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Lets take the "King of All Media" or the former king of all media, which is more like it. Stern use to be in the limelight constantly. With his limited subcription (I know it isn't a podcast) exposure on Sirius, he's just not talked about anymore. That's uppermost in my mind. A subscription will limit you, no matter who you are. Right now, I would think is an exceptionally bad time for a subscription model.robnokshus06 said:Quote from: robnokshus06 on Today at 12:51:36 am
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Podcasts are great. Adam Carolla has zoomed to #1 on iTunes or did you miss that thread?
Adam Carolla's podcast is number one at iTunes. Frosty Heidi and Frank Uncensored is number three and the Conway and Whitman podcast is number 53. In the comedy category its Carolla #1, FHFU #2 and C&W #14.
These talents can now do their shows unfettered by corporate interference. They create on demand programming in bite sized chunks that fit today's shorter attention spans. No need to draw out a topic because you have 4-hours to fill, no FCC rules to tell you what you can and cannot say. I have a feeling that the former talk hosts of KLSX will be thanking CBS soon for doing them a huge favor.
By the time CBS is done paying out their contracts they will have established loyal podcasting audiences that they will then be able to monetize either via a small subscription fee, ad insertion or product placement. Meanwhile CBS will still be facing a 1.5 billion dollar debt payment next year and more than likely a new set of performance royalties for the music they replaced these hosts with.
Adam, FHF and C&W may very well have NO desire to return to radio by then.
There's only one big question. How do you make money off those podcasts now as the costs aren't low to produce them (now is the key word)? Whitman already dropped his subscription fee. I really don't see a subscription model as working. People will accept spots or maybe live reads (John & Ken and Bill Handel on KFI do a ton of live read spots and they work well). I'm not aware of product placement being used in radio talk shows.
Actually, the costs are quite low to produce a podcast once you have the initial hardware, mics and recording software. A podcast is really only a large mp3 file and doesn't require the same infrastructure as streaming.
You aren't aware of product placement in "radio" talk shows because, unless they are disclaimed as advertising, they would be illegal (I'm fairly sure) but we aren't talking about RADIO talk shows, we're talking about podcasts! "Live" reads by talent, especially someone like Adam, woven seamlessly into the conversation could be quite effective. As for subscriptions, in a recent LA Radio story it was recounted how Jamie Jack and Stench have over 2,000 listeners that pay 5-dollars a month to subscribe to their daily, roughly hour long podcast. You do the math. This IS happening now.
Not knocking podcasts, just the idea of subscriptions. Not only the model but for your career.
Here's the article, again, on Carolla's podcast. It says it costs him about $2K per month to do the show. http://www.latimes.com/news/opinion/sunday/la-oe-stein6-2009mar06,1,4616454.column