The European Open Source Academy Magazine presents a comprehensive exploration of how open source innovation, policy, and community leadership are driving Europe’s digital sovereignty, resilience, and technological independence. This article was published in its first issue (January 2026 edition).

The Last Open Frontier: How Podcasting Preserved the Original Internet Spirit

In an era where algorithms determine what you see and whom you reach, podcasting stands as an unlikely rebel. While social media evolved into walled gardens, podcasting preserved the open, interoperable architecture of the early internet.

Podcasting's origins are distinctly European. French entrepreneur Tristan Louis proposed the concept in 2000, the first podcast appeared in 2003, and UK journalist Ben Hammersley coined the term "podcast" in 2004. Built on RSS and open standards—the radical idea that anyone can publish without platform permission—podcasting predates and thus escaped the social media platform trap.

The numbers are remarkable. As of 2025, approximately 4.5 million podcasts reach 584.1 million listeners globally—projected to hit 651.7 million by 2027. The industry is valued at nearly $40 billion, with podcast advertising expected to reach $4.46 billion in 2025. Yet this ecosystem operates without central authority, algorithmic interference, or platform gatekeepers.

This openness isn't nostalgic—it actively shapes how communities form and discover content differently than platform-controlled media allows.

RSS as the Great Equalizer: Infrastructure for Discovery Without Gatekeepers

At podcasting's heart lies RSS—Really Simple Syndication. While tech platforms spent billions on engagement algorithms, RSS enabled a different model: listeners choose what they want, creators reach audiences directly.

RSS is a standardized format allowing any podcast app to access any feed. Subscribe in Apple Podcasts, Spotify, or an independent app—you're not trapped. The same feed works everywhere. This interoperability is fundamental yet revolutionary compared to platforms where content, audience, and identity are locked to a single company.

There's no algorithm deciding whether episodes reach subscribers. No platform arbitrarily changing policies. No company deciding podcasting isn't profitable and shutting down the system.

This foundation evolves. In summer 2020, Adam Curry ("The Podfather") and Dave Jones launched Podcasting 2.0 to extend RSS while maintaining openness. The transcript tag exemplifies this: embedding transcripts directly in RSS feeds enhances accessibility for deaf/hard-of-hearing listeners, improves discoverability, and enables new navigation.

Open-source platforms adopted it immediately—Castopod implemented transcript support in November 2020. When Apple Podcasts adopted it in March 2024, small open-source teams had influenced the largest tech company. Innovation came from community, not corporate headquarters.

Europe's Vision: Funding an Alternative Digital Future

While the United States built its internet on data extraction and surveillance capitalism, Europe has quietly funded a different vision. Since 2020, the European Commission's Next Generation Internet (NGI) initiative has invested over €500 million in 500+ projects building blocks of a human-centric, privacy-respecting internet. This continues podcasting's European roots—from Tristan Louis's 2000 concept to Ben Hammersley's 2004 naming, European thinking has shaped open internet architecture.

Through NGI Zero, managed by Dutch foundation NLnet, the EU systematically supports the Fediverse—interconnected platforms using open ActivityPub protocol where users on Mastodon follow and interact with PixelFed, PeerTube, or any other ActivityPub platform through one account.

European funding supports: Mastodon (end-to-end encryption, moderation), Pleroma (lightweight servers), PixelFed (privacy-focused photos), PeerTube (Framasoft's video platform with live streaming), Lemmy (federated Reddit alternative, funded June 2020), Mobilizon (event planning, launched October 2020), Funkwhale (music streaming), XWiki (federated wikis), Misskey (Japanese microblogging), GoToSocial (lightweight deployment), GNU social (pioneering federation). Beyond platforms: ActivityPub bridges to XMPP/Matrix, WordPress/Drupal plugins, mobile clients like PixelDroid, interoperability testing frameworks.

This isn't rhetoric—it's systematic infrastructure building operating on entirely different principles than Silicon Valley: no data harvesting, no algorithmic manipulation, no vendor lock-in.

Beyond Broadcasting: The Fediverse Brings Two-Way Conversation to Podcasting

The Fediverse represents open protocols' next evolution. With over 11 million users across thousands of independent servers, ActivityPub creates true interoperability: Mastodon users follow PeerTube channels, comment on PixelFed photos, join Lemmy discussions, RSVP to Mobilizon events, and interact with podcast episodes—all from one account.

This transforms one-way broadcasting into genuine community interaction. ActivityPub-enabled podcast platforms allow episodes to appear in Fediverse followers' timelines. Listeners comment, share, discuss—interactions flow back to podcasters without intermediary platforms controlling or monetizing conversation.

This differs fundamentally from Twitter or Instagram, where algorithms determine whether followers see announcements. On traditional platforms, audiences belong to the platform—rules change, reach is throttled, shutdowns happen. In the Fediverse, audiences follow directly via open protocols. Dislike your hosting provider? Move servers and keep your followers.

This architecture creates the conditions for genuine community formation rather than algorithmic engagement optimization. Without systems designed to maximize "time on platform" through controversy and outrage, conversations can form around shared interests, curiosity, and mutual respect.

Community-Centric vs. Platform-Centric: A Cultural Shift in Media

The technical architecture of open podcasting creates different cultural dynamics than platform-controlled media. Algorithms optimizing for "engagement" inevitably favor content triggering strong emotional responses—anger, fear, outrage. Communities forming around open protocols can develop their own norms based on shared values rather than platform metrics.
From my experience speaking at European conferences—FOSDEM, Open Source Conference Luxembourg, Journées du Logiciel Libre—I've observed how European digital sovereignty perspectives emphasize community autonomy and collective governance. These reflect fundamentally different assumptions about what the internet should be and whom it should serve.

Open infrastructure enables communities struggling on major platforms: niche interests, minority languages, accessibility features, local news, educational content. European funding for Fediverse platforms recognizes that healthy digital ecosystems require diversity, not just massive platforms optimized for data extraction.

When French municipalities deploy PeerTube for educational videos, when Polish towns replace YouTube with their own instances, when universities host Mastodon for academic discourse, when podcasters choose ActivityPub-enabled hosting—these are assertions of digital sovereignty and community autonomy. The European Commission operating its own Mastodon instances demonstrates that alternatives are viable even at governance's highest levels.

The Road Ahead: Can Open Protocols Compete with Platform Convenience?

The challenge facing open alternatives is real: competing with well-funded platforms spending billions on user experience and network effects. Mastodon's signup process has been criticized as confusing. Discovery mechanisms remain less sophisticated than algorithmic recommendations.
Yet opportunities are equally significant. Growing awareness of platform risks—privacy violations, algorithmic manipulation, arbitrary deplatforming, psychological toll of engagement-optimized feeds—drives users to alternatives. The Fediverse added over 2 million users following major platform controversies.

European NGI funding has proven remarkably efficient at supporting innovation across the entire spectrum, from experimental projects to established platforms. This diversity creates resilience—no single failure can collapse the ecosystem.

As more services adopt ActivityPub—Ghost, Tumblr, Threads, Flipboard, WordPress, Discourse—the open web strengthens. Each participant creates value for all without central permission. A PixelFed photographer, PeerTube video creator, WriteFreely blogger, Mobilizon event organizer, and ActivityPub-enabled podcaster all reach and interact with the same federated audience.

For podcasting, Fediverse integration opens new possibilities. Episodes become centers of cross-platform discussion. Comments from Mastodon, shares via Pleroma, discussions on Lemmy, video responses on PeerTube flow together around podcast content—rich community interaction with decentralized control. RSS that served podcasting for two decades now connects with social protocols designed for the internet we need.

Conclusion: Choosing Our Digital Future

The future of online community isn't predetermined. It depends on the choices we make—as individuals, communities, organizations, and societies—about which infrastructures we build, fund, and use.

In podcasting, we've seen that open architectures can not only survive but thrive for decades, creating vibrant ecosystems without centralized control. The question is whether we'll apply these lessons to the broader internet. Will we continue accepting that a handful of companies should control how we communicate, whom we reach, and what information we see? Or will we invest in alternatives that preserve the internet's original promise: a space for human connection, creativity, and community that serves people rather than exploiting them?

Europe's commitment to funding open source alternatives demonstrates that different futures are possible—and practical. The technologies exist. The communities are forming. The protocols work. What remains is choosing whether we want our digital public spaces to be shopping malls managed by corporations or commons maintained by communities.
Podcasting showed us the path. Now it's up to us to follow it.

Introducing the Castopod Installation Script

curl -fsSL https://castopod.org/install | sudo bash

That's it. One command. The script will guide you through the rest. Go make coffee. Come back to a fully configured Castopod installation.

Tested Platforms

The installation script has been tested on:

• Ubuntu 24.04
• Debian 13
• Fedora 43

Recommended: Ubuntu LTS or Debian stable on a freshly installed server to avoid dependency conflicts.

Note: This is the very first public release of this installation script. It may contain bugs or unexpected behavior on certain configurations. If you encounter any issues, please report them. Contributions are welcome—feel free to submit a merge request to help improve the script.

Traditional Installation Process

Installing a self-hosted podcasting platform traditionally required multiple manual steps:

1. SSH into your server
2. Install and configure Nginx or Apache web server
3. Install PHP with the correct version and required extensions
4. Set up MariaDB database server
5. Configure Redis cache server
6. Configure PHP-FPM settings
7. Write virtual host configuration
8. Obtain SSL certificates with Certbot
9. Set up certificate auto-renewal
10. Create cron jobs for scheduled tasks
11. Set proper file permissions and ownership
12. Troubleshoot configuration issues

For multiple podcast instances on one server, each step needed to be repeated with careful attention to avoid conflicts between installations.

The New Way: One Command

We got tired of this. So we built a script that does it all. SSL certificates, database configuration, cron jobs, security hardening—all automated. You can be podcasting in minutes instead of hours.

⚠️ Security Disclaimer

Never blindly run scripts from the internet with sudo. That command above downloads and executes code with root privileges on your server. Only run it if:

1. You trust the source - This script is maintained by the Castopod team and open source
2. You've reviewed the code - Download it first and read what it does: wget https://castopod.org/install-castopod.sh
3. You understand the scope of the modifications - The script upgrades system packages, installs software (FrankenPHP, MariaDB, Redis/Valkey, FFmpeg), modifies system configurations, and creates databases

We strongly recommend downloading the script first, reviewing it, and then running it:

# Download and review the script
wget https://castopod.org/install-castopod.sh
less install-castopod.sh  # Read through it

# Make it executable
chmod +x install-castopod.sh

# Run it after you're comfortable with what it does
sudo ./install-castopod.sh

The script is extensively commented (almost every line has an explanation) to make auditing easier.

What Makes This Special?

🏎️ Powered by FrankenPHP and Caddy

This installation script uses a modern, streamlined stack: FrankenPHP with Caddy.

What is FrankenPHP?

FrankenPHP is a modern PHP application server built on top of Caddy. It's a single binary that includes:

• PHP runtime - No separate PHP-FPM installation needed
• Caddy web server - Production-ready, high-performance web server
• Worker mode - Keeps your PHP application in memory for blazing-fast responses

Why it's cool: Traditional setups require Nginx + PHP-FPM + careful socket configuration. FrankenPHP is just one binary. Download it, point it at your PHP app, done. No more debugging "502 Bad Gateway" errors because PHP-FPM crashed.

Performance: FrankenPHP can run in worker mode, keeping your application in memory between requests. This eliminates the PHP bootstrap overhead on every request—no more loading frameworks, parsing configs, and establishing database connections for each visitor. The result? Significantly faster response times and lower server load.

What is Caddy?

Caddy is a modern web server that handles HTTPS automatically. Its killer feature: automatic SSL certificates.

Why it's cool: With Nginx, you need to install Certbot, run it manually, set up cron jobs for renewal, and debug certificate issues. With Caddy, you just specify your domain name. Caddy automatically:

• Obtains certificates from Let's Encrypt
• Renews them before they expire
• Handles HTTPS redirects
• Manages certificate storage

No Certbot. No cron jobs. No manual renewal. It just works.

🚀 Truly Automated

The script doesn't just install packages. It:

• Upgrades your entire system first (security matters!)
• Installs ALL dependencies with the correct versions (FrankenPHP with embedded PHP, MariaDB, Redis/Valkey, FFmpeg)
• Creates unique databases for each instance with randomly generated 32-character passwords
• Manages Redis database numbers automatically (even expands the database pool when needed!)
• Generates Caddy configurations optimized for Castopod
• Obtains SSL certificates automatically via Caddy's built-in ACME support (no Certbot needed!)
• Sets up cron jobs for scheduled tasks and session cleanup
• Configures file permissions correctly (because 777 is not the answer)
• Locks down databases to localhost only (security by default)
• Generates a detailed installation log with every password, URL, and config path you'll need

🎯 Interactive by Default, Silent When You Need It

Run it without arguments and you get a friendly guided experience:

sudo ./install-castopod.sh

For automation, CI/CD, or when you just want to get things done:

sudo ./install-castopod.sh -y podcast1.com podcast2.com podcast3.com

Zero prompts. Pure automation.

🏢 Multiple Instances? No Problem.

Want to host multiple podcasts on one server? Just list the domains:

sudo ./install-castopod.sh -y \
  comedy-show.com \
  tech-talk.fm \
  cooking-podcast.org

Each gets:

• Its own directory (/var/www/castopod/DOMAIN/)
• Its own MariaDB database and user
• Its own Redis database number
• Its own Caddy configuration block
• Its own SSL certificate (automatically managed)
• Its own cron jobs
• Its own access and error logs

No conflicts. No shared credentials. Clean separation.

🔒 Secure by Default

We didn't just automate the installation—we hardened it:

Database Isolation

# MariaDB: Locked to localhost
bind-address = 127.0.0.1

# Redis: Locked to localhost
bind 127.0.0.1
protected-mode yes

What this means: Your databases aren't exposed to the internet. Attackers can't even reach them, let alone brute-force them.

Random Credentials Everywhere

• Database passwords: 32 random characters
• Installation keys: 6 random characters
• Analytics salts: 64 random characters

No more "password123" or "castopod" defaults.

Principle of Least Privilege

FrankenPHP runs as a dedicated castopod user—not root. If the web server is ever compromised, the attacker doesn't get root access to your system.

File ownership follows the same principle:

/var/www/castopod/domain.com/
├── app/                 # owned by root (read-only)
├── public/
│   ├── index.php        # owned by root (read-only)
│   └── media/           # owned by castopod (uploads go here)
├── writable/            # owned by castopod (logs, sessions)
└── .env                 # owned by root (read-only config)

What this means: The web application can only write where it absolutely needs to. An attacker can't modify your application code, even if they find an exploit.

SSL Certificates: Zero Configuration

With Caddy, SSL certificates are truly automatic:

1. Caddy detects your domain from the configuration
2. Obtains certificates from Let's Encrypt on first request
3. Stores them securely in /var/lib/castopod/caddy/
4. Renews them automatically before expiry

No Certbot. No cron jobs. No manual commands. Just add a domain and Caddy handles everything.

Your certificates renew themselves. You'll never think about SSL again.

📦 Install Specific Versions

Need to install a specific Castopod version? Easy:

# Find available versions at:
# https://code.castopod.org/adaures/castopod/-/releases

sudo ./install-castopod.sh -y podcast.com \
  --package-url https://code.castopod.org/-/project/2/uploads/.../castopod-1.13.7.zip

In interactive mode, the script even shows you the URL to the releases page.

📝 Logging Done Right

Every installation creates two types of logs:

1. Main Installation Log

/var/log/castopod-install-20260119_143022.log

Contains:

• Every command executed
• All generated passwords
• System configuration changes
• Error messages (if any)

2. Per-Instance Logs

/var/www/castopod/podcast.example.com/installation.log

Contains:

• Installation URL: https://podcast.example.com/ABC123-install
• Database credentials
• Redis configuration
• FrankenPHP/Caddy paths
• Cron job details
• Debugging commands

Need to know your database password in 6 months? It's in the log. Need to find your Nginx config? It's in the log. Everything is documented.

🔧 Troubleshooting Built In

Each instance log includes a complete debugging section:

# Check application errors
sudo tail -f /var/www/castopod/podcast.com/writable/logs/*.log

# Check web server / FrankenPHP logs
journalctl -u frankenphp -f

# Check Caddy access logs
sudo tail -f /var/log/caddy/podcast.com-access.log

# Check Redis
redis-cli -h 127.0.0.1 ping

# Test scheduled tasks
sudo -u castopod /usr/local/bin/frankenphp php-cli /var/www/castopod/podcast.com/spark tasks:run

# Reload FrankenPHP configuration
sudo systemctl reload frankenphp

Copy-paste ready. No guessing about file paths.

How It Works

Step 1: System Preparation

The script detects your Linux distribution (Debian, Ubuntu, CentOS, RHEL, or Fedora) and upgrades all packages:

# Debian/Ubuntu
apt-get dist-upgrade -y

# CentOS/RHEL/Fedora
yum upgrade -y

Why? Security. You want the latest patches before installing a public-facing web application.

Step 2: Dependency Installation

Installs everything Castopod needs:

• FrankenPHP - Modern PHP application server with built-in Caddy web server
• MariaDB - Database server
• Redis/Valkey - Cache server (Valkey on Fedora 41+, Redis elsewhere)
• FFmpeg - Media processing

That's it. No separate PHP installation, no Certbot, no complex configurations. FrankenPHP bundles PHP with all required extensions and handles HTTPS automatically.

Step 3: Per-Instance Setup

For each domain you specified:

1. Downloads Castopod (latest version or your specified URL)
2. Extracts to /var/www/castopod/DOMAIN/
3. Creates database with random credentials
4. Allocates Redis database number (auto-expands pool if needed)
5. Generates .env file with all configuration
6. Adds domain to Caddyfile with optimized settings
7. Sets up cron jobs in /etc/cron.d/
8. Configures permissions (root owns files, castopod owns only writable/ and public/media/)

SSL certificates? Caddy handles that automatically when the first request comes in. No extra steps needed.

Step 4: You're Done!

The script shows you the installation URLs:

🌐 podcast.example.com
   https://podcast.example.com/ABC123-install

Open that URL, create your admin account, and start podcasting.

Real-World Examples

Example 1: Single Podcast for Personal Use

# Download the script
wget https://castopod.org/install-castopod.sh
chmod +x install-castopod.sh

# Run it (interactive mode)
sudo ./install-castopod.sh

# Follow the prompts:
# - Confirm you want to proceed
# - Enter your domain: mypodcast.com
# - Press ENTER to skip the .env file option

# Done! Open the installation URL and set up your podcast

Example 2: Podcast Network with 10 Shows

# Create a list of domains
DOMAINS="
  show1.podcast-network.com
  show2.podcast-network.com
  show3.podcast-network.com
  tech-show.podcast-network.com
  comedy-show.podcast-network.com
  interview-show.podcast-network.com
  news-show.podcast-network.com
  sports-show.podcast-network.com
  music-show.podcast-network.com
  culture-show.podcast-network.com
"

# Install all at once (non-interactive)
sudo ./install-castopod.sh -y $DOMAINS

Each show gets complete isolation. Each has its own admin panel, database, and configuration.

[SCREENSHOT: Terminal showing multiple successful installations]

Example 3: Automated Deployment with Default Settings

# Create default.env with network-wide settings
cat > default.env <<'EOF'
app.storageLimit=100
app.legalNoticeURL="https://YOUR_WEBSITE/LEGAL_PAGE"
email.protocol="smtp"
email.SMTPHost="YOUR_SMTP_GATEWAY"
email.SMTPPort=587
email.SMTPUser="SMTP_USER_NAME"
email.fromEmail="SMTP_USER_ADDRESS"
email.SMTPPass="SMTP_USER_PASSWORD"
EOF

# Deploy with defaults
sudo ./install-castopod.sh -y \
  new-show.podcast-network.com \
  --env-file default.env

The script appends default.env to each instance's .env file. Consistent configuration across all shows.

The Details That Matter

Videoclips Ready Out of the Box

Castopod lets you generate shareable videoclips from your podcast episodes—perfect for promoting your content on social media. This feature requires FFmpeg, which the script installs automatically. No extra configuration needed. Just upload your episode, select a clip, and Castopod handles the rest.

Large File Uploads: Handled

The script configures both Caddy and PHP for 512MB uploads:

# Caddyfile
request_body {
    max_size 512MB
}

# PHP (via /etc/frankenphp/conf.d/99-castopod.ini)
upload_max_filesize = 512M
post_max_size = 512M
memory_limit = 512M
max_execution_time = 300

Upload your 3-hour podcast episodes without worrying about file size limits.

Redis Database Auto-Expansion

Redis defaults to 16 databases (0-15). Installing your 17th podcast?

Traditional approach: Manually edit /etc/redis/redis.conf, increase databases, restart Redis, hope nothing breaks.

Our script: Detects you're out of databases, backs up the config, increases by 16, restarts Redis, continues installation.

You: Don't even notice.

[ILLUSTRATION: Visual showing Redis database pool automatically expanding from 16 to 32 databases]

Cron Jobs That Actually Work

We learned this the hard way: user crontabs and system cron have different formats.

The script creates cron files in /etc/cron.d/ with the correct format:

# /etc/cron.d/castopod-podcast-example-com

# Run scheduled tasks every minute (only errors are logged)
* * * * * castopod /usr/local/bin/frankenphp php-cli /var/www/castopod/podcast.example.com/spark tasks:run 2>> /var/www/castopod/podcast.example.com/writable/logs/cron-errors.log

# Clean up old sessions daily at 3 AM (only errors are logged)
0 3 * * * castopod find /var/www/castopod/podcast.example.com/writable/session/ -type f -mtime +7 -delete 2>> /var/www/castopod/podcast.example.com/writable/logs/cron-errors.log

Each instance gets its own cron file. Errors are logged to cron-errors.log for easy debugging without filling up disk space.

Separate Caddy Logs Per Domain

Ever tried to debug one site when logs from 10 sites are mixed together? It's painful.

Each instance gets separate logs:

/var/log/caddy/podcast.example.com-access.log
/var/log/caddy/podcast.example.com-error.log

Plus, you can check the FrankenPHP service logs anytime:

journalctl -u frankenphp

Debug one site without sifting through traffic from all the others.

System Requirements

• Operating System: Ubuntu LTS or Debian stable (recommended), or Fedora (latest)
• Root access: You'll need sudo
• DNS configured: Your domain must point to your server's IP
• Ports open: 80 and 443 for SSL certificate generation
• Stable internet: The script upgrades system packages (may take a few minutes)

That's it. No special hardware. No complicated prerequisites.

FAQ

Can I install just the dependencies without any instances?

Yes! Run the script without domain names:

sudo ./install-castopod.sh -y

This installs Nginx, PHP, MariaDB, Redis, FFmpeg, and Certbot—but doesn't create any Castopod instances. Add instances later by running the script again with domain names.

Does this work on existing servers?

Yes. The script is idempotent—it won't reinstall packages that already exist. It's safe to run on servers with other websites.

What if I already have a web server installed?

FrankenPHP runs as its own service on ports 80 and 443. If you have Nginx or Apache already running on those ports, you'll need to either:

• Stop the existing web server: sudo systemctl stop nginx
• Or configure FrankenPHP to use different ports and set up a reverse proxy

For fresh servers, FrankenPHP handles everything. Your existing MariaDB databases won't be affected.

Can I customize the installation?

Yes. The script is thoroughly commented—almost every line has an explanation. You can modify it to fit your needs, or use the --env-file option to provide custom configuration values.

What if something goes wrong?

Check the installation log (path shown at the end of the script). It contains every command executed and all error messages. The per-instance logs also include debugging commands for common issues.

If you're stuck, the logs are extremely helpful for getting support.

How do I uninstall an instance?

The script doesn't include an uninstaller (yet), but each instance log documents what was created:

# Example cleanup for podcast.example.com

# Remove domain from Caddyfile
sudo nano /etc/caddy/Caddyfile  # Remove the podcast.example.com { ... } block
sudo systemctl reload frankenphp

# Remove installation directory
sudo rm -rf /var/www/castopod/podcast.example.com

# Remove database
sudo mysql -e "DROP DATABASE IF EXISTS \`podcast-example-com\`;"
sudo mysql -e "DROP USER IF EXISTS 'podcast-example-com'@'localhost';"

# Remove cron jobs
sudo rm /etc/cron.d/castopod-podcast-example-com

# SSL certificates are managed automatically by Caddy - no manual cleanup needed

Is this production-ready?

Yes. The script:

• Uses stable package versions
• Implements security best practices
• Generates detailed logs for auditing
• Has been tested on multiple distributions
• Handles errors gracefully

Get Started

Download and Run

# Method 1: Direct from the web (easiest)
curl -fsSL https://castopod.org/install | sudo bash

# Method 2: Download first, review, then run (recommended for security)
wget https://castopod.org/install-castopod.sh
less install-castopod.sh  # Review the script first!
chmod +x install-castopod.sh
sudo ./install-castopod.sh

Security reminder: Method 2 is recommended. Always review scripts before running them with sudo.

What to Expect

Time: 5-15 minutes depending on your server's internet speed and whether it needs to upgrade packages.

User interaction (interactive mode):

• Confirm you want to proceed
• Enter domain names
• Optionally provide a default .env file path

User interaction (non-interactive mode): Zero. Perfect for automation.

Result: A fully configured Castopod installation ready for your content.

Why We Built This

Self-hosting shouldn't be hard. Podcasters should spend time creating content, not wrestling with server configurations.

We wanted anyone with a domain name and a server to be able to install Castopod in minutes—not hours or days. We wanted the installation to be secure by default, not after you read 17 blog posts about hardening PHP applications.

This script is our answer: One command. Five minutes. Done.

Resources

• Installation Script: https://castopod.org/install-castopod.sh
• Castopod Releases: https://code.castopod.org/adaures/castopod/-/releases
• Documentation: https://docs.castopod.org
• Source Code: https://code.castopod.org/adaures/castopod
• Report Issues: https://code.castopod.org/adaures/castopod/-/issues
• Community: https://podlibre.social/@castopod
• FrankenPHP: https://frankenphp.dev
• Caddy: https://caddyserver.com

Try It Today

Got a server and a domain? You're 5 minutes away from running Castopod:

curl -fsSL https://castopod.org/install | sudo bash

That's all it takes. (But remember to review the script first if you're security-conscious!)

When Adam Curry launched the Podcasting 2.0 movement in the summer of 2020, few could have predicted the profound impact it would have on the entire podcasting ecosystem. Today, we're witnessing another milestone moment: Apple Podcasts has added support for podcast chapters, including the <podcast:chapters> tag from the Podcasting 2.0 specification.

Three Ways to Add Chapters

With the upcoming iOS 26.2 release in December, Apple Podcasts will support three different methods for implementing chapters on your podcast:

Episode Description: The most accessible method for everyone. Simply add chapter titles and timestamps directly to your episode description, starting the first chapter at 00:00:00 with at least three chapters total. This format works across Spotify and YouTube as well, making it a universal solution.

RSS Feed: Submit chapters through your hosting provider's RSS feed using the <podcast:chapters> tag. This is where Castopod shines—we've supported this Podcasting 2.0 standard from the beginning. This method offers the most flexibility, allowing you to include images and even update chapters after publishing without re-uploading your audio file.

File Metadata: Specify chapters in the header of an MP4 file or by modifying the ID3 tags of an MP3 or AAC file. While this works well for some workflows, these tags can be stripped by certain hosting platforms during processing.

The Not-Invented-Here Syndrome Is Not a Fatality

This marks the second time Apple Podcasts has implemented a Podcasting 2.0 feature, following their adoption of the <podcast:transcript> tag in March 2024. That was a watershed moment: Apple not only embraced the community standard but also automatically generated transcripts for almost every podcast in their catalog using AI. Just as with chapters now, creators could opt out of the AI-generated transcripts by providing their own using the <podcast:transcript> tag—giving podcasters full control while dramatically improving accessibility for millions of listeners.

The transcript rollout followed the exact pattern we're seeing with chapters: Apple supported multiple formats (VTT, SRT), made it easy for any creator to participate, and proved that a major platform could adopt open standards without compromising their user experience. In fact, the integration of transcripts improved Apple Podcasts significantly, enabling full-text search within episodes and better accessibility features.

What we're witnessing is a powerful demonstration that community-driven standards can succeed, even when dealing with one of the largest platforms in the ecosystem. The "not-invented-here" syndrome—the tendency for large companies to reject externally developed solutions—has plagued the tech industry for decades. But Apple's embrace of Podcasting 2.0 specifications proves that collaborative, open standards can win when they solve real problems for creators and listeners alike.

As James Cridland noted in his Podnews analysis, Apple is taking this even further by automatically generating chapters for podcasts that don't have them—using AI to identify natural chapter breaks. James had already speculated about this feature back in September, wondering if Apple would use AI-generated chapters as a way to encourage broader adoption. Creators can easily opt out of these automatic chapters by providing their own using any of the three supported methods.

Why This Matters: Discoverability and Accessibility

Chapters and transcripts aren't just nice-to-have features—they're fundamental to solving one of podcasting's biggest challenges: discoverability.

The heavily decentralized nature of podcasting has always been both its greatest strength and its biggest weakness. Unlike centralized platforms, podcasts can't be easily indexed, searched, or semantically linked. Content that exists only in audio format is essentially invisible to search engines and accessibility tools.

Chapters transform this equation entirely. They enable:

• Better search: Listeners can find specific segments within episodes
• Improved SEO: Search engines can index and rank podcast content more effectively
• Semantic links: Specific moments can be referenced and shared with precision
• Enhanced accessibility: Screen readers and assistive technologies can navigate podcast content more easily
• Faster navigation: Listeners can jump directly to the content they want

When Apple implemented transcript support in March 2024, we saw the entire ecosystem respond. Podcast hosting platforms and listening apps rushed to add support because creators demanded it. The same pattern is already unfolding with chapters.

The Network Effect Begins

Here's what happens next: Now that Apple Podcasts supports the <podcast:chapters> tag, every other platform will follow. We've seen this story before with transcripts. Hosting platforms that don't support chapters will face pressure from their creators. Podcast apps without chapter support will seem antiquated compared to competitors.

Many podcast apps have already implemented chapter support, demonstrating the demand for this feature and proving the viability of the standard. Apple's adoption will accelerate this trend dramatically.

The beauty of open standards is that they create positive network effects. Each platform that adopts the standard makes it more valuable for everyone else. Creators only need to implement chapters once, and they work everywhere. Listeners get a consistent, improved experience across all their apps.

Castopod: Ready from Day One

At Castopod, we've been champions of Podcasting 2.0 since the beginning. Our platform already supports the <podcast:chapters> tag, meaning our users are ready to take advantage of Apple's new chapter support immediately—no updates required, no new workflows to learn.

This is the promise of open-source podcasting infrastructure: when the ecosystem moves forward, you move with it automatically because we're all building on the same foundation.

Looking Forward

When I interviewed Adam Curry about the Podcasting 2.0 initiative, we discussed his vision for a more open, decentralized, and feature-rich podcasting ecosystem. At the time, even I didn't fully appreciate how transformative these efforts would become.

But now, watching major platforms like Apple adopt community-driven standards, the vision is becoming reality. Chapters and transcripts are just the beginning. The Podcasting 2.0 specification includes features for value-for-value payments, cross-app comments, live streaming, persons tags, and much more.

Each time a major platform embraces one of these standards, it validates the entire approach and makes the next adoption easier. The momentum is building, and the future of podcasting looks more open, accessible, and discoverable than ever.

Get Started with Chapters Today

If you're hosting your podcast on Castopod, you already have everything you need to add rich, feature-complete chapters to your episodes. Our implementation of the <podcast:chapters> tag allows you to:

• Add chapter markers with custom titles
• Include images for each chapter
• Update chapters after publishing
• Support all listening apps that implement the standard

The decentralized podcast ecosystem thrives when we work together on open standards. Apple's embrace of Podcasting 2.0 chapters is proof that this collaborative approach works—and a sign of even better things to come.

Want to learn more about implementing chapters in Castopod? Check out our documentation or join our Discord. And if you're interested in the broader Podcasting 2.0 initiative, visit podcasting2.org to see what's next for the open podcast ecosystem.

We’re thrilled to announce the Official Castopod Plugin Repository is live at plugins.castopod.org, the new open‑source hub to discover and manage Castopod plugins!

Inspired by familiar developer package ecosystems, it makes finding, evaluating, and installing plugins straightforward.

You can now:

• Search for plugins that add new features or integrations.
• Browse available plugins by category and purpose.
• Download the plugins bundle as a zip archive in one click.
• Submit your own plugin to share with the community.

🖥️ New CLI commands

Starting with the new v2.0.0-next.4 release, plugins can be installed and managed directly from the terminal using new Castopod CLI commands, making setup faster and consistent across environments.

Example: install a plugin by vendor/name

php spark plugins:add ad-aures/podcast-license

This command fetches the latest version of the “podcast-license” plugin from the official repository and installs it into the plugins/ directory under the ad-aures vendor.

What else can be done?

• update an installed plugin to its latest version.

• remove a plugin cleanly from the instance.

• install multiple plugins declared in a plugins.json file.

See the full command set and workflows in the plugins install docs.

Prefer manual installs?

Drag-and-drop still works: download the plugin from the official repository in one click, place it in the plugins/ directory, and Castopod will load it for you.

✨ Refreshed documentation

To help Castopod users make the most of this new ecosystem, we’ve fully refreshed our documentation.

You’ll find updated guides covering plugin architecture, installation, creation, and submission — all designed to make contributing and extending Castopod as intuitive as possible.

Dive into the new docs to learn how plugins work, how they integrate with your instance, and how to build your own.

👀 Looking forward

This release is a key milestone that closes the loop on the plugins initiative and brings the project another step toward Castopod v2.

The remaining v2.0.0-next.x releases will focus on the major refactorings needed to overhaul media asset management and stabilize Fediverse integration.

Stay tuned — v2 is around the corner, marking a new chapter for Castopod 🚀

The second milestone for Castopod Plugins has been reached!

A few months ago, we've announced Castopod v2, the next major version of Castopod, opening up customization capabilities for the community thanks to the Plugins Architecture.

Since then, we've now created the first 12 plugins of Castopod, each one satisfying different use cases and pushing the limits of the architecture.

At the same time, we've also kept on maintaining v1 and welcomed significant contributions with:

• an awesome user guide (written by Paul Cutler, host of The CircuitPython Show podcast)
• new cool API features (implemented by Nate Ritter)

Introducing the 12 Official Plugins

In recent months, we've been reshaping the Plugins Architecture by developing a collection of official plugins for Castopod. These plugins fall into two categories:

🔺 features previously part of the core that have been extracted
🟢 new features introducing Podcasting 2.0 tags or long-awaited improvements

1. 🟢 custom-head
   add code snippets in the <head> tag of all public pages: inject new meta tags, custom styles, or third-party scripts.
2. 🔺 custom-rss
   inject custom RSS to your feed's channel and items.
3. 🔺 op3
   prefix your episodes url with the Open Podcast Prefix Project (OP3) analytics service.
4. 🔺 owner-email-remover
   remove all occurrences of owner email from the RSS feed.
5. 🟢 podcast-block
   express which platforms are allowed to publicly display your feed and its contents.
6. 🔺 podcast-episode-season
   indicate the podcast's episode or season number and names.
7. 🟢 podcast-images
   add multiple image resources for the podcast in your RSS feeds using <podcast:images>'s Podcasting2.0 tag.
8. 🟢 podcast-license
   indicate the podcast's license
9. 🔺 podcast-medium
   specify the type of medium your RSS feed holds.
10. 🟢 podcast-podroll
    recommend other podcasts.
11. 🔺 podcast-txt
    add freeform text, like a DNS TXT record.
12. 🔺 show-notes-signature
    add a signature to all your episodes show notes, a great way to include your social links in one go.

You can find the source code for these plugins, all licensed under AGPL v3, at https://github.com/ad-aures/castopod-plugins.

Advancing the Plugins Architecture

The majority of the improvements during this period focus on the form builder. When developing a plugin, you can define forms through the settings property in the plugin's manifest.json file. This prompts users in the admin area to input data, which can then be utilized when implementing the plugin's logic in the Plugin.php file. Check out the docs to learn more.

The following updates have been introduced to the form builder:

New field types

• rss: a code editor for writing XML tags, specifically adhering to RSS specifications.
• html: a code editor for creating HTML content.
• group: allows grouping of form fields, requiring a fields property to be specified.

New field properties

• multiple: enables a field to accept multiple entries, allowing users to add additional fields as needed.
• validationRules: defines validation rules to ensure user input is correct.
• defaultValue: specifies a default value for a field.

Other enhancements

• The helper and hint properties are now available for all field types.
• options now support a description property.

The Road to the Final v2 Release

With the recent enhancements and updates, creating a new plugin has become an enjoyable and intuitive process.

👉 Some plugins took us only a few minutes to get up and running!

We’re nearly there!

1. The Plugin Repository

Our next focus will be developing the Plugin Repository, an index of both official and community crafted Castopod plugins.

This future open data & open source repository will enable users to discover, download, and install their favourite plugins to enhance their Castopod experience.

2. Refactor, refactor, refactor

Before the final v2 release, we’ll tackle some long-awaited improvements to enhance UX and address persistent bugs:

1. Media files
   • Implement asynchronous media uploads.
   • Enable sharing of media files and editing of their metadata.
   • Unlock support for alternative media sources.
2. Fediverse
   • Resolve issues with fediverse integration by reworking the module.
   • Add a proper nodeinfo2 route for improved discoverability.
3. PHP 8.4
   • Upgrade the codebase to the latest PHP version for improved stability. PHP 8.4, released on November 23, 2024, is supported until December 31, 2028.

Once complete, we’ll release v2 and assist users in migrating to the new version! 🚀

Open letter initially published in French by the Petites Singularités association, translation by OW2.
To sign it: please publish it on your web site (French, English or both), then add yourself in this table.

Since 2020, Next Generation Internet (NGI) programmes, part of European Commission's Horizon programme, fund free software in Europe using a cascade funding mechanism (see for example NLnet's calls). This year, according to the Horizon Europe working draft detailing funding programmes for 2025, we notice that Next Generation Internet is not mentioned any more as part of Cluster 4.

NGI programmes have shown their strength and importance to support the European software infrastructure, as a generic funding instrument to fund digital commons and ensure their long-term sustainability. We find this transformation incomprehensible, moreover when NGI has proven efficient and ecomomical to support free software as a whole, from the smallest to the most established initiatives. This ecosystem diversity backs the strength of European technological innovation, and maintaining the NGI initiative to provide structural support to software projects at the heart of worldwide innovation is key to enforce the sovereignty of a European infrastructure.
Contrary to common perception, technical innovations often originate from European rather than North American programming communities, and are mostly initiated by small-scaled organizations.

Previous Cluster 4 allocated 27 millions euros to:

• "Human centric Internet aligned with values and principles commonly shared in Europe" ;
• "A flourishing internet, based on common building blocks created within NGI, that enables better control of our digital life" ;
• "A structured eco-system of talented contributors driving the creation of new internet commons and the evolution of existing internet commons" .

In the name of these challenges, more than 500 projects received NGI funding in the first 5 years, backed by 18 organisations managing these European funding consortia.

NGI contributes to a vast ecosystem, as most of its budget is allocated to fund third parties by the means of open calls, to structure commons that cover the whole Internet scope - from hardware to application, operating systems, digital identities or data traffic supervision. This third-party funding is not renewed in the current program, leaving many projects short on resources for research and innovation in Europe.

Moreover, NGI allows exchanges and collaborations across all the Euro zone countries as well as "widening countries"^[1], currently both a success and and an ongoing progress, likewise the Erasmus programme before us. NGI also contributes to opening and supporting longer relationships than strict project funding does. It encourages to implement projects funded as pilots, backing collaboration, identification and reuse of common elements across projects, interoperability in identification systems and beyond, and setting up development models that mix diverse scales and types of European funding schemes.

While the USA, China or Russia deploy huge public and private resources to develop software and infrastructure that massively capture private consumer data, the EU can't afford this renunciation.
Free and open source software, as supported by NGI since 2020, is by design the opposite of potential vectors for foreign interference. It lets us keep our data local and favors a community-wide economy and know-how, while allowing an international collaboration.
This is all the more essential in the current geopolitical context: the challenge of technological sovereignty is central, and free software allows to address it while acting for peace and sovereignty in the digital world as a whole.

[1] As defined by Horizon Europe, widening Member States are Bulgaria, Croatia, Cyprus, the Czech Republic, Estonia, Greece, Hungary, Latvia, Lituania, Malta, Poland, Portugal, Romania, Slovakia and Slovenia. Widening associated countries (under condition of an association agreement) include Albania, Armenia, Bosnia, Feroe Islands, Georgia, Kosovo, Moldavia, Montenegro, Morocco, North Macedonia, Serbia, Tunisia, Turkey and Ukraine. Widening overseas regions are : Guadeloupe, French Guyana, Martinique, Reunion Island, Mayotte, Saint-Martin, The Azores, Madeira, the Canary Islands.

TL;DR

Castopod v2.0.0-next.1 was just released, but it's not the v2… yet! Do not use in production, use the latest v1.x instead.

This release introduces a new Plugins Architecture, a pivotal change for allowing anyone to extend and customize Castopod and make it their own.

During the next months:

• we will be focusing on creating a first batch of plugins
• we will create an official and open repository for plugins
• we will spend some time refactoring and refining Castopod taking into consideration all of the feedback we've got from v1 so far

Now, let's build some plugins! 🚀🙌

Why a Castopod v2?

In short, to focus on building a more modern and robust podcast hosting solution.

Being the only open source podcasting platform on the fediverse, Castopod peeks many interests and different use cases. Moreso after the release of v1 in late 2022.

Now, with hundreds of self hosted instances in dozens of regions, and with the many feature releases and bug fixes… it's time to take a step back and rearrange the pieces to give podcasters even more control over their podcasts.

Castopod is an open source podcasting platform that serves as many podcasts and episodes needed, through a built-in website, RSS feeds and the Fediverse.

It shouldn't do more than that, though it must do it as best as possible.

What's changing?

🏗️ A new Plugins Architecture

This fancy designation basically means that we've added a way for anyone to hook into parts of Castopod and enhance its core features.

This translates to having a new plugins/ folder in the root of Castopod, where you can drop in third-party plugins or even build your own!

A plugin is but a folder with:

1. a manifest (JSON file)
   This file includes the plugin's metadata, permissions, and describes its behavior, ie. which hooks are being used or declaring settings to persist user preferences.
2. a Plugin class (PHP file)
   This class contains the plugin's logic, where the hooks (class methods) are implemented.

As of now, a plugin can extend:

• the Podcast's RSS feed, to edit/add tags into the <channel> and <item> elements
• the site's <head>, to add third party scripts, custom tags and more.

So these two files alone can constitute a plugin… But there's more!

Plugin authors may add a README.md file to guide users, add an svg icon for branding, or even add translation files to make their plugin accessible in multiple languages with internationalization baked in.

More info about plugins: https://docs.castopod.org/next/en/plugins/

📜 A new documentation website

Castopod's docs website was getting a bit rusty.

It was built using an old version (pre v1) of a static builder called VitePress and didn't allow for much.

After some consideration, instead of upgrading the version of VitePress, we've decided to shift to a more powerful docs builder: Astro's Starlight.

Starlight renders more optimized pages for better SEO and will help us rewrite a clearer and straightforward documentation website thanks to its features and components.

With the upgrade, we've included new languages : Catalan 🇪🇸, German 🇩🇪, Spanish 🇪🇸, Serbian (latin) 🇷🇸, Chinese (simplified) 🇨🇳, adding to the already available English 🇬🇧, French 🇫🇷, Norwegian 🇳🇴 and Portugese (Brasil) 🇧🇷 languages.

Moreover, the docs are now versionned, with a develop and a next branch to keep track of differences in coming releases.

Check out the new docs website: docs.castopod.org

What are the next steps?

This first "next" release marks an experimental phase for the coming months to, well… experiment!

That is done by inviting any developer or organization to push the limits of Castopod's Plugins Architecture by building their own plugins.

We are also creating a batch of official plugins to serve new features for Castopod, as well as to show what is possible.

These efforts will help refine the Plugins Architecture, address any limitation we bump into and introduce new hooks if needs be.

Furthermore, at the end of this phase, we'll be building an open repository to host official and community crafted plugins whilst ensuring that anyone can create their own.

In conclusion, you should expect more next releases to come, and with it probably some breaking changes, but that's just how development goes 🙂

Now, let's build some plugins! 🚀🙌

Wanna help?

Do you want to build a plugin?
Checkout the plugins docs on how to get started.

Do you have an idea for a plugin but don't have time to work on it?
Submit an issue on our issue tracker.

Do you want to start podcasting?
Check out castopod.com, and get your Castopod running in just 5 mins!
Or see castopod.org if you want to know more about Castopod, and how you can self-host it.

You can also support us via OpenCollective, or just come and have a chat with fellow podcasters and contributors!

The Art and Craft of Podcasting

Podcasting is a unique form of media that offers creators the freedom to explore diverse topics in formats that range from highly structured to conversational improvisation. The power of podcasting lies in its ability to connect with niche audiences, providing a platform for voices that might otherwise go unheard in conventional media channels.

Tools of the Trade

Digital Audio Workstations (DAWs)

Efficient podcast production relies heavily on robust editing software. Programs like Audacity provide beginner-friendly interfaces, while Ardour caters to those looking for advanced multi-track editing capabilities. These tools are essential for cutting out silences, managing sound levels, and integrating multiple audio tracks seamlessly.

Open Source Platforms

Platforms like Castopod empower podcasters to distribute their content without relying on third-party services. Its integration with open protocols like ActivityPub enables a decentralized approach to sharing content, ensuring creators retain control over their distribution and audience engagement.

Open-source software offers podcasters a vast array of tools to enhance every aspect of podcast production, from recording to distribution. These tools not only support the pyramid's layers but also empower creators with more control and flexibility over their projects.

• Recording and Audio Processing: Ubuntu Studio, PipeWire, and Jack Audio provide robust platforms and frameworks for managing and processing audio, essential for high-quality recording.
• Communication Platforms: Tools like Mumble, BigBlueButton, Jitsi Meet, and Jami offer reliable solutions for recording remote interviews or collaborative podcasting, ensuring clear audio communication.
• Editing Software: Audacity, Ardour, and Zrythm are powerful editing tools that allow detailed manipulation of audio files, making it possible to achieve professional sound quality.
• Broadcasting and Miscellaneous Tools: OBS (Open Broadcaster Software) and Gnome Sound Recorder, mhWaveEdit serve broader broadcasting and simple recording needs, catering to various levels of podcast production.
• Voice Technology and Automation: Innovations like Linto and Whisper assist in transcribing and automating parts of the podcasting workflow, integrating cutting-edge voice recognition technologies.
• Content Management and Publishing: Platforms like Castopod, WordPress with podcasting plugins, and Podcast Generator simplify the podcast publishing process, providing podcasters with full control over their content distribution.
• Podcast Listening Apps: Open-source applications such as AntennaPod, Podverse, Escapepod, and Podcini offer listeners diverse options for accessing podcasts, enhancing audience reach and engagement.

These open-source resources support podcasters at every step of their journey, aligning with the "Podcasting Pyramid" to streamline production and maximize the quality and reach of their podcasts. This holistic ecosystem not only simplifies the technical challenges of podcasting but also nurtures a vibrant community of creators and listeners.

Hardware Essentials

The quality of recording equipment can significantly affect the clarity and professionalism of a podcast. While starting with basic microphones and built-in computer sound cards is feasible, investing in high-quality microphones and external sound cards can greatly enhance audio quality. High-performance mics ensure that the voice is captured clearly, minimizing background noise and echo.

The Podcasting Pyramid

Podcasting can sometimes be an intimidating endeavor, especially when it's hard to determine what aspects are most crucial for success. Inspired by Maslow's hierarchy of needs, the "Podcasting Pyramid" offers a structured approach to prioritize the essential elements of podcast production. This pyramid helps clarify the path from foundational needs to the finer details that elevate a podcast's quality, outlined as follows:

• Echo-Free and Quiet Environment: The base layer ensures that recordings are clear, free from background noise, and other auditory distractions.
• Comfortable Underwear: Recognizing the importance of comfort during long sessions, this level emphasizes practical considerations like wearing comfortable clothing.
• Preparation and Planning: This crucial middle layer underscores the need for careful planning and organization to ensure content is coherent and engaging.
• Powerful Microphone: Moving up the pyramid, the focus shifts to technical necessities, with a powerful microphone essential for capturing high-quality sound.
• Gold-Plated Cables: At the pinnacle, the use of gold-plated cables represents a commitment to the highest audio transmission quality, ensuring every detail is preserved. If you don't know how to spend $50, buy some comfortable underwear instead.

Philosophical Dimensions of Podcasting

The ethos of podcasting is deeply rooted in principles of decentralization and accessibility. Emphasizing open standards like RSS feeds and supporting federated networks through ActivityPub, podcasting advocates for a web environment where content and data are not monopolized by a few large platforms. This approach not only fosters a diverse and vibrant digital ecosystem but also aligns with the broader goals of digital sovereignty and community empowerment.

Common Challenges and Solutions

Technical Hurdles

One of the most common issues podcasters face is technical errors during recording, such as failing to press the record button or selecting the wrong microphone input. Environmental factors also play a critical role; a poorly chosen recording environment can lead to subpar audio quality due to echo or background noise.

Strategic Practices

To avoid common pitfalls, podcasters are advised to conduct thorough pre-recording checks, including sound level adjustments and environment assessments. Regular testing of equipment and backup recording setups can also mitigate potential problems.

Future Directions in Podcasting

Looking ahead, podcasting is set to continue evolving with advancements in technology and the growing community of content creators. The integration of AI-driven tools for tasks like transcription and editing is likely to streamline production processes further. Moreover, as the global conversation around digital rights and open internet standards progresses, podcasting stands as a testament to the potential for a more equitable digital future.

Conclusion

Podcasting is more than just a medium; it's a movement towards more open, accessible, and interconnected forms of media. For anyone looking to enter the world of podcasting, understanding both the technical aspects and the underlying principles of digital distribution is crucial. By embracing the tools and practices discussed, podcasters can create meaningful content that resonates with audiences and withstands the challenges of a rapidly changing digital landscape. Whether you're starting your first episode or looking to refine your production techniques, the world of podcasting welcomes all who are ready to share their voice with the world.

Going further

Dive into the world of open source podcasting with this video from the talk given on May 26th, 2024, at the Open Source Software Days in Lyon, France, featuring Benjamin Bellamy of Castopod and Walid Nouh from the podcast "Projets Libres".

🇧🇪 Vous pouvez retrouver cet entretien en Français sur belginux, site informatif concernant principalement les applications auto-hébergées avec Docker.

This interview was originally written in French for belginux (informative website primarily about self-hosted applications with Docker).

The growing need for people to do so implies the use of various tools, and podcasting is an excellent means to achieve this. Even though the system isn't new (dating back to 2004), it's booming! And significantly so.

belginux offers you an interview with Benjamin Bellamy, the "father" of Castopod, the free application for creating and broadcasting podcasts, but also the creator of The Podcast Font, a resource providing all the icons you need for your podcast website, podcast application, or podcast documents.
Benjamin Bellamy

Benjamin Bellamy is the CEO and co-founder of Ad Aures, a startup founded in 2020, which offers podcast hosting through Castopod.

And it's precisely about Castopod that Benjamin will talk to us!

Thanks to him because for the site's first interview, he was generous with his answers and extremely kind!

From my side, I'm almost done with the site that will host Castopod for belginux, and I have exciting news: Benjamin Bellamy has already given his agreement for us to offer you a podcast! I sense that it won't just be about Castopod but also about free software and open-source! 😎

I think he has a lot to say...!

belginux: How did the idea to create Castopod come about?

Benjamin: Initially (around 2019), Castopod was part of a triptych of three solutions aimed at solving three problems we identified in the world of Podcasting (which we grouped under the initiative "Podlibre", to free Podcasting):

• A decentralized directory, open to everyone, freely, for reading and writing, so as not to depend on Apple's index. Eventually, PodcastIndex (and Podping to a certain extent) met this expectation, probably much better than we could have done!
• A tool for sharing podcasts and podcast episodes, and sharing "timestamps" of podcast episodes, across platforms, so that a listener can share a podcast in a simple and transparent way, with someone who might not use the same listening app. We had built a prototype based on deep linking and... third-party cookies. With these being decommissioned by Google and Apple, the project was stopped, and I don't know if it will ever be reborn.
• A free tool for publishing podcasts to guarantee real freedom of creation for podcasters. Yes, this is Castopod. In 2019, there were no more modern, open-source podcast hosting solutions. Yet, we are very attached to the decentralized and open architecture of Podcasting. The risk of "YouTubisation" of Podcasting, which has become evident in recent months, has always existed. ("YouTubisation" means locking creation into a pretty and convenient ecosystem but also a closed one and controlled by a single actor.)

belginux: In your opinion, what makes Castopod an ally of choice for hosting, creating, and publishing podcasts?

Benjamin: We weren't very imaginative concerning the foundations of Castopod: we tried to create the WordPress of Podcasting.

The idea was therefore that anyone could "easily" (as easily as WordPress...) install Castopod, even on a PHP/MySQL shared hosting service costing 2€ a month: by downloading a zip file, you would only have to "upload" it to your server, and then follow the installation wizard.

And that's what we did!

Type castopod.zip in your browser's address bar (yes, try it), and off you go!
Thanks to this design, i.e., no need for a big expensive server, no complicated installation procedure, Castopod allows everyone to self-host.

And self-hosting is the key to freedom: as a podcaster, you alone decide what content you put online, and no one (as long as you respect the law, of course) can censor you.
Castopod gives power back to creators over their content.

But what makes a podcast valuable is not just the content: a podcast's value is also its audience.
And we see this every day with the big tech companies: they "lend" you an audience, an audience that does not belong to you and that they can take back at the slightest misstep, justified or not. They alone decide the rules.

That's why Castopod has been connected (well, almost always, since alpha-42 version) to the Fediverse and Mastodon thanks to the ActivityPub protocol: this allows interactions ("likes", comments, shares...) with listeners from any server in the Fediverse, without centralized control.
It is essential to guarantee direct contact, without intermediaries, between a podcast and its audience.

With Castopod, creators take back the control that big tech companies had appropriated.

Finally, Castopod was designed to meet the needs of everyone, amateurs, professionals: each installation or "instance" of Castopod can host as many episodes and podcasts as you want with manageable rights, but also publication on all listening apps (Apple, Spotify, Deezer, Podcast Addict, Pocket Casts, AntennaPod...), the creation of videograms, a PWA app, "widgets" (players embeddable on all websites), geolocation of podcasts and episodes, podcast import, monetization, listening statistics, content pages, private episodes, scheduling publications, integration of subtitles and chapters, and still quite a few surprises!

belginux: Why did you choose to make it open-source?

Benjamin: In fact, Castopod would not exist if it were not open-source. Historically, it's even its primary “raison d'être”.

There are about a thousand podcast hosts (among which about a hundred are "visible", meaning those we hear about regularly).
So, there's little interest in being the 1001st.
However, we couldn't find any modern, comprehensive, and open-source solutions. Castopod came to fill this gap we felt.

And again, the podcast is open and decentralized: it's the ideal ecosystem for open-source.

Finally, we received support (including from NLnet) for the development of Castopod precisely because it is open source.

belginux: There is often a lot of confusion when we talk about free software, Castopod being free software, does that necessarily mean it's free and that we can do anything with it?

Benjamin: We often confuse three very different notions: open-source, free, and gratis. Castopod is all three.

This confusion is even more common as English speakers have one word ("free") for both "libre" and "gratis" (differentiated by "free as in free beer", gratis, and "free as in free speech", libre).

Free, according to the Free Software Foundation (FSF), means:

• the freedom to run the program for any purpose;
• the freedom to study how the program works, and change it to make it do what you wish;
• the freedom to redistribute copies so you can help your neighbor;
• the freedom to distribute copies of your modified versions to others.

Open-Source means the source code is published, i.e., the internal workings of the software are not secret and are publicly known. For a user, open-source has no interest: it's "free" that is important.
In practice, free software is always open-source, but the reverse is not necessarily true: open-source software can be not free.

Gratis means you can use the software without financial compensation.
Free software or open-source software can very well be paid.

And to answer your question, yes, you can do anything with Castopod, as long as you respect its AGPLv3 license.
This means, to simplify, that if you modify Castopod and make it operate on a publicly accessible server, you must also share your code modifications under the same AGPLv3 license.

belginux: Does Castopod have a business model?

Benjamin: Yes, and it even has several!

• Castopod benefited from European NGI0 aid through NLnet.
• It's possible to support Castopod through donations on castopod.org.
• By contacting us, it's possible to request the development of a particular feature.
• Finally, if you don't want to manage hosting, updates, etc., it's possible to get hosted by going to castopod.com: your podcast will be online in less than two minutes (with your own domain name if you wish).

belginux: In the case where someone is convinced by the idea of using Castopod but doesn't have the technical skills to install it or simply doesn't want to waste time doing so, preferring to devote their time to creativity, is there a way to use Castopod nonetheless?

Benjamin: Yes, it's possible by going to castopod.com!

belginux: How many people are working on the development of Castopod, and what are their roles?

Benjamin: Today, the main contributor and grand architect of Castopod is my partner Yassine Doghri. However, there are still some bugs and comments of my creation. 😉
About fifty contributors also participate, with varying degrees of involvement (developments, bug tickets...), and 90 have participated in translations of Castopod into about thirty languages!

belginux: If someone wants to join your team and work on the development of Castopod, are there any opportunities, any vacancies?

Benjamin: Yes, of course!
We are always open and ready to meet all talents, whatever they may be and as atypical as they are, as long as they share with us the values of free software!

Conclusion

As long as you host it, Castopod won’t cost you a dime to use and is open-source. Moreover, if you encounter any issues, their Discord offers flawless support.

I know what I’m talking about; I’ve been working with it for several months, from my first installation of Castopod to testing, with the intention of hosting belginux's podcasts. I received all the necessary help and contributed by doing translations.

The lead developer, Yassine, is more than willing to answer your inquiries and questions with a lot of kindness!

What more could people ask for?

Just because an application is free doesn't mean you can't contribute to it, either through translations, a donation, or just a star on Github!

And don't forget, belginux has made an amaziiiiiing tutorial on installing Castopod!

Image by Dall·e: a cute 3D cartoon-style image of a penguin and whale exploring the streets of Brussels.

🇫🇷 Vous pourrez retrouver cet article en Français dans le numéro 3 de Podcast Magazine (1^er magazine dédié au Podcast en France), disponible au numéro ou par abonnement, en version papier ou électronique.

This interview was originally written in French for issue 3 of “Le Podcast Magazine” (1st magazine dedicated to the Podcast in France).

Benjamin Bellamy: Hello John, can you tell us what drove you to create OP3?
John Spurlock: This followed discussions I had during Podcast Movement. It came shortly after Spotify's acquisition of Chartable and Podsights. My idea was to change from the traditional model. With the tools available today, I think it's easier to create a reusable infrastructure for podcasts, and this prevents the misuse of listener data by private companies. Podcasters are just looking to get reliable statistics on their audiences. With OP3 (Open Podcast Prefix Project), I envisioned a simple solution, offering public pages and information accessible to everyone in the podcast industry. OP3 is public, which is crucial as podcasting is known for its transparency. Unlike closed music platforms, we lack information on the popularity and trends of podcasts in different regions. OP3 aims to fill this gap by offering transparency comparable to platforms like YouTube.

BB: How does it work?
JS: In terms of analytical standards, OP3 follows the IABv2 specification, but with a more rigorous approach to classifying bots and processing IP addresses. We use an open list for user agents (listening software), updated in collaboration with the “Open Podcast Analytics Working Group” to ensure uniformity and reliability in our analyses. Furthermore, what we do with OP3 can be easily replicated by others, as we have published the project as open source. This means that everyone can view our code and understand our decisions. This is a unique approach in the industry and aims to build trust.

BB: You collect data, is it sensitive?
JS: In terms of compliance, especially with GDPR, we have a minimal approach to data collection. IP addresses are the only personal data handled, and they are immediately hashed. We use Cloudflare's services for all data management, thus ensuring their security and confidentiality. All data transformations are visible in our code and are never stored. In fact, as an administrator, I don't even have the ability to see IP addresses, as they are not retained.

BB: But the real novelty is making open data, right?
JS: Yes, regarding the open data aspect, I think one of the great assets of the Internet is the ecosystem it generates. As a podcaster, you can publish without asking anyone's permission. Similarly, data should be open to stimulate innovation. If your podcasts are popular, it's better to demonstrate this with open and accessible data, allowing other players to add value to what you do. At OP3, we apply this philosophy to both our podcasts and our data. Currently, OP3 focuses mainly on providing data to podcasters, then to podcast applications, and finally to the industry as a whole. The idea is not to allow the download of a complete database like PodcastIndex.org does, but to provide specific statistics and analyses. Users can get data on specific podcasts if they know their URLs. We may consider making the data more widely available on a paid basis in the future to support the project.

BB: But are the data of a podcast free?
JS: OP3 is free for podcasters and offers total transparency. The statistics of a podcast cannot be private; they are public by default. For a podcast's data to be available on OP3, it must also be listed in PodcastIndex.org.

BB: OP3 follows the IABv2 standard, is it certified?
JS: Regarding IABv2 certification, although we follow their guidelines, certification is not our priority due to its high cost. While I'm not opposed to certification, it would need to be financially viable.

BB: Indeed, the OP3 servers have a cost, what is the business model?
JS: Concerning the funding and viability of OP3, the goal is to minimize costs using innovative infrastructure techniques. OP3 operates on a global CDN, making it very reliable. We accept support and receive contributions of $100 to $500 per month. We currently manage about a thousand podcasts, but the goal is to increase this number. Infrastructure costs will increase slightly with expansion, but we hope to maintain a sustainable model through sponsorship.

BB: Can you tell us what OP3 has in store for the future?
JS: Regarding the development of OP3, the goal is to improve integrations with podcast hosts and to make our service known to more podcasters. We are also looking to improve integrations with third-party systems for better data management.

BB: Thank you, John, for all these answers! A word to conclude?
JS: I think that the reliability of data in the podcast industry is a crucial issue. I am convinced that the transparency and openness of OP3 contribute to a better understanding and improvement of the entire sector.

Illustrations by Katerina Limpitsouni

🇫🇷 Vous pourrez retrouver cet article en Français dans le numéro 3 de Podcast Magazine (1^er magazine dédié au Podcast en France), disponible au numéro ou par abonnement, en version papier ou électronique.

This article was originally written in French for issue 3 of “Le Podcast Magazine” (1st magazine dedicated to the Podcast in France).

Since their emergence in the early 2000s, podcasts have continued to grow their audiences, reaching increasingly numerous and diverse publics. A significant milestone was reached in 2014 with 'Serial', a podcast by American journalist Sarah Koenig (produced by NPR), which quickly exceeded 5 million downloads and ultimately reached an astronomical 340 million downloads by 2018! The podcast advertising market, rather nascent until then, rapidly developed and strengthened, much like the radio advertising market had a century before. The need for reliable audience measurement tools thus became indispensable: 'How many listeners heard my advertising message?', 'When?', 'Where?' are legitimate questions that advertisers expect answers to. However, providing this information is not as simple as one might expect.

Indeed, two challenges make podcast audience measurement... frankly complicated!

First challenge: Podcasts are decentralized. Unlike centralized platforms born after the 2000s (such as Facebook, YouTube, etc.), Podcasts are not controlled by a single actor. Even though Apple Podcasts has long dominated, podcast technology has always been open and interoperable. This is excellent news because it results in an eclectic, thriving, and free ecosystem. In practice, this means that podcasts are not all stored on a centralized system but are distributed across hundreds of different hosts – at the podcasters' choice – and listeners can choose from hundreds of listening applications! There is no single point where all listens could be measured – as is the case with YouTube, for example. Measurements at a particular host will not provide data on podcasts hosted elsewhere, and measurements on a given listening application will not provide data on listeners using other applications: Podcasts are decentralized, and so is their audience measurement.

However, akin to Google Analytics for websites, solutions that fit between hosts and listening applications – often called 'Podcast Prefixes' – have emerged. Among them are Chartable, Podtrac, and OP3 – there are others. Their operation is clever because it is quite simple: it interposes the 'Podcast Prefix' between the RSS feed and the MP3 file.

Second challenge: Podcasts were born before the era of “hyperconnectivity”. The original podcast technology - MP3 files in an RSS feed - comes from the 90s when Internet connections were not permanent. I'm talking about a time that those under twenty may not know, but modems in those days would disconnect the phone: they blocked the telephone line when connected, and Internet was paid by the minute! 'Streaming' (i.e., downloading files while listening) was unthinkable, and files had to be downloaded in advance to listen once disconnected. And this technology is still used today. Most podcast audience measurement tools cannot count 'listens' (which would be possible with streaming), but they count 'downloads'. However, it is technically impossible to know if a downloaded file will ultimately be listened to, so listening statistics are in fact only download statistics.

Finally, a podcast can be downloaded completely anonymously, without ever having to create a user account. In an age where GDPR struggles to protect us from systematic profiling, this seems barely believable: a podcast can still be listened to without any 'login' or 'cookie'. Demographic data (age, gender, etc.) are therefore generally not known, except within certain listening platforms. (For example, it is impossible to use Spotify without giving your birth date. And while you are not required to specify your gender, the question is still asked…)

But then, how do you measure a podcast's audience? There are several ways to proceed. Each will measure one of the links in the podcast chain. Each implements its own methodology, each with its advantages and disadvantages.

Measurements can thus be made:

• Directly on the hosting platform
• Between the host and the listening application – the famous 'Podcast Prefixes'
• In the listening application
• By survey.

Let's start with some bad news: the most technically advanced solution proposed by the American radio network NPR, RAD (Remote Audio Data), never really saw the light of day. It was boycotted by Apple and Google even before it was implemented once. It would have allowed for reliable and precise listening data. In simple terms, it was meant to insert temporal markers into an MP3 file (for example, at the time of broadcasting an advertisement) and to notify a server each time a listening application passed one of these markers.

Regarding free third-party services that also offer a paid option, utmost caution is advised: these generally provide a basic service for free. Then, they charge for access to your own data, data that they can further capitalize on by publishing global overviews on hundreds of podcasts.
An exception should be made for OP3: although it is also a free third-party service, it has three unique features:

• The free offer gives access to all your data, so there is no paid offer.
• It is open-source, meaning all its programs are freely accessible.
• It is open-data, meaning the data it generates are accessible to everyone (not just to podcasters).
  In the long run, OP3 could well become a reference and provide completely new information.

As for hosts, almost all provide comprehensive statistics, often at no additional cost. Some can even aggregate their data with partial but informative data (age, gender, etc.) retrieved from listening applications (Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Deezer, etc.). Finally, it is sometimes possible to download all your raw statistics (with Castopod for instance 😉).
Note that almost all hosts follow the IABv2 standard.

And precisely, this IABv2 standard, now universally used, deserves explanation.
It is a free standard, freely available on the IAB Tech Lab website, implemented by many solutions. It can be implemented either by a 'Podcast Prefix', i.e., a third-party measurement service, or directly by a host (which is the case for most of them).
It can lead to certification, meaning that for a few thousand euros, the IAB will certify that the measurement tools in place comply with the standard.
The goal is to compare audiences, ensuring homogeneity in the counting method. Indeed, if you thought that one download number was just like another, think again: there are many ways to count.
Note also that the IABv2 standard was primarily designed to reassure advertisers who want to be sure that when they pay for a thousand listens, they get their money's worth.
In short, the rules to follow are as much as possible:

• Count only downloads of sufficient duration (to ensure the advertisement was heard). Therefore, downloads corresponding to a duration of less than a minute are excluded.
• Count only once the episodes downloaded multiple times by the same listener over a 24-hour period.
• Exclude all downloads made by robots.

We say 'as much as possible' because this standard was designed to work in the podcast ecosystem, which we have seen is quite restrictive. We are talking about the number of 'downloads' and not the number of 'listens'.
Moreover, unlike websites, podcast listening applications do not have 'Cookies' or other trackers: it is technically impossible to accurately identify a listener. Therefore, the listener is identified based on their IP address and the listening software used. If a listener changes IP, for example, switching from their professional connection to their personal connection, they will be seen as... two different listeners.

However, in the end, the errors don't matter as long as everyone makes the same ones: what counts is having a common reference point for comparison. Indeed, even with an ultra-accurate measurement of listens, how can we guarantee that the listener was attentive and focused at the time of the message that matters to us? This is part of the pitfalls of any measurement and is not specific to podcasts. The challenge is more about the comprehensiveness and availability of data than the way they were generated. In this respect, OP3 seems to meet all our expectations, provided this solution is widely adopted.

🇫🇷 Vous pourrez retrouver cet entretien en Français dans le numéro 3 de Podcast Magazine (1^er magazine dédié au Podcast en France), disponible début 2024, au numéro ou par abonnement, en version papier ou électronique.

This interview was originally written in French for issue 3 of “Le Podcast Magazine” (1st magazine dedicated to the Podcast in France).

Benjamin Bellamy : How did you get started in the radio / podcast industry? What's your story?

James Cridland : Well, I always wanted to get involved in radio and audio. Even when I was at school, I was at a boarding school in the middle of nowhere and I worked out how to grab a little radio transmitter and produce a pirate radio station which was great fun. I’ve always wanted to play around with audio and radio and that sort of thing. And so as soon as I left school my first job was working in a radio company in Yorkshire in England — and this will really show how old I am — my first job was carrying the mobile phone for one of our reporters. Mobile phone was one of these great big things, you know, it was incredibly heavy carrying it around. It was a bit like a suitcase and I had to carry that around. And when I wasn't doing that, I was editing magnetic tape. So yes, long, long, long time ago. And I've been involved in audio, radio and podcasting ever since.

BB: You also worked at the BBC?

JC: Yes, I've worked in lots of different commercial radio stations across the UK. I worked for the BBC as well for a couple of years. And so I moved to the BBC after working at Virgin Radio where I ended up launching in 2004 the first mobile phone app in the world to stream radio stations. So we launched it on six different Symbian phones, this is how long ago that was.
We may have launched it on more phones than we actually had listeners. It wasn't a tremendous instant runaway success, but we didn't have Wi-Fi in phones in those days. So of course it was very expensive to stream audio and stream radio. So that was a very difficult thing.
And while I was at Virgin Radio, I wrote the first RSS feed for a daily podcast from a radio station in the UK. So we jumped into podcasting very early, and in fact six months earlier than Apple did.
So it was great and exciting when Apple got involved in podcasting. We'd already been there for six months. It was quite validating in a way. That was a great experience.
And then I went to work for the BBC for a couple of years looking at iPlayer, which was at the time their radio player and their radio app.
And after that I've been working for myself but being a consultant to lots of different companies across the world, including a few in France, helping people understand where the future is going in terms of audio consumption.

BB: So at the time when you were working for the BBC, you were already in the podcast ecosystem?

JC: I'd been involved tangentially in podcasting for quite some time, having worked at Virgin Radio on a number of different podcasts, but basically taking radio content and making them available in terms of podcast content. And we tried a lot of innovative and exciting things there. And then, yes, mostly my work at the BBC was around making sure that the catch-up radio worked very well. So you could go back and listen to any show streaming from the 50 radio stations that we ran.
I've always been interested in radio and audio in all of its forms, and podcasting is just another way of reaching audiences. Very early, I went to the first podcast conference in London, which was in 2004. And I remember being shouted at, because there were all of these indie podcasters there, all these “native podcasters”, as you would call them in France, who were there, and they really resented a large commercial radio company being involved in the whole podcast ecosystem. And I was there talking about seeing if we could free up some of the music that we had to be pod safe, and so you could play them on podcasting, and sharing all of our figures, and sharing how we produced all of these systems to automatically produce all of these shows. But people weren't particularly interested in that. They were more interested in shouting at me and saying “Why are you involved in this?!”. And so I've been very aware from then on, that actually there are some people in the podcast ecosystem — and I think this is particularly the case in France — some people who are particularly annoyed that commercial radio and public radio are involved in podcasting, but doing it a different way. There are quite a lot of people who would rather it was just left to the independents. I think there's space for everyone. And that's what excites me about it.

BB: What are your activities now? What is your job?

JC: My job is writing the Podnews newsletter every single day. That's what pays my salary these days. I came up with the idea of doing the newsletter in 2017. I was at a big radio conference.
And I was chatting with a friend of mine, and he was saying “Where do you get your podcast news from?”, and I said “Well, you know, it's not really anywhere, is there?”. And we had a quick chat about it. I then came home again and I thought, maybe there's something there in doing a newsletter about podcasting. I'd already done a weekly newsletter about radio and the future of radio so I knew how to do that bit. I ended up being in the right place at the right time, starting a newsletter about podcasting. And so I've been doing that ever since late May 2017. That's what I now earn the majority of my money from. I'm still doing a little bit of radio consultancy work. But it's mostly doing podcast stuff and writing the daily newsletter.

BB: You get the money from the sponsors. Is that correct?

JC: Yes. So there's sort of three income streams there.
There's sponsored things that appear in the newsletter.
There is classified advertising, which anybody can afford to go into that newsletter.
And then there are supporters as well, people that believe in what I do and pay a monthly amount of money, and there's value for value as well. So it's a good mix of both advertisers, but also people who are supporters of what I do and find an awful lot of value in the sort of thing that I end up doing every single day.

BB: This is the daily newsletter. There is also a weekly podcast, which used to be called “Podland”, but is now called “Podnews Weekly Review”. Can you tell me why you changed the title?

JC: Sam Sethi, my co-host, will tell you that the reason why I called it Podland is that I didn't know whether it would be any good or not and I didn't want to put the Podnews name onto something that would be crap. But at the time, Podnews was actually running a weekly newsletter, if you knew where to look. So I didn't really want to call it the Podnews Weekly because that would be confusing. So I really wanted to point out that it is a different thing.
It's a review of the week's news. That's what it's there for. So I wasn't quite comfortable with calling it anything to do with Podnews. But the closer that I worked together with Sam, the more that I understood that actually it was really helpful that it shared the same brand, that we were able to pull our resources and do things under that brand. And that's what we ended up doing, so we changed its name in the beginning of this year and that's been very helpful. It's allowed people to understand that I'm not just somebody that sort of hides away and doesn't really have much of an opinion in the newsletter, which has a daily podcast as well. That's also had a really nice, you know, effect in terms of growing that audience.
So Podnews daily is exactly the same as the newsletter, it's me reading out the newsletter.
We keep all of the guests to the Podnews Weekly Review, where most of the time it's Sam interviewing them and I also interview a fair amount of people for the Podcast Business Journal, which is a very business focused newsletter that I send out every single week.

BB: How do you approach selecting guests or topics to ensure engaging and informative episodes?

JC: Quite a lot of the time it's whoever Sam wants to talk to. And Sam is a fascinating character. He knows an awful lot of people. He's been involved in the online world for many, many years. He used to work for Netscape, used to work at TechCrunch, he knows lots of people at Microsoft. So he has a tremendous address book and is very good at reaching out and asking people to talk to them. We focus on people who we find interesting and that are doing interesting things, which is one of the reasons why you've been on so many times. There are really interesting folk out there and it's really nice to end up talking with them.

BB: How did you and Sam meet? How did you end up producing a weekly podcast?

JC: Well, Sam ended up inviting me to take part in a virtual podcast event that he was running. I'd actually heard of Sam for many years prior to that, but I don't think we had ever spoken. And so all of a sudden he says “Why don't we do a podcast together?”, and I was there thinking “Yes, that would be interesting, why don't we do a podcast together?”.
The first time that we met was nine months after we'd started the show, in podcast movement in Los Angeles. That was the first time that we had actually ever met face to face.

BB: In “Le Podcast Magazine” #2, I interviewed Adam Curry and David Jones about Podcasting 2.0. I've seen you very active in the podcasting 2.0 community. Do you consider yourself as a part of this movement, this community?

JC: I'm not a part of Podcasting 2.0, but I certainly help wherever I can. And whether that's making sure that some of the new podcasts that I'm covering are in the Index, because that's important. I enjoy playing around with technical stuff. I enjoy pushing the envelope, trying new things, trying new ideas. Those sorts of things keep me interested in the world of Podcasting. And so if there are interesting new ideas that I can very easily implement on my side, then I will absolutely do that. So that's been quite fun to end up doing.
But also quite fun to basically help promote what Podcasting 2.0 is doing. We have a section every Monday in the pod news newsletter called the Tech Stuff, and that focuses very much on the much more technical side of podcasting. It was only natural that if there are new and interesting things going on with RSS feeds and all of that, then I'm really excited to be involved in that.

BB: When were you aware of Podcasting 2.0's existence?

JC: Well, I was aware of the Podcast Index, which was the first thing that Adam and Dave were working on. And I was aware of that pretty early on. I've always been interested in the openness of podcasting and the openness of the podcast ecosystem. And that's exactly what Adam and Dave were talking about. I've always been sort of railing against the fact that Apple seems to be running the entire podcast ecosystem. Apple seems to have the only database of podcasts that was out there that anybody could actually use. And I was very keen that there was someone else in that field to help us and to help podcast app developers, and other people try something new and interesting. Then once Adam and Dave were talking about new features for RSS. I thought, well, this sounds exactly like the sort of thing that I'm really interested in. So everything that Adam and Dave have been doing has been really interesting to me.

BB: Adam Curry doesn't mince his words when he disagrees with someone, including you. Are you two getting along?

JC: Yes, I think so. Absolutely. He and I are very similar, actually. We both are very obsessive about what we are interested in. And that means that if people either don't get it or are willfully not getting it, then we will not be particularly happy about that. But what is exciting about the whole Podcasting 2.0 ecosystem is that actually people are incredibly passionate about what they are doing. And sometimes that means that people's ideas clash and that's actually great. I would much rather that than interminable meetings and people saying one thing and doing the other and blah, blah, blah. At least you know where you stand. So that's a good thing.

BB: Podcasting 2.0 is mainly about features. What are the things that really matter to you?

JC: From my point of view, transcripts is a big thing, so that you can actually see what was talked about in a podcast, but also closed captions that appear on a podcast app's screen. Those are really important, not just for accessibility and making sure that everybody can consume a podcast, but also they're important in terms of understanding what's in a show, understanding what people are talking about, trying to get a bit more of a grip on some of the things that are talked about in a particular show. That's really helpful, too. So the podcast transcript tag is a very important side of that. And, of course, that has coincided very much with AI and very freely available, at least in the English language, podcast transcription tools.
I have a particular soft spot for the location tag. The location tag in Podcasting 2.0 is about what this particular episode is about. So it's got nothing to do with where you record it, but it's much more to do with what the show is all about. I'm particularly interested, and there are very few people who have implemented it fully, but I'm particularly interested in the OpenStreetMap integration. Because that should enable you to go “I want to see all of the podcasts that are about museums in Paris”. Because OpenStreetMap has all of that information, and the podcast location tag also has all of that information. So you should be able to go “Every podcast about railway stations in Germany”. And it should be able to pull that kind of information out. And that will be really exciting.
There's a company that I'm an advisor for, called Maps.fm, which does a little bit of that but it's not using fully the podcast location tag. However, that is making an awful lot of geographical podcast content available and I'm super excited about where that might end up going.

BB: Yes, I don't think that you can fetch podcasts from OpenStreetMap yet.

JC: No, but what you can do is you can pull in from OpenStreetMap, “Give me a list of IDs that are museums in Paris”. And you can then look at that list of IDs and then look at the Podcast Index and go, “Which of these IDs actually exist in the index?”. Nobody is yet doing it. Partially because nobody is yet properly using it. I think Castopod is one of the only podcast hosting companies who is actually doing this. But if there were more companies using this, both in terms of location on an episode level, but also tying into OpenStreetMap, then you can actually pull all of that information out. And that would be a super exciting thing.

BB: You present yourself as a radio futurologist, how do you see the future of podcasting?

JC: Well we could sort of broaden this out and look at the future of radio as well. There are two things that are happening with audio.
So, yes, there's lots of music radio stations. The future for music radio stations that just play music is not particularly exciting. I don't think it's a very good future because there are much better technological solutions than a radio station to play you music that you would like, I'm afraid, at the end of the day. And I used to be a music radio DJ so I should possibly be one of the people that is most sad about that, but that is, I'm afraid, the way that things are going.
However, radio, the idea of live radio, the idea of feeling as if you're part of a community as you're listening to something, that shared experience and that human connection is a really important thing. And that isn't going to go away any time soon. Actually, when we have a look at radio consumption these days, then it's still incredibly high. Nine out of ten people are tuning into the radio every single week, in most countries. No matter how you calculate those figures — because every single country calculates them in a very different way — but it always comes down to nine out of ten people every single week are still listening in some way, shape or form. And that's a really good thing. I suspect, though, that we're going to see much more on-demand content, which means much more podcasting
and much more of that sort of thing happening. That's where podcasting comes in because typically we've had an experience on radio where it's been a local experience because that's all that radio can do.
If you have a transmitter which is in Lille, it'll broadcast to Lille, it won't broadcast much further than Lille. Therefore, your “raison d'être” is to broadcast to Lille. That is not something that podcasts excel in. Podcasts excel in communities, but communities of common interest rather than communities of location. Actually you can focus much more on really serving your audience. If your audience is really into underwater knitting, then great, here's the podcast for people who like knitting underwater. That's what podcasting can be really, really good at. And so I see very much the future of podcasting as being less mainstream shows — although there will still be large mainstream shows — but shows that are focused more on niche communities, communities of common interest. That's what podcasting can really benefit from.
And the fact that it's on demand, the fact that with new features we can have comments, we can have feedback from the audience, we can have all kinds of new and interesting, exciting things happening is very good for where the future of podcasting is going.

BB: I heard that you have a strong opinion about “RSS holding podcasting back”. Can you explain that to us?

JC: Yes, there are quite a lot of people, and quite senior people in podcasting, who have this real downer about RSS and say “If only RSS didn't exist, podcasting would be so much larger”. I'm always really surprised by that and I try to get to the bottom of what they mean.
“What is the problem with RSS?”
“Why is it holding podcasting back?”
“What is the alternative?”
Almost everybody who I talk to, it comes back to statistics, to measurement. Because they sell advertising, they want to know exactly how many people are listening, who they are, what they're doing, all of that kind of information. And that isn't part of the RSS system and it's very unlikely to be part of the RSS plan as you go forward, because there's no easy way of getting information back about your audience. And frankly, it's very unlikely that there ever will be, because you need app developers to put this kind of spying into their apps and then send it all the way back and everything else.
So really, what people are saying, when they're saying that RSS isn't the future of podcasting, what they're really saying is that “Open” isn't the future for podcasting. Because open RSS is what makes podcasting work. And if you take the openness away, because you want all of this spying on people to get really good measurement, then you take the whole open nature of podcasting away and that, I think, would kill the entire industry. Because the whole excitement of podcasting is that I can podcast from this room in Australia and I can be on the same platform as Joe Rogan, I can be on the same platform as the Daily from the New York Times or any of the other “Choses à savoir”, any of the other really large shows. That's what makes podcasting exciting to me.

BB: Do you think Spotify will renew Joe Rogan’s contract?

JC: Oh, I would have thought that Joe Rogan's contract is going to be really interesting to watch. I would guess that Spotify probably will. It's still the number one show. The latest Top 50 podcasts has just come out from Edison Research and they say that Joe Rogan Experience, again, number one. So I'm sure that Spotify would like to hold on to him. But I would also imagine that Joe may be interested in getting more ears hearing his stuff. And so, therefore, that might mean that he might be interested in something which is a bit more open or potentially even looking at somebody like YouTube or someone else to actually partner with. So it will be interesting to see whether or not Joe Rogan is still an exclusive this time next year. I suspect that he'll still be with Spotify, but I suspect that we will be able to hear his excellent podcast, he says, on many other platforms other than just the Spotify platform.

BB: But whether it's Spotify or YouTube, aren't you afraid that these platforms are going backward and against the openness of the RSS feed?

JC: I think that YouTube, as it currently stands, is a really bad thing for podcasting, if we see YouTube as being where the future of podcasting is going. If it's another place to sling your podcast and make sure that a few people have a listen to it, then great, that's fine, I don't see a problem with that. But if YouTube becomes the predominant way that we consume podcasts, then most people in podcasting will be out of a job.
There won't be any advertising sales for podcasts because YouTube will be doing that.
There won't be any podcast hosting companies because YouTube will be doing that.
There won't be any of these things going on because YouTube will swallow all of that up because they're not part of the open RSS experience.
Spotify, for all of its people saying how bad it is, it's still part of the open podcasting experience. I can still be there if I want to be. Now, sure, they've got exclusives and stuff like that as well, but the fundamentals are that they still come and take my show from my MP3 hosting company and I can still reach all of the people who are using that particular app without any extra work. Very different world once you come into the whole YouTube environment and it worries me in terms of what it might mean if YouTube is very successful.
Having said that, it is Google's fourth attempt at trying to understand how to play podcasting. They've failed in the previous three, so doubtless they'll fail on this one as well. I think Google is very good at one thing and one thing only and that's search and they haven't actually launched a big product in the last 10 years, which is an astonishing thing to actually realize that the last massive launch that they had, well, I mean it was Google Plus and see what happens to that. So that we're relatively safe. I think that Google will mess this up as they've messed everything else up over the last 10 years, but who knows what the future might be.

BB: When I was preparing this interview, I was looking at all the pictures I took of you to illustrate this article, and the first one I found, from Podcast Movement 2019, was you talking about Google Podcasts.

JC: Yes, that was a very peculiar thing. They ended up saying, “We've been given a session to speak about Google Podcasts, but company policy is we're not allowed to present at conferences. So you can have me up as a speaker to answer questions, but please could you talk about what Google Podcasts is?”.
And I said, yes, that's fine. What do you want me to say?
“Oh, we're not allowed to tell you that either. Just tell people what you think of Google Podcasts.”
But I was genuinely very excited about Google Podcasts. I was genuinely very excited about what that could have meant for podcasting if Google had actually done it right. And sadly, Google didn't do it right. And that never took off for a large variety of reasons. But I actually thought that this was going to be the time when Google got it right. But sadly, not quite to be.

BB : You were at Le Salon de la Radio in Paris in January 2020, what did you think of it?

JC: That was a great event, actually, a really enjoyable event. I remember how vibrant the French podcast industry was and how different it is. As an English person looking into the French podcast landscape it’s very clear that French people like to use French companies. And so there were lots of companies there who I was unaware of. And of course, some of them are now owned by much larger American companies.

BB: One last question, as an expert in audio content, what advice would you give to French aspiring podcasters?

JC: In terms of general advice, making sure that things are consistent, making sure that you understand what your podcast is there for, what problem it solves for the audience, and making sure that it's there absolutely consistently every day, every week, every month is really important.
So that's the advice that I give an awful lot of podcasters.
Particularly for the French language market, you have a real opportunity in that there are millions and millions of English language podcasts out there. There are far, far fewer French language shows out there. There are real opportunities to own a particular part of podcasting, to own a particular subject, to own a particular niche, because there are far fewer competitors out there. And there's real opportunity to have a look at the French language market from that point of view.
And the only other thing that I would say in terms of advice specifically for French language shows is to work together more closely with your friends and colleagues in radio. It's very strange that France, and France alone has this concept of a “native podcast” and of a radio podcast. It's a peculiarly French thing. And I wish that there was more working together with the incredibly talented people who work in French radio and the other side as well. And so tying all of this back to the Radio Show in Paris in very early 2020, one of my sessions was “10 things that radio can learn from podcasting and 10 things that podcasting can learn from radio”. And it was a really enjoyable session and I'd love to do more of those in the future because I think there's real opportunity for people who love great audio to work together far more.

All pictures (CC) BY-SA 4.0 by Benjamin Bellamy

Many podcasters and podcast listeners have been asking us how to find podcasts powered by Castopod, that can be followed on the Fediverse. Castopod allows interactions with the audience (follow, like, share, comment) but where are these podcasts?! When will they be promoted?
The wait is over, Castopod Index is here!

But Castopod Index is not just a directory; it's a resource for podcast enthusiasts and creators alike.

On the Castopod Index website, you will be able to find a selection of podcasts powered by Castopod.

You may search podcasts thanks to these three fields:

• Text search in podcast title, author and handle
• Language
• Podcast category

Three pages are available:

• Index is the home page with all podcasts, latest published episodes are shown first.
• New is the page for newly created podcasts.
• Top50 is the page for podcasts with the largest audience according to OP3.

Here's what you can expect to find for each podcast listed:

• Podcast Title: The name of the podcast, providing a glimpse into its content.

• Fediverse Nickname: Just click on the handle and paste it in your federated social network (eg. Mastodon). You'll be able to follow your favorite podcasts and interact with them without any middleman: like, share or comment any episode you like!

• Cover Image: A visual representation that captures the essence of the podcast.

• RSS Feed Link: Easy access to subscribe and stay updated with the latest episodes.

• Analytics Link: If provided by the podcaster, a link to detailed analytics on OP3.

• Listening App Links: Convenient connections to all listening apps (Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Antennapod, Podverse, PodFriend, Pocket Casts Podcast Addict…) as provided by the podcaster.

• Podcasting 2.0 Features: Castopod Index takes pride in highlighting podcasts that utilize innovative "Podcasting 2.0" features:

  • Chapter: Episodes enriched with chapters, complete with links and images.
  • Funding: Discover tipping platforms and other funding avenues used by the podcast.
  • GUID: Unique identification for each podcast.
  • Location: Explore locations mentioned in the podcast, displayed on an interactive map.
  • Locked: Features ensuring anti-copy protection.
  • Person: Get to know the team behind the podcast.
  • SocialInteract: Connections to the Fediverse for enhanced community interaction.
  • Transcript: Access to transcriptions for a more inclusive experience.
  • Value: Information on monetization options like the value4value tag.
  • …

• Audio Clip: A one-minute sneak peek from the latest episode, giving you a taste of what the podcast offers.

• Follow button: just click and follow all your favorite podcasts from your favorite social network on the Fediverse!
  

The goal of this website is to see the collaborative spirit of the "Podcasting 2.0" community. A special thanks goes to the "Podfather" and the entire team behind this movement, Dave at PodcastIndex.org, and John at OP3.
Their dedication and innovation have paved the way for a richer, more connected podcasting world.

PodcastIndex plays a pivotal role in the evolution of "Podcasting 2.0", acting as a catalyst for the development and adoption of innovative features that enhance the podcasting experience for both creators and listeners. By fostering an ecosystem where new standards and functionalities can thrive, PodcastIndex.org is instrumental in introducing features like real-time transcriptions, enhanced chapter markers, and interactive content. These advancements not only offer podcasters creative ways to engage and retain their audience but also make podcasts more accessible and dynamic for listeners. The platform's commitment to open standards and community-driven innovation ensures that the podcasting medium remains vibrant and adaptable, constantly evolving to meet the changing needs and expectations of its global audience.

OP3 stands as a valuable tool for podcasters, offering insightful open data analytics that are crucial for understanding audience engagement and trends. By leveraging the data from OP3, podcasters can gain a deeper understanding of their listeners' behaviors, preferences, and feedback. This information is vital for tailoring content, enhancing user experience, and strategically planning future episodes. The Castopod Index integrates this feature by providing select numbers fetched from OP3, allowing both podcasters and listeners to glimpse into the podcast's performance and reach. This integration not only aids podcasters in refining their craft but also helps listeners in choosing podcasts that align with their interests, based on popularity and engagement metrics.

Embark on your podcast discovery journey with Castopod Index – your one-stop destination for all things podcasting!

Broadcasted on the Parisian station Radio Cause Commune, the show explores various topics related to digital technology, free computing, and its social implications. Each edition of “Libre à vous !” provides interviews with experts, discussions about news and initiatives in free software, and also features sections dedicated to varied chronicles. The aim is to provide a space for expression and information on these themes, in a format accessible to all listeners, whether they are novices or experts in the field. Knowledge sharing and raising awareness of the stakes of freedom are at the heart of this radio show.
The show is hosted by Frédéric Couchet, Executive Director at April.

On October 10th 2023, Carine Fillot and Benjamin Bellamy were invited to talk about podcasting.
Here is the transcription of this episode.

Frédéric Couchet: In this episode of our podcast, we are joined by Carine Fillot and Benjamin Bellamy to discuss the world of podcasting.
Carine and Benjamin are experienced podcasters, and they share their insights into the growth and popularity of this medium. They talk about the benefits of podcasting, such as the ability to have in-depth conversations and connect with an audience on a personal level. They also discuss the challenges that come with producing a podcast, including finding the right equipment, editing, and marketing.
The guests highlight the different types of podcasts that exist, ranging from educational and informational to entertainment and storytelling. They also emphasize the importance of finding a niche and developing a unique voice and style for your podcast.
Carine and Benjamin provide tips for aspiring podcasters, including researching your target audience and understanding their needs and interests. They also stress the importance of consistency in releasing episodes and engaging with your listeners.
Throughout the conversation, Carine and Benjamin share their personal experiences in podcasting, offering valuable advice and inspiration for anyone looking to start their own podcast.
Tune in to this episode to learn more about the exciting world of podcasting with Carine Fillot and Benjamin Bellamy.

Carine Fillot: Hello. It's always a pleasure for me to come into a radio studio, especially since I started in radio as a teenager. Today, after a long journey, particularly at Radio France, I'm venturing into something that isn't strictly radio, but is still radio: podcasting. Today, Elson is both a training organization and a company. We help individuals as well as companies to design, produce, and distribute podcasts. We also have a service that works with companies or organizations on production. Additionally, we are closely interested in experimenting with a prototype related to content discoverability: how to recommend content not only algorithmically, but also editorially. In recent years, we have spent a lot of time analyzing radio content that is distributed as podcasts, as well as what we call native podcasts, which are podcasts created by independent creators and distributed on the internet rather than on traditional FM radio.

Frédéric Couchet: Thank you Carine. Our second guest is Benjamin Bellamy.

Benjamin Bellamy: Hello. I have been a convinced open source advocate for over twenty years and have been a podcast listener for a little less than twenty years. In 2020, I founded the company Ad Aures which develops open source tools to create fair and sustainable ecosystems for all podcasters.
What does this mean in a nutshell? We develop computer solutions that allow for hosting podcasts, making them discoverable, transcribing them, and monetizing them.

Frédéric Couchet: The concepts we are going to talk about today are discoverability, which is important.
We had the opportunity to meet two experts, one of whom has extensive radio experience.
Many of the people who listen to us do so primarily through podcasts, although we also have listeners on FM radio, of course. Perhaps these individuals have an idea of what a podcast is, but we will still start by explaining what a podcast is, the concept of podcasting. What is it in concrete terms? Who wants to start? Carine.

Carine Fillot: Today, it's a word that we use in many contexts to describe various realities actually. Let's say that if we have to go back to its origin, first of all, it's the contraction of two words: "pod", we'll understand it later, which comes a lot, initially, from the Apple ecosystem and the iPod because, in the 90s, we didn't have smartphones and we often used this digital player to listen to or even listen to music, MP3s. And then "cast", which means broadcasting in English. So it's a portmanteau word, podcast, which emerged especially when Apple's iTunes platform aggregates - Benjamin can clarify, in 2005/2006, at a time when we are actually adopting this digital player. When we talk about podcasts, we often talk about aggregation and we start to aggregate podcasts.
Behind this word, there is a very old web technology called RSS feed, which is a content indexing format. Benjamin, maybe you can elaborate on it if you want to talk about it in a more technical way? I will just finish by saying that "podcast", today, is also content, it's a way of saying "I create content that is not radio, it's audio content that has a slightly different DNA and is therefore distributed through this underlying distribution mode, via RSS feeds.

Benjamin Bellamy: Absolutely. The first thing to understand when talking about podcasts, and to eliminate any ambiguity, is that we can't eliminate the ambiguity. In fact, there is no official definition of a podcast, there never has been, and there probably never will be, so everyone puts their own meaning behind this catch-all term that dates back to 2004. It was Ben Hammersley, a journalist for The Guardian, who first used it, and it was also referred to as audio blogging at the time. Everyone puts their own interpretation behind the term podcast.
As an engineer by training, I tend to see definitions that are more technical in nature. My definition of a podcast is that it is a multimedia content, usually an audio MP3 file, that is in an RSS feed. The RSS feed you mentioned, which dates back to 1995, is simply a way to share information. At that time, it was mainly used for blogs, and in a completely decentralized manner, meaning that everyone can subscribe with the software of their choice.
In 2000 - and I think it's important to note this because there is currently too much French bashing going on - the technical invention of the podcast is attributed to a Frenchman named Tristan Louis, who was the first to come up with the idea of putting an MP3 file in an RSS feed. It was mainly used by what we call geeks. In 2003, Adam Curry, an early podcaster who had already had a career on MTV as a video jockey, created a small program that allowed the downloading of these RSS feeds - at that time it was not yet called a podcast, the term podcast was created later - onto his iPod. In fact, the first device that allowed the consumption of podcasts was the iPod. It immediately becomes clear why it was called a podcast.
For the anecdote, which I personally find quite amusing, in 2005, two years after Adam Curry created this little script that allowed him to listen to his podcasts on his iPod, he received a call from Eddy Cue, who was working at Apple, who asked him if he could come to San Francisco to meet Steve Jobs. He found himself in San Francisco one morning facing Steve Jobs, who said to him, "Your thing interests me, and I see that you have a small index with quite a lot of podcasts, will you give it to us so that we can promote it?" Adam Curry was very happy that this thing was gaining importance and that Apple was interested in it, so he said yes. That same afternoon, Steve Jobs, in his keynote, announced what is now known as Apple Podcasts, which, at that time, was called iTunes Podcasts. In 2005, one year after the invention of the term and two years after its usage on iPods, we had the explosion of podcasts, or at least the first one, which made it visible to everyone. It was no longer just a matter for geeks, it was truly a mass media tool, I would say.

Carine Fillot: At that time, a little later, around 2006, I remember one of my bosses walking through the office door and telling me, "The CEO of Radio France, at that time Jean-Paul Cluzel, has decided that within two or three months, all Radio France shows would be available as podcasts." It was a real revolution. Before that, we only broadcasted on the internet, but we didn't segment radio shows. In reality, a radio show is already virtually segmented, it's called a program schedule. The radio had also recently been digitized. So, basically, we had to organize everything so that each show delivers an MP3, because what is a podcast? It's an MP3 file placed within a text file.
Regarding the notion of RSS, I work closely with podcast learners, and it's true that for them, this concept is still a little obscure: what do you need to make a podcast? To revisit that, what do you need from a technical standpoint? An MP3 file, but a podcast is not just the promise of a single MP3 file, it's the promise of recurrence, much like a radio show. You need, just like creating a website, a sort of server, called a podcast host. For a long time, podcast hosts, which are well-known in France today—Castopod is one of them, there are others like Ausha, Podcastics, etc.—provide you with the means to generate this famous RSS file, which is actually a text file that updates itself. This text file is not a complicated coding language for those who don't know how to code, it's a markup language. These tags were created, during that time, in 2005/2006, by Apple. They describe what this podcast is: the podcast title, then the promise of what it will be. We describe this recurrence of episodes. Then, there is a heading in this file: we say who the author is, we say who the podcast thumbnail is. Then, we move down: a podcast is a stream, it's a stack. Then we have the episodes, so an episode has a title, a description, and it has a web address on the MP3 file server.
When we subscribe to a podcast, when we subscribe through an interface, which is most of the time a podcast aggregation application, which today is still Apple Podcasts or Spotify, etc., we are actually subscribing to this file that updates itself, and through the interface of a player, we come to listen each time there is an update.
So, starting from 2006 and in the following years, a use of podcasts started to develop, the opportunity for people to listen to radio shows again. Obviously, at that time, major radio stations like RTL, Europe 1, and the Radio France group embraced this new mode of distribution by understanding that they could address new uses and new needs: listening to radio shows again at the right time, wherever they want, on a mobile device. That's how the first podcast listeners, and we can still see it in the statistics today, were not the most represented ones, they weren't necessarily young people, they were also people who, at the time, had a Mac, an iPod, and started exploring the podcast world by listening to radio shows again.

Frédéric Couchet: Benjamin.

Benjamin Bellamy: I just wanted to vehemently disagree with a detail you just mentioned. Apple did not invent podcasting at all! Apple brought it to the forefront.

Carine Fillot: That's what I wanted to say.

Benjamin Bellamy: It has contributed tremendously to its development because Apple single-handedly supported podcasts, without a business model, for over 15 years, but technically Apple didn't invent anything at all!
Afterward, they said, "if you want a podcast to exist, it needs to have a square image, 1400 pixels, it needs a bunch of things," they standardized, in a way, what was actually a good thing, but technically they didn't invent anything.

Carine Fillot: As you mentioned, RSS feeds have been around for a long time.

Benjamin Bellamy: All the technology already existed, in fact, all these technologies already existed in the 90s. We can give them credit for bringing that to light.

Carine Fillot: Anyway, they invented Apple Podcasts, which ultimately was the first tool people could use to do it because, at that time, remember, in 2006, there was no YouTube yet, there was no Spotify yet, Deezer was just being born. We were in a moment where, actually, the only player capable of generating use was that one.

Frédéric Couchet: I'll pass the floor back to you, Benjamin. I just want to clarify two things: first, about the audio file format. You mentioned MP3 a lot because it's one of the few formats that Apple can handle, but you can use any type of audio format, there are several. For example, in the case of the "Libre à vous!" podcast, we have MP3 format, Ogg format, there are several options.
You mentioned Apple Podcasts, Spotify. There are also open-source applications that allow podcast playback. We can suggest a very simple example, if people want to discover it, it's AntennaPod, a tool that allows you to subscribe to podcasts either by discovering them with keyword searches, or by simply entering the link when you visit a web page. Let's take a concrete example: if you are listening to us right now and you have either a phone or a computer, you go to libreavous.org and you will see "Subscribe to the podcast". That will give you a link and, if your computer is properly configured, it will automatically open an application for you to subscribe. Then you can listen to the episodes on demand, the ones you want or all of them, we encourage you, obviously, to listen to all of them.
We'll come back later to the role of Apple and other players.
Just a quick question. You come from radio, we also do radio. Earlier you used an important term, "native podcasting". Can you explain, maybe you Carine, the difference between a podcast that is a replay of a radio program, for example, and a native podcast? What does it change both for the person creating it and for the person listening to it?

Carine Fillot: Before we begin, I would like to point out that this is very France-centric!

Benjamin Bellamy: I was about to say it, but you read it in my eyes.

Carine Fillot: We discussed this together with Benjamin, we talk a lot about the subject of podcasting, why do we actually make this distinction? In my opinion, it needs to be compared to other ecosystems. In France, we have a strong radio presence and we can see that here, we are in an associative radio station. In France, there are many associative radio stations and different categories (A, B, C, D, etc.), there are public service radios, there are major national radios, etc.; there is FM broadcasting throughout the territory, even though, admittedly, there may be a lack of transmitters and radio diversity in some areas, there is still that. So, when the French-speaking podcasting actors emerge, when we talk about 2006, as the adoption of these practices is taking place, there is a gap between these years 2006/2007 and the arrival of what we call native podcasts, even though there have always been podcasters since the invention of this possibility. Myself, in 2007, I had a web radio station; we did streaming and podcasting. We clearly saw that yes, there were people downloading our podcasts, but they were mainly geeks, there wasn't a mass usage of this yet.
At one point, at least in France in recent years, a sector has become structured and this is also when the term "native podcast" appeared. Today, there are well-known podcast studios - Louie Média, Binge, Bababam, pure players like Slate - who have come up with new editorial proposals because with podcasting, we break free from the radio schedule. What does that mean? It means we can have different formats with non-homogeneous durations, with episodes. We can appropriate radio, but we can create our own formats, and above all, there is often a strategic positioning, but sometimes it starts from a very personal and natural intention: I want to bring up a topic of expertise, a niche subject, often a societal subject, so I can do it, the radio is still quite accessible to me. We have witnessed a DIY (do-it-yourself) trend in all other creative and cultural industries - music, studio recording, home studio for musicians - the fact of doing it yourself, we are no longer dealing with film, we are in the digital era, etc., so podcasting remains accessible today. Even the cost of investing in a microphone, a recorder, a podcast hosting subscription is affordable. As a result, it opens the door to these new voices, to people who carry a unique discourse. It doesn't mean that we don't have the same voices on the radio, it means they take a different path. Since then, we have also been influenced by social networks, personal branding, figures like influencers, even if we don't find the DNA of influencers in the podcasting world, at least not in the mainstream, so we have people who also want to stand out, to say "we are not radio". Not to differentiate themselves from radio, but to succeed in existing, especially considering that today in France, podcasting, the replay podcasting of radio shows, is actually the most consumed form of media in the history of radio.
The term "native podcast" allows us to say "in fact, we are a bit like the new podcasts, we are a bit like the new trends, we are a bit like the new subjects. We are not broadcast on radio." However, those podcasts also have to promote the usage of podcasts. I think that is why in France, there is this desire to differentiate the two terms in order to stand out and exist.

Benjamin Bellamy: To add on, Carine can read my mind, and she said that this notion of difference, this dichotomy between the native podcast and the replay podcast is very French-specific. It doesn't exist at all in the United States. As an anecdote, we work a lot with a movement called Podcasting 2.0, which aims to enhance the functionality of podcasts by adding transcriptions and various other features. We asked them to add the possibility of having a tag that indicates whether a podcast is a native podcast, meaning it is original content that was first created as a podcast, or if it is content that was published elsewhere before. We talk about radio, but it's not only about radio. For example, is HugoDécrypte's podcast a native podcast or not, since it was first published on YouTube? This is a question that can be asked.
It is clear that all of this is very cultural. I am not convinced by this distinction. If Anglo-Saxons don't make it, there must be a reason. In video, we can see that we have transitioned from a linear view to a non-linear view, and the same will probably happen with audio. We call it podcasting, we call it whatever we want, it doesn't matter, it's all a question of usage. And whether the content I listen to in a podcast was previously published elsewhere? I would say it's almost secondary.

Carine Fillot: It is within the podcast ecosystem that these two terms are differentiated.

Frédéric Couchet: Okay, I understand, but I still see a significant difference in the way people who produce these shows, either for radio broadcasting or as podcasts, behave. Earlier, you used the term "niche audience," "they have something to say." I listen to a lot of podcasts, and one thing I constantly notice on most of them is a lot of jargon! We listen to a podcast because we were interested in that particular topic - I was listening to one this morning, as I am interested in marketing.

Carine Fillot: Honestly, I think marketing is the crème de la crème!

Frédéric Couchet: I spend a part of my time trying to understand this jargon and I think that one of the main differences is precisely the audience. When we do radio, we first address the person who listens to the FM band, so we make an effort to popularize and make it understandable. On the other hand, people who do native podcasts often address a niche and don't think about the people who might discover them by chance, so those people will have to hold on to understand. I don't know what your opinion is on this.

Carine Fillot: I absolutely agree with you. I convey this message to the people I train in podcasting, of course! As you've understood, my DNA comes from radio. However, there are many people who do it out of mimicry. I think we'll talk about monetization later, but when I train people, I tell them, in fact, in our trainings, we explain it like this: the radio know-how for the benefit of a podcast project. Then, it's up to people to choose whether they want to do something very specialized. Just like some people want to do community radio their whole life, there are people who want to professionalize themselves, etc.
In terms of audience, let's not fool ourselves, in certain themes and subjects, it's very beneficial to be in a niche and create a community. But yes, you are right, it creates an echo chamber, and I often tell people "think about removing these jargon words, stop talking about KPI, talk about key performance indicators, make that effort in teaching". Indeed, I agree, you will gather a lot more people. Then it's up to each person to try and find the right balance to showcase expertise. Indeed, in marketing and many other professions, even in all French companies in general, there is this tendency towards jargon and echo chambers, and radio doesn't have that DNA: there is a much more inclusive approach with radio and a much more exclusive approach with podcasts. If your strategy is to be exclusive, then fully embrace it, but it means that you will leave people behind; the entry barrier is high. This doesn't mean that there won't be people who will make the effort, like they do with other media "I will listen, educate myself; I will listen to a podcast, and at the same time I have the Internet to understand", but you will leave people behind. And since the DNA of radio is to be an FM transmitter, the fact of not knowing, of feeling, of understanding - there are obviously surveys, studies - but it's about always having that magic of "turning the button - even if we don't turn it much today but still - on the car radio and stumbling upon a surprise, something that we can later turn into a habit of listening, etc. There are always two communities in the radio audience: those who are already acquired and those who are around. Radio has a much broader reach, I completely agree.

Benjamin Bellamy: There is obviously a big difference in terms of training. Generally, someone who goes through radio training will be trained, informed, and attentive.

Carine Fillot: What do you mean by "formatted"?

Benjamin Bellamy: Not addressing an audience in any way.
However, as we were discussing freedom earlier, one great thing about podcasts is that they can be a bit chaotic. There are people who have no training at all in doing this, who just jump in and learn as they go. As a result, the quality index, if we can even talk about a quality index, is uncertain. Nevertheless, there is much more content and it also generates a lot more diversity. The level of standardization is much lower in podcasts, which also contributes to the richness of the medium.

Carine Fillot: I completely agree with that. In any case, what I had in mind is something that is technical jargon and things that narrow it down a bit.
However, indeed, sometimes we find the markers of community radio. In a community radio station, the framework is sometimes much less formal than in a private radio station, etc., so there's this thing of saying "I can do it myself, I can do it in my own image," so it's interesting.
At Elson, we did a lot of curation, we listened to a lot of podcasts that were starting out, amateur podcasts, and some more professional podcasts. When we presented them to a listening committee of about twenty people, there were sometimes things that were striking: the voice of a person who has a unique perspective on a subject, and that doesn't lie, but as often happens in radio; more often than not, the voice doesn't lie.
People often ask why we don't do much vocal coaching in our training programs. I often say that the aesthetics of the voice is no longer a subject, unless there is a problem with elocution, etc., which can be worked on with a speech therapist or other medical professional. Nowadays, we no longer have this code of voice aesthetics. The voice is the person speaking, and if a person is aligned with what they are saying, there is no such thing as a bad voice. We often talk about the new voices of podcasting, but the podcast reveals this.
What is also interesting to see is the journey that some of these podcasters take: at first, they start, they try, they try something else, etc., they try not to give up along the way because it's thankless, moreover, to be your own medium. People will try to create something, in addition they have to do the marketing, etc. but it progresses, and what is interesting is to see how someone goes from "I do" to "do I become a podcaster" or "do I also become an author." We are in an ecosystem at a time when, moreover, we question this, especially with regard to the funding of certain creators. And what does it mean to be an author of a podcast or radio? It's a question that is being asked today.

Frédéric Couchet: We're going to talk about it. I just wanted to clarify that I wasn't criticizing the podcast because I'm a very avid consumer of podcasts and I completely agree with what Carine just said. There are definitely voices, and I'm not just talking about the voice we hear, but about the stances taken.

Carine Fillot: The unique and individual expression of people.

Frédéric Couchet: To the people we invite to the radio show who say "I'm not comfortable, I'll stumble, etc.", we tell them "don't worry, you're going to talk about your experience, your life, what matters to you, your story, and that's what will interest people". So it wasn't a criticism of the podcast, it was just an observation about a certain number of podcasts that target individuals and don't think about others.

Before the musical break, we're going to start talking a little bit about podcast actors, so the people who create, the people who listen. A really great thing about podcasting, as you mentioned earlier Benjamin, is that indeed you can grab a microphone, a recording tool, you can even create your own website, to get started in podcasting. In any case, from a technical point of view, it's very simple to get into podcasting, it's not a big investment, there are no barriers to entry.

Benjamin Bellamy: Today there is no entry barrier as all you need is a mobile phone.

Frédéric Couchet: It's true that with the phone, it's even easier. Carine may not completely agree, but she will say so later. Go ahead Benjamin.

Benjamin Bellamy: I know she completely disagrees, but since she is very polite she doesn't interrupt me.
Today, podcasts are created using a mobile phone. Sometimes, we use headsets or things like that to ensure that the quality is not too bad, but with a mobile phone it is entirely possible and we can do many things.

Carine Fillot: A mobile phone plus an accessory!

Benjamin Bellamy: No more accessory, okay.

Frédéric Couchet: What accessory?

Carine Fillot: The question that arises is: do we do our podcast alone where we talk by ourselves and don't interview anyone, or do we interview someone? There are actually quite a few accessories developed to attach to a phone. However, I still need to make this gesture: I speak, you speak, and bring the microphone close to the mouth.

Benjamin Bellamy: If we were to make an interview podcast, but it's not necessary. We can also create a monologue podcast where we talk to ourselves, where we share our life stories.

Carine Fillot: Of course, absolutely, but there aren't many of them, it's not the most common type of podcast, but yes, it is possible. However, it's always the same, it's like with any tool, you need to know how to place it, how to use it, how to transfer files from your phone, etc. In any case, it's not the most common kit for a podcaster. Most of the time, we would rather invest in a digital recorder, maybe an additional microphone with a digital recorder, but even with a kit like that, the prices won't exceed 450 euros, which is still reasonable.

Benjamin Bellamy: 450 euros, that's already very high quality.

Frédéric Couchet: It's still quite a budget!

Benjamin Bellamy: Today, for 50 euros, you can get a recorder or a microphone that will make a significant difference in terms of quality.

Carine Fillot: We're talking about someone who wants to start either an outdoor podcast or an interview podcast with a long-term project in mind. This is not the first thing we do. In training, we say: "For now, don't buy any equipment. You don't know what your project is going to be, how you're going to realize it, in what conditions, whether you're going to do your interviews remotely, in which case, is it going to be a phone, a computer, or a USB microphone?" There are plenty of possible configurations. You can do your first tests with a smartphone, of course, and once you want better sound quality and more comfort for recording, you can turn to a basic kit.
Obviously, there may be a financial cost for each person, but that's not the main thing. In any case, in order to find an audience, what is essential? What are we talking about? What is this podcast about? What is the editorial proposition going to be? What is the subject? What is the promise? The technique is the tool that will allow, and maybe even enhance the podcast. It may even have an impact on the concept itself due to the technical choices we make, etc., but above all, it still comes down to: what is the message going to be?

Benjamin Bellamy: But even then, when it comes to podcasting, we have the right to change our minds. Podcasting is truly the medium of freedom: I can do whatever I want, I can change the format, I can change the duration, I can change the frequency, I can change the topic, I can do absolutely anything I want, and of course, I can change the microphone.

Carine Fillot: Of course!

Frédéric Couchet : We will continue our discussion, which started during the break, on the topic of podcasting, with our guests: Carine Fillot, founder of Elson, and Benjamin Bellamy, founder and CEO of Ad Aures and Castopod, which we will talk about later, of course.
Right before the musical break, we were talking about the people who create the content, who create the podcasts, and the technical barrier to entry. Carine emphasized the importance of the project, of the message we want to convey.

Carine Fillot: The Voice of Others, as well.

Frédéric Couchet: Or the voice of the voices of others, indeed. We will continue on this topic. We will also talk about the issue of podcast discoverability, which has undoubtedly evolved today: finding a podcast that interests us or making ourselves known, and also the question of monetization because, until now, we haven't talked about this aspect, but there are people who create podcasts to monetize them, to make some money, which is probably not the majority of people, at least that's my intuition.
In this first part, regarding the work of people who create podcasts, finding their way, finding the voice of others, what advice would you give? What tips, what steps should these individuals take when embarking on a podcast idea?

Carine Fillot: There are often two ways to approach podcast creation: either it starts with a personal desire - what is your personal intention? This is often intertwined with a theme or subjects - or we take a journalistic approach, where we move from a subject to what we call an angle, which is a specific way of approaching the subject, often involving a cast of individuals. In a widely spread podcast, let's call it the interview podcast, for example, the person being interviewed is often our material, as we can see here in this show. We often come across this and think, "this is what matters most, and then we'll see who we find along the way in terms of audience."
Another option is to say, "I start from the end of the funnel, which is the target audience community I want to reach," so, just like in good marketing, I describe people: who are these people, how do I imagine their interests, etc.? Here, in fact, we will rather drive the podcast's creation through audience strategy, which is often linked to a theme or subject. This is where we touch a bit more on the question of the niche, knowing that the two can intersect and that at a given moment, a niche subject can become much more mainstream over time. We can see it: podcasts that have emerged on the topic of feminism, or even on many subjects, such as geopolitics or defense strategy, some podcasts have existed for a while, like Le Collimateur, which today, with all the current events in geopolitics, etc., has become a quite popular and listened-to podcast.
Will I also get tired? What is the size of the subject? Will I at some point have covered everything there is to cover?

Frédéric Couchet: And also the frequency: is it a monthly or weekly podcast?

Carine Fillot: Exactly. That's the frequency. Then there's the recurrence, which also goes hand in hand with the frequency of release. I like to ask our learners this question: does your podcast have an end, and who will lose interest first, you or the listener?
In fact, there are two forms of podcasts. There can be a streaming podcast, which is more popular, a bit like a radio show: we have regular appointments, so we don't necessarily know when it will end. Plus, when we start, we don't imagine stopping. Or there can be a podcast with a more heritage DNA: there we may decide on a certain chapter structure, a certain number of episodes, a certain storyline, and there are stories that end at a given moment, topics, documentaries, etc. These are other forms of podcasts, maybe other formats as well, and it doesn't mean that we can't maybe follow one heritage series with another, in the same stream of podcasts, etc.
I tell them this because not seeing the end sometimes makes it difficult to see what the primary objective is. Maybe the first objective, when you start, is to create a demo.
What is certain is that the streaming podcast, with a recurring promise, is much more appealing to the audience than a heritage podcast.

Benjamin Bellamy: This question was actually present right from the beginning of the podcast's creation, in the podcast metadata. In the metadata, there is a title, what we call "shownotes" which includes the description and summary, and there is a specific field that indicates whether the podcast is episodic or serial. The original reason for this field was to answer the question: should I start with the latest podcast because there's no point in going back in time, as it is a news review or something that is meant to be ongoing, as you just mentioned? Or am I telling a story with a beginning, middle, and maybe an end, in which case I need to start from the beginning? There was thus a need to explain, to tell the listening applications: display the very first episode, which is the oldest, or display the latest one because it's the most recent and most relevant.

Carine Fillot: Today, we are faced with a difficult question unless you are a strong brand or media outlet that is able to keep a podcast alive even after it has ended. You see, once people subscribe to a podcast and receive notifications on their chosen application saying "there is a new episode, etc.", it's already a long journey to get to that podcast. So, if you create a podcast and it stops after a while, and you don't have the means to promote it, it becomes complicated. Even some big studios today are wondering how they can try to create a big umbrella, a podcast title that is very general, to cover various subjects or series that may have a somewhat common DNA but can be very different because they capitalize on the same RSS feed. The question of what we call titling, the act of titling episodes, etc., and making it readable is therefore very important today. What do people do when they come across a podcast for the first time? They look at it before listening to it. So the readability of the title, the chapter divisions, etc., is important to understand what we're dealing with in these different contents, in these series because it's actually more effective to have something that continues.
So, it's very annoying when you're a creator, and I am currently facing this issue: creating a documentary series is very promising, but inevitably, a documentary series comes to an end after a certain number of episodes.
There may also be possibilities in the multi-format realm. Even though, and I fully agree, I often say this: a podcast is a space of freedom. You're not bound by the constraints of radio, so if you want to create multiple series within one feed, if you want to have multi-formats, if you want to do a short episode and then an interview the following week, as long as you don't betray the overall promise and who you are, it doesn't matter. There's this freedom: the multi-format of episodes, maybe even multiple podcasters in one podcast, who knows, maybe together we are stronger, there are still things to be created. As today we are in what is ultimately promising, we'll get there, there is an open ecosystem thanks to this RSS feed, but at the same time, when you're a podcaster, alone in your feed and you have to produce and you're obliged to produce to keep the feed going, it's also complicated.

Frédéric Couchet: Just before giving you the floor Benjamin, there's something I really appreciate about podcasts, and it's the consistent duration. This allows me to choose a podcast that fits my schedule. For example, when I go for a run, I will choose a podcast that I know will last between 50 minutes and an hour, because it will align with my workout. I really like this aspect, and I've noticed that most podcasts adhere to it, respecting the duration.

Carine Fillot: You like to be reassured!

Frédéric Couchet: Well, I like to be reassured about the duration. It's a personal preference.

Carine Fillot: That's true. Unless you are in a podcast where the subject is already very specific, it is often the title that carries the weight, it is the subject. When we are faced with a list of episodes and we have too many choices, often it is still the title, sometimes it is the name of the person mentioned in the title.

Frédéric Couchet: Benjamin, I'll let you react, and then we'll talk about discoverability specifically.

Benjamin Bellamy: It's best to avoid calling your podcast "my weekly podcast" because, in general, it doesn't guarantee good discoverability.
I wanted to take this opportunity to talk about discoverability. We discussed the difference between serialized podcasts and episodic podcasts. It's important to understand that for 15 years, podcasts were driven by Apple Podcasts, so in a way, Apple Podcasts was the only discoverability engine. It was Apple, in fact, entirely Apple, who decided what a discoverable podcast was, what made a podcast visible, what made a podcast part of its top 100. Apple imposed its conditions on everyone and everyone accepted them without complaint: it meant having a nice, square image, as I mentioned earlier, with 1400 pixels, and having unwavering regularity.
Today, the unanimous advice from everyone working in the podcast industry is: be consistent. I disagree with that. I say no, do what you want, just don't betray your audience, but it was Apple who originally imposed the need for regularity on everyone and said, "if you haven't published anything in a month, you no longer exist." Today, there's something incredible happening: there's an immense wealth of podcasts, especially serialized ones, that have been forgotten and are no longer visible because Apple decided that a podcast that hadn't published anything in over a month no longer had the right to be seen. And since Apple has never been very strong in search engines, we don't see them, we don't find them at all.
Things have changed in the past five years, thanks to the podcast buzz that has been building for about five years now, and a lot has happened. I think it all started with the podcast Serial, which had 230 million downloads and completely changed the game. Nevertheless, today, Apple Podcasts, as we were looking at this morning with Carine, represents roughly 37% of listening shares, which seems huge, but five years ago it was 100%, or almost 100%.

Carine Fillot: It has really dropped.

Benjamin Bellamy: So today, continuing to obey Apple's rules doesn't seem to be necessarily the best strategy, or at least not the only one.
The second platform today is Spotify. I'm not a big fan of Spotify, but in terms of discoverability, I personally find that they do a much better job than Apple. They are able to find older content and make more personalized recommendations, rather than just saying "here are the top ten shows of the week: Les Grosses Têtes, Guillaume Meurice, Choses à savoir, After foot, HugoDécrypte, and so on!" In fact, I haven't discovered anything new, the discoverability is practically nonexistent.

Carine Fillot: I just wanted to clarify about Apple. There's probably this discourse around the fact that Apple has indicators that cause it to decrease if there's no regularity. I was talking about it more from the perspective of the podcaster with their audience. Anyway, most of the time it's something that we self-produce, that we do ourselves. So, when we talk about regularity, it doesn't necessarily mean doing a show every week, it means being present on your RSS feed with that content, so the promise is reiterated and we create that connection. It's more of a relationship with an audience and it also imposes a certain production rhythm. I often say, "if you don't feel up to it, 15 days is already pretty good. Squeezing in a show, a podcast, in episodes every 15 days is not easy, but start with a month, try to get to three weeks, and then, depending on your topics, if the podcast is easy to produce or not, if you depend on other people to make it or even interview", it's more in that relationship, actually. It's saying that at least, if you're present just with your episode, with a certain regularity, you maintain the connection and you don't have to do a whole bunch of social media presence communication. You're already there in your RSS feed and that can be enough. But at least that connection is established.
Likewise, I often tell them, in order to maintain this connection, stop talking at the end: you need to add stars, things, subscribe. I tell them, "if you have a call to action to make, maybe it's a newsletter, your website, create something on the side, but you're live with your audience."

Benjamin Bellamy: If we're talking about links, we're not really talking about discoverability anymore. If we have the link, people don't need to discover us, they already know us.
In terms of discoverability, which means finding new listeners, especially for a podcast series that has ended, I like the metaphor from James Cridland, a podcast journalist who has a daily newsletter called Podnews, which you can find on podnews.net. He says that we have a paradox in the podcasting world, in that Apple has created an ecosystem where it's as if we have a library where we can find all the books that have been published and released in the past two months, and all those that are older than two months have been discarded because they're no longer interesting. There is an incredible wealth in podcasts, and just because a podcast has stopped publishing and is, in quotes, "dead," doesn't mean it's not interesting or valuable, quite the opposite.
For us, the challenge of discoverability is also there: it's about saying "I'm interested in a topic," and there are podcasts about everything because the decentralization of podcasting and the fact that it's a very open medium means that there are no algorithms, no censorship, so there are podcasts that cover everything. Today, it's complicated to find a podcast that interests me, and that's where the challenge really lies. It's about how I'm going to find a podcast that interests me, in my language, for a specific duration, on a topic that has been discussed.

Frédéric Couchet: Very quickly Carine.

Carine Fillot: The starting point of the Elson project is this. It is the realization that podcasts are being forgotten, that podcasts also disappear from the web because, after a while, we have to pay for the RSS feed of a podcast that has run its course, etc., but it has value. It has value especially in discovering historical artefacts, but not only that. It was necessary to find this balance.
When we launched the first prototype of Elson, which gathered 2000 users, we also had an editorial committee. People would suggest podcasts to us, and we would do human curation, testing this curation on our website with a player. People would sign up and receive a newsletter of recommendations, the sound of the day for those who wanted to discover a podcast each day, a playlist to try to create cross-connections, ultimately trying to bring transversality between these RSS feeds, and also drawing on our knowledge of radio to see: what do they have in common, what is different about them? When we curate a playlist of podcasts or a playlist of podcast episodes, should we start with the most specialized, or with the more general ones, etc.? What does this listening and discovery experience of podcasts actually mean? It means that at some point, we have to be able to qualify, source, and human curation, at a certain point, accounts for this discoverability that we can achieve in a certain way. However, at some point, we encounter a barrier, which is a more technological barrier, as well as the barrier of the mass of podcasts, even if we are far from the numbers in the United States, there are still a lot of French-speaking podcasts.
These are the common issues we have with Benjamin. At the beginning of the show, we also talked about transcription. So there is this challenge: to eventually find the elements that will allow us, through the technology of transcription and semantic analysis, to know what it is actually about, what these contents are talking about, and also to try to deliver a listening experience for the listeners. As Benjamin said, the listening experience on Apple is subject to the goodwill of Apple and its rules, the same goes for Spotify, etc.
There is still, without a doubt, room today for a podcast discoverability platform that plays with different codes, different rules, one that takes into account both the content and the users' habits.

Frédéric Couchet: Before I let you react because we only have five minutes left before the final questions, so we won't talk about monetization. However, we are still a show that talks about digital freedoms. We have just talked about Apple and Spotify, and I fully understand that. But Benjamin, I want us to move on, and it will be relatively brief, unfortunately, on closed ecosystem versus open ecosystem, and more importantly, what is the role of free solutions and free platforms in podcasting? It will be very brief, I apologize for that. We might cover it in more detail in a second episode. Go ahead.

Benjamin Bellamy: Carine was just talking about podcasting and how some podcasters want to keep their podcasts online without continuing to pay monthly fees. That's one of the reasons why we developed Castopod, castopod.org, which is a podcast hosting platform. We weren't very original in the sense that we took a model that seemed to work quite well, which was WordPress. WordPress allows you to publish content websites, but Castopod is specific to podcasts.
Castopod allows anyone to download the solution and self-host their podcast, at a very low cost or even for free if they already have their own server.
As we mentioned earlier, podcasting technology dates back to the 90s and has not evolved much since then. In the 90s, the web was completely decentralized, and there were no closed platforms like there are today. If you're on Facebook, you're confined within Facebook; you're not on the internet as a whole. The same goes for YouTube; you're confined to YouTube, meaning that Google is the only one who decides what content is allowed to be there, what content is visible, and what content is recommended. With podcasting, we don't have that at all because we can choose our hosting platform. Carine mentioned a few of them, but there are others as well. I would mention podCloud and Vodio because they're very nice and very good platforms, and they're French companies, by the way.
You can choose your hosting platform, so if your podcast gets removed from one hosting platform, you can easily move to another without losing your audience. Your listeners can go to a listening platform; we mentioned Apple and Spotify because they have the money today, but there are many others available.

Carine Fillot: Podcast Addict created by a French developer.

Benjamin Bellamy: There is Pocket Casts.

Carine Fillot: Podcast Republic, there's a whole bunch of them.

Frédéric Couchet: AntennaPod.

Benjamin Bellamy: There are plenty. There are open source ones, ones for mobile phones, there are really a lot of them. So, the fact that it's decentralized, meaning that there isn't a single platform where you can listen to podcasts and that, as content creators and as listeners, we have the ability to switch, gives us a freedom of tone, a freedom of speech that has become quite rare on the internet today. The simple fact of not having a recommendation algorithm in podcasts, at least not a single algorithm, is an incredible wealth to me.

Carine Fillot: That's why the comparison to blogs is often made. Let's say they are blogs created by creators, without being filtered by an algorithm or a Google-like search engine. They exist, they have their host, they have their voice, and if we search for them, we can find them.
Today, the issue of discoverability is being tackled by many actors, from the biggest to the smallest, including public services. Radio stations are less focused on this issue, as they often have strong brand identities and their main concern is strategic positioning in terms of audience. However, discoverability is crucial today. Anyone who starts exploring podcasts, even just looking for a specific topic, still faces many obstacles and often needs to invest a lot of time in finding the podcast they are looking for. Once they find it, though, they can become completely hooked.

Frédéric Couchet: Thank you. We will do another show because there are some topics we didn't cover and we rushed through the last part, but you were both fascinating.
One last question, really in two minutes max each, if you wish: what are the key points you would like to convey to the listeners in two minutes max. We'll start with Benjamin.

Benjamin Bellamy: First of all, we are very happy to be here, and it is no coincidence that we are on the show "Libre à vous!" because, once again, the podcast ecosystem is free, and for us, that is important and needs to be defended. I especially invite all podcasters to stop saying "rate us on Apple Podcasts," as Carine mentioned. Why? Because, first of all, it puts all our eggs in one basket and it entrusts our audience and content to a GAFAM. Strategically, we can see where that has led with other types of content. In any case, that is not the advice I would give.
It's complicated, and that's why we are working tirelessly on it.
We haven't talked at all about Podcast 2.0, which, in my opinion, is the major challenge in the coming months and years, which is: it's nice to say that we should use free and open-source software and not blindly trust the GAFAM, but what do we do? Podcast 2.0 is one possible answer to that. If you go to newpodcastapps.com, you will have access to applications, not all open-source, but at least decentralized.

Carine Fillot: Personally, I would say don't pit radio against podcasts; they are actually highly complementary. I believe that both radio and podcasts have their own talents, and there are plenty of reasons for them to come together. Maybe I say this because I come from community radio, that's where I started, but also because I see a significant difference: FM radio is regulated by Arcom, formerly known as CSA, etc. On the other hand, the web is an entirely open ecosystem, but both have their own advantages.
Today, it's interesting to consider this for professionalization. When you're on the radio, you potentially have the status of an author, and you can also professionalize yourself by collaborating with others instead of being on your own. At the same time, podcasts bring a new freshness, new DNA to audio content. It's therefore interesting, and it's also great to see people from both worlds come together. That's why I'm thrilled to be here.

Frédéric Couchet: Perfect. I think we should do a new episode, if only to talk about Podcasting 2.0.
I'm letting people who are interested in podcasting and are in the Paris region know that they can go to the Paris Podcast Festival on October 13th and 14th, 2023 at La Gaîté Lyrique. Soon there will also be PodCastres in Castres, in the Tarn, where Benjamin Bellamy will be. Do you have any dates in mind Benjamin?

Benjamin Bellamy: October 28th and 29th.

Frédéric Couchet: October 28th and 29th, 2023. You will be able to meet Benjamin and of course they will come back.
That was Carine Fillot, a founding member of Elson, and Benjamin Bellamy, founder and CEO of Ad Aures and Castopod.
I wish you a nice end of the day and see you soon.

Carine Fillot: Thank you!

Benjamin Bellamy: Thank you!

Podcasting has taken the world by storm, providing creators with a unique platform to share their ideas and expertise while captivating audiences with diverse content. To maximize the benefits of podcasting for both creators and listeners, transcription has emerged as a game-changer.

SEO and Accessibility Boost

Transcription makes podcasts more accessible to individuals with hearing impairments or those who prefer reading over listening, promoting inclusivity and diversity in the audience base.
Additionally, transcribing podcast episodes can have a profound impact on search engine optimization (SEO). Search engines can crawl and index the text within the transcripts, improving the podcast's discoverability and visibility in search results. This, in turn, leads to increased organic traffic and a broader audience reach.

Note: paragraph edited on 2023-07-26 following a suggestion from Evo Terra.

Enhanced Recommendation Systems

Transcripts will enable podcast platforms to develop powerful recommendation systems. By analyzing the text content, AI algorithms can better understand the context and themes of each episode, leading to more accurate and personalized recommendations. As a result, listeners are more likely to discover relevant content, and podcasters can enjoy increased engagement and retention rates.

User Experience with Chapters

Transcripts also facilitate the creation of chapters within podcasts, enhancing the user experience. Listeners can quickly jump to sections of interest, skipping irrelevant content and providing more control over their listening experience. This feature is particularly helpful for long-form podcasts, where segmented content allows for a more engaging and convenient consumption process.

AI and Open-Source Revolution

Automatic transcription has seen remarkable advancements, thanks to AI and open-source projects. Initially, open-source initiatives like Vosk and Kaldi paved the way for accessible and customizable speech recognition systems. These projects laid the foundation for automatic transcription but had limitations in terms of accuracy and speed.

OpenAI's Whisper

OpenAI's Whisper took automatic transcription to the next level. Leveraging the power of transformer-based models and large-scale neural networks, Whisper demonstrated substantially improved accuracy and faster recognition speeds. This breakthrough allowed podcasters to generate accurate transcripts in a fraction of the time it once took, optimizing their workflow and enabling more frequent content creation.

Linagora's LinTo Project

Linagora's LinTo open-source project further democratized voice recognition by making it available to enterprises. This initiative extended the benefits of AI-driven transcription beyond the podcasting sphere, empowering businesses to harness the potential of speech-to-text technology for various applications, from customer service to data analysis.

The “Podcasting 2.0” Initiative

Spearheaded by Adam Curry (“The Podfather”) and Dave Jones, The “Podcasting 2.0” initiative is revolutionizing the podcasting landscape. Launched in 2020, this movement aimed to usher in a new era of podcasting with advanced features, including transcription, but also seamless integration of chapters and many other things. This initiative opened the doors to the future of podcasting, enabling creators to provide richer experiences to their audiences.
Moreover, this vision is not a distant future, as the "Podcasting 2.0" initiative is already available at NewPodcastApps.com! Podcast creators can now embrace this new era by choosing from a selection of applications that fully integrate advanced features such as transcription and chapter indexing with external clickable links and images. With these tools at their fingertips, podcasters have the opportunity to create enriched and captivating experiences for their audience while setting new standards in the podcasting world. So, don't miss this opportunity and join the podcasting revolution today!

Transcription has become an indispensable tool for podcasters and audiences alike. With the help of AI and open-source innovation, automatic transcription has become more accessible, accurate, and cost-effective. The "Podcasting 2.0" initiative has accelerated this transformation, making it easier than ever for podcasters to enhance SEO, accessibility, recommendation features, and user experience through chapters. Aspiring podcasters only need to select an app from newpodcastapps.com to embark on this exciting journey of enriched podcasting experiences.
Let's embrace the power of transcription to create a more inclusive and engaging podcasting world.