How has podcasting changed over the last ten years

We regularly participate in the recording of one of the most popular podcasts in Runet - the “Sound” program , and in our blog on GT we publish transcripts of programs, complementing them with notes and links to products.

Today we decided to see how podcasting has changed since its first appearance on the web.
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Josh Morgan stresses the fact that podcasting is experiencing a boom today. Someone compares podcasts with blogs, recalling a similar boom in the early 2000s, someone pays attention to the return of "serialized" content.

In the same way as by 1933 in the United States, the radio made its way “onto the stage” and the books faded into the background, today's programs are gaining the attention of audiences around the world. The radio drama of the 1930s, which became a new kind of entertainment for the postwar period, returns in the form of regular analytical reviews and entertainment programs in the format of podcasts.

Podcasting itself is a young and decentralized phenomenon. Today, Apple remains the most influential player in this field, and in June 2015 it celebrated a decade since the launch of the first podcast in iTunes.

Today it is possible to get acquainted with the work of many experts in the field of podcasting: Casey Liss (Casey Liss), Jason Snell (Jason Snell), Dan Benjamin (Dan Benjamin) and Marco Arment (Marco Arment). By the way, we mentioned one of Casey's guides and tips on choosing equipment for Dan Benjamin's podcasts. Marco Arment (Marco Arment), who published an ode to the sound quality of podcasts, also shared his solutions found during the podcast recording process.

But Josh Morgan wrote about how he researched podcasts posted in the iTunes library. To do this, he had to independently select a sample from the iTunes US catalog, distribute the programs into categories and count their number in each of the categories.

It took about 2 500 podcasts to “cheat”: release dates were estimated, the number of months during which the podcast was active; number of issues per month; volume of profanity; the number of English and non-English descriptors; average duration of one issue; number of ratings.

In which categories iTunes contains the most releases:

• The three largest categories by the number of issues - "Christianity", "Music" and "Humor"
• Least of all - “Aviation” (150), “Hinduism” (260) and in the subcategory “Government and state institutions” (320)

How many podcasts are active:

• About 40% of the total, which is more than 60,000 podcasts
• The average lifetime of a podcast is 6 months or 12 episodes.

Other finds:

• About 5,000 new podcasts in iTunes US are launched each month.
• Almost a third (30%) of all podcasts launched from June 2014 to June 2015
• Average duration increased to 40 minutes by June 2015
• Approximately one of the five podcasts in iTunes US was not in English.
• Podcasts, for which users rate, were rated on average 7 times

Podcasts in 2015 have become more popular than ever, but most do not live long. Many suspend their work when their authors reach their goals or lose interest.

Transmissions are becoming increasingly diverse in terms of culture. Non-English-language podcasts may soon make up a quarter of all podcasts in iTunes US.

It is worth noting that the podcasting market allows a number of developers to think about launching specialized services and applications that independent podcast producers can take advantage of. These are people who can spend, say, about $ 200 on software for podcasts, which is quite serious money.

PS If you are interested in this topic, and you have a desire to launch your own program, we recommend that you familiarize yourself with the basic tips of experienced presenters who are independently involved in the processing of issues, the preparation of equipment, work rooms and information materials.