We podcasters love it when the mainstream press shines a light on us. We pass links around, hand out virtual pats on the back, and generally do the happy dance. Even when an article’s underlying message waggles a skeptical finger in our general direction, we’re just glad someone’s paying attention. But every once in awhile, one of these articles gets under my skin.
The latest mixed bag podcasting story comes to us from BusinessWeek and Heather Green, who is both a podcaster and a reasonably well-informed observer of the podcast community. Along with some nice profiles, the article suggested that podcasters ought not to expect the kind of money (Keith and the Girl), mainstream notoriety (Grammar Girl) or credibility (Skepticality) that the few breakout podcasts have found. Fair enough, I suppose. No business niche provides success for all of the people who enter it, after all, but I think these measures are awfully one-dimensional.
If the measure of podcasting success is the ability to quit a dull day job, Green’s right: most people who try podcasting won’t end up making a business of it. And she’s also right that advertisers haven’t glommed onto podcasting as quickly as a lot of monetization gurus would like. But I don’t think most podcasters view what they do as a get-rich quick scheme. A lot of producers spend less time dreaming about media careers and more time trying to build a listener base that justifies their investment of time and money. Sponsorship is a big part of that for sure, but podcasters won’t have failed simply because they’re earning most of their living doing something else.
I guess I wonder too why a business magazine would take the trouble to rain on a potential market parade. The tech geeks in Silicon Valley garages are heroes long before they reach the market. But the guy or gal in the basement with a microphone who wants to talk about brewing beer or raising show dogs gets slapped down by people who measure success only in pre-existing big media terms. If Procter and Gamble’s ad agency ain’t calling, you might as well give up any ideas of making it as a podcaster, the theory goes. Sorry, but I don’t buy it. If I can get a local or regional brewery to pick up the costs of time, equipment and bandwidth for This Week in Beer, it doesn’t matter that Madison Avenue hasn’t called.
Finally, and I don’t like admitting this, but it’s true: podcast growth currently finds itself in something of a lull. Both mainstream acceptance and advertising dollars are taking their sweet time, and the newness and coolness of a year or two ago has worn off a little. But it has been during the past sleepy few months that Grammar Girl host Mignon Fogerty has been quietly moving up the iTunes charts. But it’s not her unlikely personal success (which Green’s article describes) that is important for podcasting as a whole. Grammar Girl is a big deal because thousands of people outside the early adopter demo — teachers, librarians, writers and Oprah fans — have added the show to their iPods and computers. It’s also a big deal because the media outlets that cover the phenomenon are less and less likely to condescend to the podcast format itself. They’re starting to take for granted that content delivered this way is for real, and not just a fad your geeky brother-in-law tried to explain at the last reunion.
