's, it's looking at what works and what doesn't work.
Well, obviously what I'm doing doesn't work.
Well, I mean, you have to look at what is working on, on, on YouTube if you want to expect to succeed over there.
But I'm not a YouTuber, so that's part of it.
So yeah, but is that because you're not trying to become a YouTuber or— I mean, you see what I'm saying?
It's a— yeah, but we're talking to podcasters. We're not talking to YouTubers.
So yeah, but we're on YouTube right now.
I know, but we're talking to podcasters. 99% of this audience is listening to this show.
Why can't we talk to YouTube too, Todd? I don't understand.
We can, but you know, they don't subscribe. Make them, make them subscribe.
No, they do. I've got one episode of the show that was watched 4,000 times on YouTube. Did you tell them to come over and subscribe to the podcast?
Probably not. You'd probably tell them to like and subscribe.
Well, no, Todd, I'm publishing this show. So what we need to do is tell people in this show to go over and subscribe to our podcast.
Okay, there you go. So those of you watching on YouTube, come over to newmedishow.com and follow the podcast.
You thought that I should go in and add content to our show?
No, but I guess we got to tell the YouTubers to come over. We got to, you know.
Yeah, we do. It's part of accommodating all of the listening platforms that we have to the show, like even X, right? I mean, we're here on X as well. I'm assuming so.
Yeah.
So, you know, speaking to that audience is a little bit different too. So that's kind of the transition I'm trying to make, Todd, with my work and what I'm doing for StreamYard and whatever is trying to think holistically about this ecosystem of content creation and being a content creator that's creating content for all of these platforms as best as I can and trying to optimize those experiences to find out, well, what works and what doesn't work. And it even means creating short content, Shorts, from this stuff, um, which I could do with some of our past episodes that were run through StreamYard.
Yeah.
Um, so I could do Shorts, and I've done a few.
We'll have that. I have that capability at Blueberry soon. So be able to do that.
Yeah. And if, yeah. Yeah. Are you creating any kind of, yeah, I thought that you were creating, um, we're creating episode art.
Uh, yeah, we are.
Yeah. So just create a separate prompt in there to generate a thumbnail for YouTube art.
I do.
Oh, for YouTube art?
Yeah. But I, I'm not in my AI. I do that separately. Okay, but the YouTube art I get, I'm never happy with. So, you know, the last— my last podcast episode wasn't too bad. I was talking about the American Privacy Right Act that's trying to get through Congress, and they put a whole bunch of text on the thing. It's half of it spelled wrong. So, you know, that's, that's part of the challenge too.
Yeah, StreamYard just added a new feature in the platform. That, that allows you to create your thumbnail art for YouTube, or, or the wide format art.
Yeah, yeah, yeah.
Um, and doing it in the tool using the graphics and the images from the show. Um, so it's usually very simple art. It basically would be like both of our pictures superimposed on it with big bold letters and text across the image itself, and that sells the episode. And that—
I guess I don't watch YouTube. I guess I don't watch YouTube that way. I don't look at art. I look at the title of the episode.
Well, Todd, it's no different than podcasting.
But if I'm doing that on— when I look at the art only on YouTube, it's always clickbait. Makes me feel clickbait. Let me read the title, and usually that's clickbait too.
So, well, certainly some of it is. Yeah, I agree with you.
Majority of it.
Well, I think increasingly what we're going to see happen is episode-level art for podcasts are going to be more and more like what you see on YouTube. So I think that's, that's the ultimate direction of that is that the episode-level art is going to be more sell, sell, sell, sell what the, what the episode is about. It's the same thing with the importance of your episode titles is that it's got to have important keywords that sell the episode. It can't just be episode 203.
You know, you look at the art that I've been coming up with for this show.
Yeah, but that's not really selling the content of the show though, is the problem.
Well, again, I'm not a— again, I think a lot of that's clickbaity. That to me does not interest me to listen to an episode when it looks clickbaity. So if someone can figure out how to make it so it's not clickbaity, then—
We'll talk. Clickbait, I think what we have to do is get really clear on what you mean by clickbait because clickbait is some sort of a falsification of the content that's enclosed in the content.
It's a, most of the stuff is, oh, we drove off a cliff. Well, yeah, they drove down a little hill or whatever it may be. So.
So it's an exaggeration is what you're saying.
Yeah, it's exaggeration, or it gives me anxiousness to want to, to see what happened.
Well, I think the goal of thumbnail art on, on YouTube is to get people's attention, obviously.
Yeah.
Well, what are key, key things, simple messages you can make visually to people to entice them to click to watch your video?
The response I've got, the response I've gotten recently is the newsletter I used to send out. It was boring and bland. And the newsletter I send out now on every episode is actually got people reading it because it's actual true substance of what is in the content without having to be flamboyant and say I drove off a cliff.
So yeah, I don't think you have to do that, Todd, but I also see a lot of thumbnails that are created that do a much better job of selling an aspect of the content that is enticing enough.
You have to have— listen, you have to have some expertise in being able to do that.
That is, that is not all going to be a skill that you develop based on practice and seeing what other people are doing that is working.
Yeah, well, I, I'm not a big fan. Again, unless, unless AI is creating, I can only draw stick figures.
So, well, there's entire, uh, whole YouTube videos out there talking just about how to create.
Oh, I, oh, I, I understand it, and that's— I don't have— but the thing is, how long do you spend putting that together? How much time do you spend putting together that art?
Well, that's why StreamYard built this tool.
Well, before that, and not everyone uses StreamYard, if you're going to—
that hard—
if you're live streaming and not using StreamYard, how long does it take you, and what You gotta have Photoshop. And I thought, I can't—
I mean, I can't just give you a fix.
Does it take you 20 minutes, 30 minutes? Uh, how long does it take to come up with your art?
I think it depends on how you create the art, how long it takes. Because I mean, Todd, I'm being totally— but I'm being totally truthful here. Just go to Canva. Canva has all those templates.
I understand that, but the majority—
modify it and save it.
The majority of podcasters don't have time Yeah, Todd.
Yeah, they do.
They don't. So they don't. They don't. They tell me they don't. They don't.
They don't have time to create, um, episode level.
They haven't had time to create good show notes. They don't have time to create chapters. They don't have time to create episodes. They have lives. They have wives. They have girlfriends and boyfriends. They don't have time. This is why we did what we did. To give them some of the time back. Is it perfect? No. Does it improve the product output? Yes. Will it get better over time? Sure. But majority of podcasters barely have enough time to record their episode, write a title and one paragraph for their episode and publish.
Okay. So that's a pretty low bar of— that's Aspiration, though.
Okay. I have looked at thousands and thousands.
I'm not, I'm not, I'm not really disputing you. I know there are podcasters out there that think about this like that, but I'm also saying that, that there's many podcasters that currently use Canva right now.
Sure.
And they will use Canva to generate episode-level art, square episode-level art for their podcast. I believe that, but I bet all they have to do is change the setting of Canva to make it widescreen. Use the same layout or the same content and just save it as a widescreen version of their episode.
If they can afford Canva in these tight times, many people use Canva. I understand, but a majority of podcasters, a large number, again, it takes time. Do you have time to do this? Most podcasters don't have time. You're probably talking 5% I will have to start looking at the, at the episode art for shows and get— don't look at the top 100 because they have staffs, they have teams. Go deeper in the stack and start looking at how many people are doing episode art, and I think you'll be shocked to find it's not that many because they just—
the question isn't, isn't to cater to the lowest common denominator, but cater to what is going to help that podcaster. Oh, I reached— I— success that they want to reach.
Exactly why we've done what we've done.
Because when I hear your messaging is saying is that everybody is doing like the base minimum, they are—
majority are doing the base minimum.
But I don't think that's what we should be communicating.
No, I'm not saying that. I'm just telling you, that's why I asked you how much time you are spending creating this fabulous art that you're putting up. I'm not— I'm playing devil's advocate.
I created— okay, Todd, I created basic templates that I just reuse over and over.
I'm just playing devil's advocate here.
I know you are, and it's fine. And I think it's— I think we have to be careful that we're not encouraging people to just do the bare minimum.
No, I'm not, but I'm just telling you the reality of what's happening with a podcaster that's in the trenches doing their show. Right.
No, I'm, I'm sure there are folks out there like that, Todd. I'm not, I'm not really arguing that. I'm just saying, well, what's the best practice?
Well, okay.
Best practice is to create—
Sure. The best practices.
Or if you're doing a YouTube video, your best practice is to create something that's more engaging and not just an AI-generated image.
I know, but we're talking about podcasters here. We're talking about episode art.
No, but there are podcasters that are doing YouTube too.
Not many.
Well, it's growing. So I would just accept that.
But they're not— okay. There are, but they aren't seeing any traction.
Because maybe they're not doing these things, Todd. I think just like with us with this show, we're not supporting custom thumbnails with our show in YouTube. So I'm doing it off of my account.
I do it off mine.
I'm seeing results off of my account. I'm not seeing results off of your account.
I'm doing the same thing.
No, you're not. You're doing completely different album art than I am.
Or send me over your album art. I'll use yours. Happy to take it. I have once or twice.
Sometimes you haven't used it though.
Well, I'll use it if you send it to me. I very rarely get it from you.
Okay.
All right. Do you want to do custom? I'll put your But you got to send it right away. It can't be 2 days from now.
Can be— oh, after the fact, you mean?
Because this, this show goes up immediately, you know, at least within an hour.
Okay.
Because again, I don't have time either.
Right.
You know, that's again, it's— that's the thing that we're looking at over time. These templates will get better and having the ability. The thing is, I don't want to pay for Canva. I don't want to. I don't want to pay for some of these other platforms out there.
But Todd, not everything is about what you do.
Okay, I understand that. But here's what I— if I'm not— okay, Rob, please understand.
Yeah.
If I'm not trying to be— I could buy Canva, I can buy Headliner, I can buy all these things. I can put that on my expense report, no issue. The average podcaster does not have the budget to have 3 or 4 tools to help them with 3 or 4 things that they want to do to grow their show. So in order to walk the walk and talk the talk, I have to use what I can do without having a whole bunch of fancy stuff, because I don't want to have to tell a podcaster, you have to have Canva, you have to have Headliner, you have to have this.
And then don't, don't tell them that they have to. Well, say it's an option.
We tell them it's an option. But the problem is, the problem is, again, if I'm going to walk the walk and talk the talk, I have to be able to do with what I have. And this is one of the reasons why we provided what we provided, so that those that don't have the extra $20 a month for Canva, the extra $20 for a headliner, the extra $20 for some, or $30 or $40 from some AI program. The extra $50 or something for a social media platform. You know, this stuff adds up. The next thing they're like, well, I'm going to go use Anchor because it's free, because I have to use all this other stuff. I can't afford to pay my podcast host anymore. So I have to be able to provide tools and services that allow them to use internally the stuff that we're producing to save them money. Because more than 50% of folks that are creating podcasts today, they don't care about making money, so they're budget conscious. So again, I'm not saying you shouldn't use these tools. My social media team uses Canva, you know. So again, millions of other people around, right?
I mean, but it's not the only tool that's out there.
That's true. There's But they all cost money.
Sure. I mean, people have to have some sort of an image software if they want to do anything with images.
Sure. Well, there's free tools out there you do image manipulation. So, yeah, you don't need to have a Photoshop subscription to edit an image. There's lots of stuff out there. But again, And it all depends on, you know, if I'm not down in the trenches doing this. And I'm worried about podcasting. I'm like, worried about YouTube.
So yeah, I mean, it's— I just see video get taking a bigger and bigger chunk.
I don't— but if people aren't— people only have limited time to watch video. Beauty Bubble says, Todd, you have to play the game. I understand. She says you can update any feature on YouTube at any time. That's true. I love the show more and more. It's taken me a few years, but these two are growing on me.
So who said that?
That said, that was from, uh, Beauty Bubble on YouTube.
Oh, okay, on YouTube, right?
On YouTube. And then I haven't even looked at Facebook. Stephanie says I— if you want to create video art, use a template and change the title of the episode. Yep, that's fine too. I agree. Canva isn't fancy, and it is— and it is fairly inexpensive. So what does Canva cost a month? $20?
I think you can get a subscription for less than that, but yeah, I'm not sure off top of my head.
Yeah, Canva. Let's look at pricing. Uh, plans and pricing.
The big advantage of Canva is it gives you hundreds of—
oh, I understand that.
And, and then you can change the color, you can change the specific layout, you can make it transparent, you can make a video out of it. Yeah, you can do all sorts of—
it's, it's a, it's a tool for dummies like me that don't know how to make graphic art. So they don't even put their pricing on the page. See, okay, here it is. Oh, they do have a free version and $119 a year for one person if you buy a year. So again, if I've got—
That's like, well, that's like $10 a month.
So if I have podcasters paying $12 a month for hosting or $20 a month for hosting, now they're at $240 for just a single tool. So again, you can use it for so many different things, Todd.
That's the—
but the majority of people that are creating content are in a single channel, you know. They're not— they're maybe on Instagram, or, you know, they're not in— they're not on 5 different social media platforms. And again, they don't have time. This is what we keep hearing from podcasts: I don't have time to create clips, I don't have time to create, uh, templates, I don't have— just the simple fact I guarantee you, if you went into Canva to create an album or episode art for this show, you'll spend at least 15 minutes in there. At least 15. Getting—
well, especially the first time that you go in and use it. I mean, I use templates over and over and over and over and over again, and it's really quick.
So, so let's say 10 minutes each time. 10 minutes times—
well, you're probably going to spend probably a half an hour the first template or the first setup or more, depending on how much research that you want to do to find the right template. And then you, you need to get into that template, make some customizations to it, make some edits, and then save that. And then you make it to create your first episode version. Right. And, and then from that point, you just reuse it over and over again.
Right. But then it gets boring. You're using the same template over and over again. It becomes—
you make slight adjustments to it, but you don't— I mean, it doesn't have to be perfect. Like, like, let's say you do an interview show, you just trade out who your interview guest is on there and maybe adjust the colors a little bit and then save it, put it out. Or actually, I use it to create, um, my thumbnail, and then I create a countdown clock for my video show, um, that actually counts down right on the image. So I convert that thumbnail into a video file, right?
Right.
And then I have a countdown clock, like a 15-second countdown clock that I can play before the beginning of my live show, right?
But again, I think it— if you look at all this stuff, you and I have budgets. We can add all this stuff. And there is part of my strategy is talking to podcasters. Time and money, time and money. Time and money. How do you save me time? How do you save me money? And because I don't have time and sometimes I have money, sometimes I don't. So that's part of it. When you ask someone to create a great title, great episode art, excuse me, episode text and all the other things that should go into a package of an episode. Mm-hmm. Um, that's a lot of time. So yeah, you know, I used to be a podcaster, Todd.
It's not like— I mean, I mean, at some point maybe it'll be easier. I'm not sure.
Well, that's one of my goals is to make it easier. And maybe it's not perfect product, but in the end, what it really boils down to is, is over the years I would look at And it's still that, look at individuals' podcast websites. We can go into that for a whole hour and a half. But again, just getting the feel from people and them telling me where their pain points are. Most, most podcasters, even right now, when I tell them, oh, you can do episode art, they're like, what? Huh?
Well, Apple finally supports their own tag, you know, so they're what?
You know, I use such and such app and there's no episode art there. So, you know, it's on the app's fault too for not surfacing this, this episode art. And maybe, maybe now, maybe these other apps will follow through and do what, you know, Apple finally did. But don't get me wrong, I understand where you're coming from, Rob, and just— it's—
well, I'm just seeing my own efforts generating more results.
Sure.
And so it's just a matter of You know, I'm trying to get better at my thumbnail art.
And whereas I was just saying my effort, where I've been putting effort on my audio podcast, is seeing results. And I'm not incurring time. It's not perfect, but I'm not incurring a time deficit. I get done with this show in about an hour. When this show's been published, I'm out the door. Same thing with my other show. I'm not spending an extra 45 minutes trying to monkey around, get something right. Sometimes it's just good enough, and over time it'll get better. And then, and then guess what's the most important part? We can do all we want with episode art, we do all we want with show notes, it really still boils back down to good content. But if we give people the time to focus on creating better content.
Right. I think that the challenge, though, that a lot of podcasters have right now is standing out and being found. You know, I think is, is one of the biggest things.
It's always been. But again, not for every podcaster is that an issue. Being found is not the problem. It's being— the show is being found is easy. It's having the episode be found.
Right. And I do think episode-level art does give an opportunity to potentially grow because that, just like what we're seeing with YouTube, YouTube is very much an episode-driven platform.
When was the last time you grabbed your phone and searched for a new show with your phone?
Search for what new show? What type of new show?
Any podcast. When was the last time you searched for a new podcast that you were looking for on your phone?
That's pretty much the only way I do it.
You search for new podcasts via your phone?
Sure.
I never have.
In the browser?
The only way I find new shows is when people recommend new shows to me.
Or in the Apple Podcasts app or— and those kind of things. I'll, I'll look at the list of featured shows that are in there. Of course, I've got a different interest than probably Joe Blow out there.
Yes, I, I mean, again, I'm a big Google guy, so I'm looking— and again, I don't— I, I very rarely add new shows to listen to, and it's usually done through a recommendation. So again, yeah, and most, most people today, um, their phone is their computer.
So, you know, this option that somehow we're thinking that people are still using laptops or desktops, they are, but that's not their primary device anymore.
Well, it's my primary device. I'm on the stupid thing.
I know, but that doesn't mean that it's—
if you have a job, you're a 32-year-old, if you have a job, you are not working without being on a computer. Unless you're in industry and you're using your hands, and that's a whole different situation.
I would say mobile phones is the number one access device now for all these things.
Yeah, maybe, you know, maybe you're not, you're not doing, you're not doing a lot.
You just have to go look at the—
well, I am for consumption. Yeah, but, but I'm looking for new shows. I, again, I'm not using my phone to go look for new shows. I'm not even using my web browser. Okay, so again, how are you— how are shows being discovered? I think it still remains word of mouth to be number one.
Well, yeah, as far as the sharing part.
Yeah, because you said people are having a hard time being discovered. And again, I think it's about getting—
I think there's a lot of— yeah, I think if you look at, uh, even the Apple Podcast directory catalog, it's cluttered with a bunch of archive shows. Right. So even if you went in there searching for something, you're going to come up with a search result that is flooded with shows that are— the 3 shows that you show up on the list are going to be shows that maybe published an episode a year ago or something.
Yeah. The 3.4 million shows that haven't produced a new episode in the last—
right. Of which there's only maybe 300,000 or 400,000 that have published an episode in the last 90 days.
Yeah. Right.
So.
That's the challenge that I think that exists for current podcasters is just the being buried in the, the kind of Yellow Pages of, hey, hey, Ted, why don't you tell the team to start suppressing shows that haven't produced a new episode in the last 60 days?
Yeah, I think that would be a terrific thing for them to do is to only surface shows that are published an episode in the last, you know, 30 days or something like that.
Right. Yeah, that would help, at least on Apple Podcasts.
That I would also, if Ted, if you're listening, I would love to see the prioritization around video podcasts be an option again in there too, like it used to be where you used to throttle between audio and video. And so you could see what's available on the video side versus the audio side. I don't know why that was stripped out of the UI, but I, you know, it's interesting is the—
how can I say this without giving it away? I guess I can say we've been talking to a lot of video-first platforms. I guess we'll leave it at that. And, uh, first platforms, I'm trying to think, uh, video first consumption side. Yeah, you know, someone, you know, let's say someone, you know, you got you know, 5 shows in your video first. They are more now looking to be off YouTube, building their own brand, building their own destinations, just because the YouTube algorithms have got them buried. They can't be found and they want an accompanying audio podcast and everything else that goes along with it.
Um, sure.
And they— and, and, and they're finally now waking up that yes, video podcasting is actually a thing. Um, that, you know, you can actually have a true video podcast in an RSS feed, which people are waking up to. So I think we'll see a growth in that regard, um, because there's a lot of people that don't trust YouTube. A lot of networks that are creating great content that has no reason to ever think about being deplatformed, nor should it, because it's not far right, far left. It's not any of that. It's, it's good content. But Google is kingmakers, and Google decides who wins and who loses. And it's, it's that way on YouTube. You can have the best content in the world, and YouTube, if they don't surface it, you will never be found. Therein lies the problem. I don't care what search you do. It'll be buried in search, it'll be 25 pages deep, and the content will never be found. They are true kingmakers. And you can— I can absolutely guarantee you, they're putting their thumb on the scale.
Sure.
So brands are now not liking having the thumb put on the scale and are looking at ways to take things back. Same thing with book authors. They're all— they're saying, hey, you know, there's too much control on these big platforms. Let me start. Is it too late? Maybe. But it goes back to my saying I've been saying for years that you never build your castle on rented land. And people are starting to figure out, even though Web 2, Web 3, whatever we're on now, that, yeah, maybe, maybe, maybe I should bring this home.
Well, Todd, I think you raise, raise an intriguing point from the standpoint that is, is beyond just talking about YouTube. It's, it's video content just generally and, and its opportunity as you look to the future. I think video publishing to communities, online communities that are siloed, may be where the future looks like. Huh?
What are you saying?
Well, taking your show and publishing it to a community that, that supports you in like a Kajabi platform, or again, you're building on someone else's platform, Superwave type platform that is being built by, by StreamYard.
Again, you're building it on someone else's platform. You're not building it on your.com.
Well, I mean, no, it's not to say that you don't want to do that off, off your own website. I think you do. So I think that is the other part of this too. But if you want to build a community outside of YouTube, specifically YouTube, right, there's Rumble, there's, I guess there's Locals, there's Discord, there's all sorts of platforms out there that are alternatives.
Now they're not perfect, but you don't have— we— I'm streaming right now, uh, in new podcasting apps without Rumble. Without YouTube, right?
So no, I think that, that's fantastic too. And so I think starting to think beyond YouTube, I, I think is the right way to start thinking.
And, you know, obviously we use the YouTube embed on our live page, but I probably should switch that out and put a— put our HLS streamer up there so that it's— sure, you know, I could do that. Um, and as people become more savvy and understand what is potentially happening. Again, I'm— I, I think in the end, OpenRSS wins, wins, wins. And it's because, again, it's open, not siloed.
Yeah, I'm a, I'm a huge fan of that. I, that's what I'm doing for the other show that I do, right? Um, and as well as this show is a video podcast too. I, I just don't know why Apple depreciated that so much.
I think it's pretty simple. I don't— you, at least currently.
Well, it's simple, but it may not be, be the right thing, right?
One thing I will say is I don't watch YouTube on my phone. I don't, I don't watch YouTube. I watch YouTube on my TV.
I do both.
Okay. Yeah, I, I don't because I'm, I'm in— I live in the country and barely half the times it won't play if I'm not on Wi-Fi. So if the— if I watch YouTube at home on a television, then when I'm using my phone to listen to content— listen, I'm not watching content. And YouTube admitted it at their own thing. They're astonished by the growth of YouTube TV, the number of people watching YouTube on TV. Well, every TV that's being sold today has YouTube on it as an access thing. There's nothing.
They're all smart. There's no TVs or they're Rokus or there's nothing for podcasts on the TV.
So where do I consume the pod? Apple TV. Yeah. Oh, what happened? I'm just hearing something just break. Hmm. I just had, I just had a tone change in my ear. Um, so I think that probably the reason Apple did that is they know that Most people are listening with this face down in the car, in a pocket, using CarPlay. I use CarPlay. The only thing I use in CarPlay is the maps and the podcast app. Actually, I use the Fountain app in CarPlay. So I think people probably don't watch a lot of podcasts on. They're just so used to listening to podcasts, they don't look at the screen. So I, I, that's probably why they had the stats on it. There was a, and probably not too many people were doing video podcasts for about 10 years.
Yeah, I just did a, I just did a lookup on video consumption on mobile phones. It says according to YANZ Media, 57 to 75% of global video is watched on mobile Now here's another reason for that.
I don't doubt that statistic at all, but if you go into any foreign country, most people do not actually have connected TVs. Because if you are on data outside the United States, and I will say not necessarily in Europe, but if you get into Asia, people are paying for their mobile either through load, what's sometimes called pay-so-WiFi. They go pay a machine and get WiFi for 6 hours. So of course this is their consumption device out largely outside the United States. They're not watching.
That's, that's, that's the number that shows here. 57 to 75% of global video is watched on mobile devices. In, in the United States, it's 70% of digital video audience prefer watching on their smartphone.
That's amazing. I, I don't watch video on my phone.
It says only 59% prefer to watch on smart TVs.
Yeah, I don't, I don't— that I don't understand either. But I guess if you're, you know, if you're younger and you don't have enough— maybe you're in a— maybe you don't have— maybe you're still living at home, you don't have a TV in the bedroom, uh, you're watching a tablet or something. So again, there's a changing demographic. So I guess, you know, because I have you know, 50-inch TV or whatever it is in my living room. And that's the place where I plop down and watch videos because I just— I get— I wonder how that spec runs as you get older.
Well, I mean, this, this, this percentage follows my consumption. I mean, I think I do consume more content on my, on my smartphone, but 60% on my smart TV too. I've got I think I've got 4 smart TVs in the house.
But I, again, I don't watch videos on— if I do, it's a Reel, you know, that's the only thing I probably watch, or maybe a TikTok. So, but I don't watch YouTube on my phone.
Right, right. But, you know, increasingly you pop up the YouTube app and it's going to present you with Shorts.
Yeah, I don't watch Shorts on YouTube. No, I avoid them.
It's the same kind of content.
Well, again, I avoid them.
So, okay, there's a difference in the content between— oh yeah, absolutely.
TikTok, TikTok Shorts, completely. Yeah, usually in YouTube it's Shorts that are associated with a channel, and I only follow X number of YouTube channels. On TikTok, I get this never-ending flow of people that I can follow. That's the main difference. And Facebook feeds me just junk. Facebook Shorts are horrible. Horrible. So, yeah, again, we're not, we're not, we're not doing Shorts. This is a, this is a podcast-focused show. You really drank the Kool-Aid, Rob, on YouTube.
No, it's about online video. It's not about It's really not about YouTube. It's just that YouTube is the number one platform for video.
Yeah, of course, for video it is. It's true, right? Right.
And they, they have been embracing podcasts, um, in, in their limited way that they have.
No, they are embracing YouTube channels in their way, labeled as a podcast. Labeled as a podcast, right? Yeah. Don't give them credit. Don't give them credit for something they haven't done successfully yet.
Well, they accomplished what they wanted to, right?
They, they accomplished their mission, right?
Which, right, that's what, that's what YouTube does.
And meanwhile, for the first time ever, we hear podcasters crying because guess what? They figured out they control the, the channel. They control it.
They control what channel?
Everything. They, they control the algorithm. They control who gets surfaced. They control—
you know, you're talking about being a podcast, is that what you're saying?
Yeah, the podcasters are complaining about YouTube because they have no control over their destiny over there. YouTube is a kingmaker. And you go to the podcast section, it only lists the most popular shows. You know, again, for the average podcaster, YouTube has done nothing. For those that have great audiences and big audiences already, yep, they've done good. But when you have big companies that have put a lot of money, that have had great success in podcasting and getting no traction in YouTube, there is a reason for that.
I don't believe that you can buy placement in in YouTube? No, you cannot.
Of course not. You can't buy.
So it's an earned place in the algorithm?
No, it is a selected— they are kingmakers. They—
no, it's an algorithmic thing.
Okay, don't— if you believe that, if you believe that all the shows that are listed in the podcast section of the YouTube app is based on a logarithm, come on. Those have been— those have been cherry-picked.
Yeah, but why, why wouldn't it be if they've, they've leveraged that algorithm to do what they want it to do?
Well, they've leveraged it to do what exactly what they want to do. You will put— they, they select who's in that list.
Who's they? YouTube. Who's YouTube? YouTube staff. You think YouTube staff is picking and choosing which video that they feature in the podcast section?
Absolutely. They, I'm sure they have.
That's not how they work, Todd. Okay.
Rob Greenlee. Go into the—
It's all algorithmic. Done. No.
Yeah, it is. Okay.
I've talked to YouTube people before.
Go into the YouTube podcast section. You see the same 20 or 25 shows. That's it. Okay.
Well, that particular section of YouTube, is that what you're specifically referring to?
Yes. That specific section. That page that no—
that nobody goes to. Exactly.
So that's what they— because that's what they— that's what they were highlighting as the crown gem of the YouTube experience. Oh yes, that was, you know, that's where their success stories came from.
I thought they were talking more about the YouTube Music side.
No, they're talking— they talk, they talk very little about YouTube Music, like 3 mentions.
Okay, so I'm— I went to youtube.com/podcast. Yep, yep. And I'm trying to pull it up. It's, it's loading. I'm just trying to see if they have any clue in here, uh, if it's algorithmic or not. And I'm looking at it and it does appear to be featuring shows that were like published most recently, kind of like a ranking based on how frequent or how new it was published. Um, most popular. So it looks like a ranked list of the most popular show that was updated.
And I guarantee same name, same names. Lex Friedman, Paul Finn.
Well, it's recommending us on the home page right now as a live show.
Well, I don't see that.
Well, I do on my screen. All right.
Let me bring it up right here. So where did you, where did you find live? I recommended.
Okay.
Recommended nothing.
Okay, well, you must not be subscribed to this show then.
I'm subscribed to my channel. Okay. So it shows you your channel and makes you feel good because you're subscribed to your channel. It's recommending you, but it doesn't recommend me. So again, these, they're kingmakers on this and picking who It's the same shows again and again. I go in here and look at this. It's the same, same 20, 25 shows that are in this section that they were highlighting as such a success. Mm-hmm. Yeah, same shows. Club Shay Shay, Philip DeFranco. Is he a podcaster? No, he's a YouTuber. Um, politics, 48 Hours, Theo Von. Again, the same, same shows. Again, Pat McAfee Show, ESPN, uh, NBC. Again, that's it. That's all we've got. And this is what we're calling success. And you know, the average, the average podcaster will never be found here. And so let's, you know, minus out of this and we just go to the homepage of YouTube. And basically the only thing I'm shown here is the stuff that I'm subscribed to, which, you know, I would expect that to be on. But again, if I search podcast, then what am I shown? I'm shown the same shows, same exact same shows that were over there in that top 20 list or whatever they had. Same, same list of stuff. There's again the OVNI. So again, this is to me— what happened, Rob? Are you still here?
Oh yeah, I just want to share my, my screen here.
Yeah, so I again, I don't— that doesn't show up for me.
So yeah, so yeah, so we're right here.
So go into incognito window and look at that.
And well, it says right in the text, it says recommended based on your subscriptions and history. No, I mean, yeah, but that tells you it's, it's an algorithm, but it's not—
but it's been edited. Okay, but it doesn't show— that's not my show, is not presented to me in that recommended list when I bring up that list.
Yeah, it's, it's not going to recommend my version of the show, but it's recommending your version of the show.
Oh, that's curious.
Yeah, because it shows it up here that there's 6 people watching and it's off of your YouTube channel. Oh, that's the Geek News Central. That's curious.
So that's because you're subscribed. I bet you if I was subscribed to your show, it would show up on mine then. Probably.
Probably.
But you have to already be subscribed. No one is— if you're not subscribed, my, my show's not— our show's not going to be shown in that list, you know, it's not. So this is wherein a lot of content creators are having mental angst against YouTube. They're not helping to grow a show. Yeah, you might get discovered if you're lucky in a search result, If you're lucky, it's, it's, it, it operates from the standpoint of, um, merit, right?
So it operates based on what the engagement is in the content.
So again, an average podcaster will never, just like the average YouTuber, will never be found.
But you can't say never, Todd, because that, that's not how the algorithm works. It's not never. It's, it's based on the, the amount of, um, or the, the watch time and the frequency of visit to a particular channel or a piece of content.
So there in lays again the same argument that you have to become a YouTuber and follow all the YouTube rules and having an ingestion of your RSS feed into YouTube. No, no, no, this has nothing to do with RSS feeds. Okay, but if you— most podcasters that are sending their stuff to YouTube are doing it via an RSS feed, having their audio—
okay, but that's a different argument. I wasn't even talking about that.
It's the same thing. Well, okay, because most podcasters are not building a YouTube channel.
Yeah, I get that, Todd. Okay, but, but There are shows that are doing YouTube channels and podcasts. This show is an example of that.
That is correct.
But the other show that I do for StreamYard is an example of that, right?
So StreamYard is a video-first platform, not a podcast platform.
So, well, okay, I mean So does that mean that— okay, so if you are talking about a tool to create content—
no, what I'm talking about has to be dedicated to us. What I'm trying to— what I'm trying to imply is that the reason podcasters are complaining— and again, we already knew this before this ever started— is that if you want to succeed on YouTube, you have to work really, really hard on YouTube. So, so those that are, are seeing no success.
That's not true, Todd. It's just, it's just not a true and accurate statement.
The majority, the majority, the high majority are not. Why do you think people are all pissed off? Why do you think people are just saying, okay, forget it?
Okay. I'm just saying, all a matter of— I mean, all— it's all a matter of degrees, right? It's true.
There's, there's—
what do you consider to be successful, Todd? Is it over 10 listeners, or is it over 100,000?
It was sold as the second coming.
No, but what is your definition of a success on YouTube?
Uh, being able to be monetized. That would be success. To be able to have enough watch hours to be, to, to be monetized. That would— I would consider that to be successful.
Okay, I've got about 2,000, 2,000 subscribers to my, my channel, and I'm fully monetized.
But again, you're one of a very small percentage of people that go through and ask. Go through and ask the majority of podcasters that are on YouTube. They are not monetized. They're not getting traction. They're not getting views.
What's the vast majority of podcasters that are publishing audio into RSS feeds are monetizing?
Well, that's by choice. They can be monetized if they want.
No, but I mean, is it $2 a month or— I mean, no, I don't know what— it's all a matter of scale, right? That's true. This whole conversation is, I think, we have to really get brass tacks with this. It's— is if you want to monetize, you have to have an audience, right?
Yeah, that's no matter what, right?
And places to capture attention, but, but are places, you know, like YouTube, Spotify, other platforms.
My main point is you go to Apple Podcasts, you can go way deep into the category and way deep into the catalog. You can go to the business category and you can keep scrolling. And scrolling and see just about everything in the inventory. Depends on how long you want to scroll. It's not possible on YouTube. Completely not possible. You go to the podcast section on YouTube and there's about 20 shows that they highlight. That's it. So again, there's going to be no discovery on YouTube unless you do a lot of work.
Well, because there's so many shows or so many channels on YouTube, there's no way that they could present everybody on one page. Exactly. I mean, I mean, you're talking, you know, millions of shows, not millions of podcasts. Well, some percentage of them are podcasts, right?
But again, I'm just saying from a growth standpoint, everyone keeps telling, oh, this is the number one place to be discovered, number one place to consume podcasts, for about 25 shows.
Yeah, I think we both agree that, that, that statement that it's the number one place to consume podcasts is probably a A little bit of a stretch.
Well, that's what all the surveys— on a practical— it's all the surveys say that's— this is the place to go.
Well, that's, that's what people are telling the researchers that are audiences, is that that's, that's where they're discovering new podcasts.
They're discovering about— they're discovering about 25 podcasts or 50. Well, Leo Vaughn, Regardless of what that number is, people are perceiving it as a place for them to hear my podcast.
Yeah, perceiving. It's the number 2 search engine.
Oh, I'm not disputing that. But again, the bill of goods that was sold, that this is going to be the second coming, this is the place you have to be to be discovered.
Well, I don't think anybody's saying that.
Well, that was what was sold.
I think it's, it's just one place to be, and I think all the trend lines are pointing to increased interest and increased production of video. And however you publish it, whether— and but currently YouTube is the number one video consumption platform. You're gonna make video, you better be on YouTube. That's all I can say.
Again, you only have so many hours to watch.
I don't know what that has to do with it, but it does.
We're long. I'm tired of arguing.
Not arguing, we're clarifying on a point around why video and podcasting is okay. I, I think that—
I'm not saying it's not okay, I'm just saying, right, again, this, this, and this is— I guess I get it, Todd.
You don't like YouTube, and that's—
no, I'm not saying I don't like YouTube. I don't like—
but that's kind of how it comes across.
I don't like how they have bastardized it.
I don't think YouTube has really done anything. So that's part of the problem is that they haven't done enough.
Well, again, it's not where I consume podcasts.
It's fine, but there's millions of people out there that are.
Yeah, that's true too. Can't doubt that. Yeah.
So I think we can leave it at that. You know, if you're listening to this and you've stuck around for this. Yeah. That, you know, you can decide for yourself.
We've got great listenership right now, or great viewership going on on YouTube right now.
That's, well, that's a good thing. Get that thumbnail up there, Todd. And, you know, I didn't even make a custom artwork for today's episode. I'm using a piece of generic art right now.
So it should be boxing gloves or something. Oh, right, right. I, I just, again, I, I play a little bit devil's advocate here, so, you know, it's just, it is what it is. I'm just— call me, call me an old curmudgeon. I, I like my audio podcast.
Yeah, I'm not going to argue with you on that.
So, and I definitely, definitely listen more than I watch, that's for sure. And what I watch on YouTube is not a podcast. I'm not watching two people talk on YouTube. That's, to me, is insane. Why would you do that? Right? Why, why, why are people watching us talk? That's the next question.
Because they got nothing else better to do.
I think so.
Go ahead. So we should probably call it, call it a day because I I have another interview I have to do in 5 minutes.
Okay, are you going— you're— so you're actually going to NAB now? Wow, when was that changed?
About a week and a half ago.
Okay, you're going to man the StreamYard booth?
StreamYard doesn't have a booth. Oh really? So yeah, I'm, I'm, I'm on a— I'm a moderator for a panel as part of the Creators Lab, uh, conference that's going on at the event in the South Hall. So on Sunday And I'm also doing a StreamYard workshop at that as well. Just going to get up and talk about the platform and how it works. So, Todd, if you happen to go to NAB, you know, go check it out. It's the Creators Lab conference in the South Hall up on the second floor, which you— oh, you know well, Todd.
Yes, I do. All right, give me, give me your contact and then we'll get out of here.
Uh, I'm at, uh, X Twitter @RobGreenlee, and also, uh, you can send me an email if you want to, robgreenlee@gmail.com, robgreenlee.com, and go check out my, my StreamYard, my StreamYard show, um, Podcast Tips with Rob Greenlee every Thursday night at 7 PM Eastern. So thanks.
@GeekNews on X, Todd. I mean, @GeekNews, @geeknews.chat on Mastodon, geeknews@gmail.com on an email. So follow or subscribe to the podcast on a new podcast app at podcastapps.com, and go watch us on YouTube. Uh, yeah, okay, whatever. Everybody, thanks. We'll see you next time. Take care. Okay.
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