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Podcasts, Wallcasts, and Paycasts

The Ezra Klein Show, as it appeared on my podcast app this morning. It is now a wallcast.

Would a blog be a blog if it went behind a paywall, or if you needed a subscription to read it?

Of course not. Blogs are on the open Web, and tend to stay there so long as they don’t move away from their original location.

Same should go for podcasts. “Wherever you get your podcasts” certifies the open nature of podcasting.

But now the New York Times is putting all its podcasts archives behind a paywall, including Ezra Klein’s, above.

Arguments about the merits of this are all economic. Let’s instead look at classification. We need a new noun for restricted ‘casts such as Ezra’s, which are no longer podcasts in the pure sense. I suggest we call them wallcasts.

For subscription-only ‘casts, such as some on SiriusXM*, I suggest paycasts.

Bottom line: It can’t be a podcast if you have to pay for any of it, including archives.

By the way, it won’t matter if a Times subscription opens wallcast archives, as a subscription does for print archives. By putting their podcast archives behind a paywall, the Times is changing the DNA of those casts. A wallcast is not a podcast. Full stop.

Spread the words.

*SiriusXM’s paycasts include “SmartLess,” “Freakonomics Radio,” “The Joel Osteen Podcast,” “Last Podcast on the Left,” and “Andy Cohen’s Daddy Diaries.” They require a subscription to SiriusXM or its Podcasts+ service​. Some, such as “Marvel’s Wastelanders” and “Marvel/Method also require a subscription​. I’m not sure what kind. (FWIW, I’ve been a SiriusXM subscriber since 2005, but only listen to live subscription streams. I’ve never listened to any of its podcasts.) SiriusXM does have some shows in podcast form, however. Examples are “The Megyn Kelly Show,” “Best Friends with Nicole Byer and Sasheer Zamata,” and “Chasing Life with Dr. Sanjay Gupta.” I believe it also has some wallcasts. For example, “SmartLess” episodes are on the open Web, but early access and bonus episodes are behind a paywall​. Or so it seems to me in the here and now. I invite corrections.

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4 responses to “Podcasts, Wallcasts, and Paycasts”

  1. Podcasts, Wallcasts, and Paycasts – Doc Searls Weblog – Dave's linkblog

    […] Podcasts, Wallcasts, and Paycasts […]

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  2. Mike’s Blog Round-Up … from Crooks & Liars Tengrain – Tom Bettenhausen's

    […] Doc Searls Weblog answers the question of when is a podcast NOT a podcast. Hint: TFNYT. […]

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  3. Michael Elling Avatar
    Michael Elling

    Few appreciate how paywalls and SaaS are indelibly linked and making the internet and software less universal and affordable; and contributing in large part to systemic inflation.

    The latter is key as the democrats do not have a good handle on inflation, nor how to control it. The following is a list of inflationary causes and somehow has to be slicked down to “it started with the guy before who wants to go back that way”:
    -China trade wars which caused component and hardware prices (which had dropped for 3 decades) to suddenly surge
    -which started the supply chain problems even before covid
    -allowing crypto to soak up energy at the margin (thereby keeping prices high) with little to no regulatory oversight
    -zero interest rates
    -tax cuts
    -first response stimulus to covid
    -continued consolidation of production, processing and distribution in the food industry (and almost every industry segment for that matter)
    – growing threat of paywalls and SaaS revolution amid little to no regulatory oversight
    -allowing health care costs to continue to spiral out of control

    Of course the present administration added fuel to the fire both intentionally and unintentionally:
    -infrastructure spending
    -covid stimulus part 2
    -allowing Ukraine conflict to persist, keeping commodity prices artificially high due to limited and more expensive foodstuff (and natural resources in the war zone) production and trade
    -raising interest rates dramatically (which raised rents on assets); albeit a necessary reaction precipitated by the prior administrations ministrations (brow-beating?) to the Fed to keep rates low
    -allowing LLM’s to soak up excess energy without regulatory oversight
    -turning a blind eye to subscription, paywall and SaaS pricing
    -allowing health costs to continue to spiral out of control (except for a few drugs, yeah!)

    The result is great corporate profits and a roaring stock market.

    Throughout the democrats have been incapable of resisting being tarred and feathered on this issue. Perhaps because they really don’t know any better.

    Reply
  4. Doc Searls Avatar
    Doc Searls

    Thanks Michael. Good dirty laundry list. 🙂 And thanks to Crooks & Liars for sending linklove to this post.

    Paywalls are going up everywhere, as producers in the shittily named content business try to get ahead of Peak Subscription, and in the process are killing the open Internet, which is biggest farm ever created for geese that lay golden eggs.

    As for the SaaS business, I just hope we’re at the far end of that pendulum swing, and that we’ll swing back toward personal, rather than personalized, forms of agency.

    Reply

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