With the release of iTunes 4.9, there's no doubt in anyone's mind that Podcasting has grown leaps and bounds. We all know that within the first two days of 4.9's release, Apple reported over 1 million Podcasts were subscribed to. That's awesome. Now in the wake of this explosive growth begins the battle for the Top 100 - undoubtedly the place you want to be if your goal is to reach as many listeners as possible (which, for many Podcasters, is NOT the goal).Unfortunately, it seems that Apple is giving a majority of the exposure over to the MSM shows, as opposed to the grass-roots, "indie" Podcasts that helped invent the medium. Sure, Z100 and ABC News can save their shallow programming over to MP3, but is that really a Podcast or just a wacky radio-guy with a production team? We left Big Radio exactly because of these schmucks who've destroyed our airwaves, and unfortunately they're getting the exposure on iTunes as well.
The problem is more brand recognition than anything else. Hopefully we can overcome the big name "me too" shows and use this exposure to benefit those are helping make Podcasting unique.
1. Apple needs to take a page from Google, which understands the importance of giving the little guy (blogs) leverage against big sites in terms of exposure. If Apple thinks an iPod video device will be driven by the likes of Disney and CBS, they are dead wrong. Apple needs to become the eBay of Podcastiing, and create a whole new industry with a whole new group of players. (I posted on this myself: http://mistersnitch.blogspot.com/2005/07/podcasts-small-videos-big-profits.html )
Posted at 6:40PM on Jul 24th 2005 by Mr. Snitch!