Discover Your Favorite Podcast's Favorite Podcasts

We're discussing a powerful shift in podcast discovery: trusted recommendations from real people instead of algorithms. With Pocket Casts now surfacing creator-curated suggestions, listeners have a new way to uncover shows they’ll actually love. We share how this works behind the scenes and why podcaster-driven discovery offers something smarter and more authentic than charts and rankings ever could.

We also highlight a creative summer listening challenge for kids, reflect on Apple’s unexpected role in preserving open podcasting over the last 20 years, and share updates on remote recording reliability. 

Sound-Off Question: What is something you wish you knew when you started podcasting?

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The 2% Club

Alban 0:00

Since our last episode , Kevin , you're top 2% in two different areas .

Kevin 0:05

I hear you don't want to be a top 1%-er . That's a bad thing , but a top 2%-er . I think the jury's still out . That could be good .

Alban 0:12

We went and did iFly , which is like a simulated skydiving , where they blow a ton of air up at you and you jump into the room and fly around a little bit .

Jordan 0:23

It's like a giant leaf blower .

Alban 0:25

A giant leaf blower. A giant leaf blower and the instructor was very impressed . Kevin , you jumped in . You just looked like you're floating in the air and he was like you're top 5% . And Kevin's like whoa , he goes no top 2% . You got upgraded from 5% to 2% as soon as he showed us the QR code for the tip jar . This is awesome . But you also made top 2% . You got upgraded in your pickleball score .

Kevin 0:59

Yeah , that's the one I'm really excited about . I don't imagine I'm going to be spending a lot of my free time doing indoor skydiving , even though I do show some, well , I should say a lot of potential right , and there's a path I could take . But I'm do show some well , I should say , a lot of potential right , and it's a path I could take . But I'm going to pass on that . I'm going to continue to invest in my pickleballing . I play in a ladder league on Tuesday nights , which is tonight , and I just got the ratings today for where we're all seated for the ladder league tonight and I got my first 4.0 rating , which in the pickleball world it's kind of a big deal .

Jordan 1:23

Is it like martial arts , where you like get a different colored belt every time you like upgrade ?

Alban 1:27

Or different headband .

Kevin 1:32

We should do . We should do headbands . That's a great idea . Your DUPR , I don't even know what that stands for , but it's D- U-P-R, gets adjusted based on , like how many games you play , who you play against , what the score is of the game and their ratings and your ratings , and so every Tuesday I play in this league and it's a bunch of I think three , seven , five to four , two , fives or four fives there's definitely a four or five in the group and based on , like I said , the score , it updates .

Jordan 1:59

Oh , like chess .

Alban 2:00

Yeah , it's like an ELO rating .

Jordan 2:01

Oh okay.

Alban 2:01 Alban 2:02 Kevin 2:02

I'm not familiar with chess , but I'd probably be top 2% in that . But I'm not

Jordan 2:06

Yeah , first try , you'll beat the grandmaster .

Kevin 2:10

Yeah , so I'm excited I'm going into tonight's match as a official . On their scorecard anyway , official 4.0 player , so I got to bring my game tonight .

Alban 2:18

All right . Well , you'll have to cue us in on on how it goes .

Kevin 2:21

Yeah , I'm probably going to have the worst night of my life at pickleball .

Jordan 2:25

That's what it's like when you like play Halo online . As soon as you start going up into the higher rankings , you just get demolished . And then the second you get like lowered again after getting your butt kicked , you just destroy everything . There's just such like a weird balance when you're in between like different rankings of things , like when you level up , it's a different tier .

Kevin 2:45

Yeah , you know , there's this thing in baseball , baseball being a very old sport with a very rich history , and there's been a lot of like , superstitions and just courtesies that have developed over time . I think these things take a lot of time to develop . They have not developed like , as you said , jordan in video gaming . They've not developed like , as you said , Jordan in video gaming . They've not developed in pickleball . And that is like when somebody is doing well , somebody's having the game of their life in baseball , everyone knows you don't call them out on it , you don't be like oh , my gosh you're on fire you're having the game of your life .

Kevin 3:16

You know it's a sixth inning and you've got a no hitter going . That would never happen in baseball . Everybody knows like you . Just respect them . You give them their space . They know . They know what's happening . You don't say it out loud . That's bad , juju . That's going to get in their head like they don't want to think about what's happening . They just want to stay locked in and keep going . Yeah , in pickleball , this doesn't happen in video games . Just the game itself calls you out like you're on a kill streak . You're like no , no , don't tell me that .

Alban 3:41

Like , like you don't want people to tell you like good shot . When you make a good shot , I mean that's fine .

Kevin 3:47

But I don't want anybody coming up to me like between games and just being like you're playing lights out . This is the night of your life Like that stuff . It happens all the time and you're like no , no , no , no , no ,

Alban 3:56

Never happens to me . People are like get it together , dude , dude , I'm sick of losing .

Jordan 4:02

Have you ever heard of the ironic process theory ?

Kevin 4:10

No , is this what I'm talking about ?

Jordan 4:11

I think this is related to it . So I was listening to this podcast this morning about the game . If you're a millennial , I'm really sorry . I just made you lose the game , but it's like a game that we all played in like middle and high school , where you lose the game by thinking about the game . Right , and it's based on ,. there was like a polar bear thought experiment and Dostoevsky, in Ironic Process Theory , he would say like don't think about the polar bear . But by saying do not think about the polar bear , you immediately think about the polar bear and then you get into your head about it and then so you basically fail thinking about the polar bear , and so I think , it's a very similar thing where , if anyone mentions that you're winning the game , you're just like and it puts you into , it , puts you in your head Right

Kevin 4:53

I did a . I did a motorcycle riding course out in Colorado off-road motorcycle riding classes and we were all connected , we had microphones and earpieces in our helmets and we're following instructors down paths and inevitably the instructor's like don't look at the terrain , look where you want to go . And so they'd be right ahead of me and they'd be coming around a corner and they'd be like okay , big boulder right in the center of the trail , don't look at the boulder , don't look at the boulder . I'm like what you just said Big boulder right in the middle of the trail .

Kevin 5:19

Don't look at the boulder . Where am I going to look ? I'm going to look at the boulder and the second I look at the boulder . The bike goes right into the boulder . It's like , just don't say it . All you have to say is okay around the bend , stay left . That's all you need to say . Then I would have looked left , I would have gone left . But yeah , once you say , don't do something , that's 100% going to do that .

Jordan 5:38

Thousand percent All right .

Alban 5:40

Let's ironically have the best podcast recording of our lives .

Kevin 5:43

Jordan's on fire .

Jordan 5:44

Oh no

Alban 5:46

Wait , how do you do this ? Opposite Jordan , we say don't have a bad podcast or do have a bad

Jordan 5:51

You just don't bring up the podcast .

Alban 5:53

Oh , we're done .

Podroll Recommendations in Pocket Cast

Alban 6:01 Jordan 6:01

Welcome back to Buzzcast , a podcast about all things podcasting from the people at Buzzsprout . All right , so let's kick things off with another fantastic Pocket Casts update . So Pocket Casts has added pod roll recommendations and it looks like they added another podcast discovery tool where they put out like podcast recommendations . They said we're rolling out podcast recommendations to help you discover your next favorite show without even trying , and then they've also added support for Podroll so your favorite podcast can also recommend shows they think you'll love .

Alban 6:35

Yeah , I love this . So you scroll down , you click this , you might like tab and for every podcast , like Buzzcast , it's got a whole list of shows you may like and they're going to find shows that they think are similar that you would enjoy . But if the podcaster has recommended other podcasts , we do that through our pod role . Those are the recommendations that show up at top . So they're utilizing this open standard to populate all these recommendations . But if you don't have them , they're going to put good shows there as well . So I went and looked at ours and it's all the shows that we have in our pod role . So go check them out , especially if you're on pocket casts .

Kevin 7:12

I think this is a really nice implementation . They recognized that not a ton of shows right now have pod roles , and so they are supplementing it with their own recommendations . They have their own mechanism . I mean probably some sort of algorithm that would recommend shows just based on other shows that you've listened to , that you're following in Pocket Cast . So your show might have shows listed under the you might like button , but you get to control them and you might not recognize that .

Kevin 7:40

You do get to control them and so if you are a Buzzsprout podcaster , you can log into Buzzsprout , you can go to podcast info pod role and you can quickly search for the shows that you like and you want to recommend and you can add them .

Kevin 7:51

If you add them there , we will add them to your RSS feed and then , once it updates it might take a day or two for Pocket Cast to update , but once they ingest that information , then when you tap on you might like , there's a little subhead that will show up and it will say recommended shows by the creator and that's how you can tell the difference . So if you're looking at various shows and pocket casts , almost all of them will have something under the you might like section , but what you're looking for is that little subhead that says recommended by the creator , which is nice , because now you know these are coming directly from the podcaster themselves , so , like if I look at podcasting 2.0 , I tap on , you might like . I see , oh , disappointing , buzzcast isn't here . I see they are recommending , uh , the pod news , weekly review this week in bitcoin , the no agenda show , the no media show and field recording podcast by csB . Okay , and I'm sure next week Buzzcast will probably be on that list as well .

Jordan 8:47

Better be .

Kevin 8:48

If I go to , let me pull up the pod news weekly review . You might like Great . I see the subhead recommended shows by the creator . They are recommending the future of podcasting . Buzzcast number two All right , we think that'd be number one . We're the main sponsor , that's all right . In and around podcasting , podcasting 2.0 and practice . Uh , that was the Claire Waite Brown show . Yeah , podcasting 2.0 pod news . Daily pod news extra and new podcasts .

Alban 9:13

Kevin's discovered a new podcast discovery tool to grow the podcast and that's complaining about our friends so that they put us in their pod roles .

Jordan 9:22

It's like the MySpace top eight . It's like why am I not under MySpace ? It is the MySpace top eight we want to be in your fade five .

Alban 9:29

Oh , man , you just have to tell people like no , no , no , it's not in an order . Oh , is it an order that I'm number two ? Why'd I move to ?

Kevin 9:35

number two . Oh yeah , it's definitely in an order you can reorder them right inside of Buzzsprout .

Jordan 9:40

It's super easy Click . I actually have a funny story about pod roles . So I stumbled upon this podcast and it's a like fiction podcast and it was so well produced . I was like man , this is really good . And then I saw that they have a pod role and this is Afterlight Fictions with Jonathan Marsh . And I look at this pod role and listed in the pod role is dreamful , buzzcast , buzzsprout conversations and I was like this is why this podcast is so good . Of course it totally checks out .

Alban 10:13

Oh , that's so cool .

Jordan 10:14

I know , I was so excited .

Alban 10:16

It'd be nice if we could find when people recommended your show and like send people an email or notification and say , hey , you just were recommended by another podcaster .

Kevin 10:24

Oh , I would love that I think we definitely can do that and my brain is starting to cook in that direction now because we finally have . You know , I don't want to take anything away from the smaller apps , but it shifts priorities right when a bigger podcasting app implements a new feature , that is super exciting . But again , I don't want to take anything away from the smaller guys , because the smaller players that implemented this stuff first . They are part of the groundswell and the momentum , moving and doing important work . And so apps like TrueFans and apps like I don't know if Fountain ever did it , but Castomatic and Podfriend I love you guys and I'm super thankful for all the work that you're doing and you're pushing and showing and modeling how this stuff can play out in real life . And then I think that's a big part of what takes a larger company like Automatic that now runs Pocket Cast and says , oh look , we have all these examples of how it could work and we should be doing this stuff on our app too . So congratulations to Pocket Cast for doing it , but thank you so much to all the other smaller apps that paved the way for this big change doing it . But thank you so much to all the other smaller apps that paved the way for this big change .

Kevin 11:27

I think it's super important and exciting that open podcasting has now brought our first sort of real contribution to podcast discovery and we brought it in a way that is not reliant on an algorithm .

Kevin 11:39

It's not like the PSP group got together and said , hey , here's how we should recommend podcasts and here's the algorithm that you should use and here's the weighting factors and the levers that you can pull to decide which podcast you're going to recommend .

Kevin 11:49

We just solved it as simply as possible , which is saying , hey , if you're a podcaster , you're probably into podcasting and you probably have other shows that you really like and you , as a human , might want to recommend those to the humans who like your show . And here's a very simple way to do it and that is now like mainstream might be a bit of a stretch , but we know that Spotify and Apple podcasts they're kind of the two main mainstream apps . But in terms of smaller third-party podcast listening apps for people who are really into podcasting and go out and get like the non-default app for listening to podcasts , pocket Cast is one of the biggest we know . Overcast is another big one and , like I said before , all the smaller ones that are doing laying a lot of this groundwork and pushing the bigger apps in this direction . They're all growing and so I'm excited about that . But this is exciting . When was the last time we saw something happen on the internet that was like a low-tech human-to-human solution that a big company actually picked up and implemented ?

Jordan 12:46

Yeah .

Kevin 12:46

Right . It just doesn't happen anymore . Like , everything now is algorithms and AI and oh , we've got the best podcast recommendations and yeah , yeah . Then everyone's trying to reverse engineer the algorithm and create content that plays to the algorithm and all that kind of stuff . This is the opposite of that . This is create a good show , maybe connect with people in real life , go to podcast conferences and meet people , and if you do all that really well , they might add you to their pod role .

Kevin 13:10

And if you get added to their pod role , you might start picking up another listener here , another listener there , more and more and more , and I really hope that this at least opens the interest on , like the Apple side , to this idea that you guys do have a good algorithm for recommending shows . There's the you might also like section in , like a now playing screen at the bottom or when you're browsing through shows , they recommend other things . Why not take the pod role and at least integrate that into some of those suggestions ? Am I , am I too excited about this new idea ? Are you guys joining me in my excitement ?

Alban 13:41

I'm with it . I love it . I think it's funny that at the same time , we've got YouTube and Spotify both touting their new algorithmic recommendation engines , and YouTube's going to do a bunch of rankings and say here's the weekly top podcast shows . Spotify is going to try to give you like a personalized podcast recommendation page , and there's something about like when you find a thing on your own and it was recommended by a source or a friend or another podcast , something that you trust and you connected with , that it feels much more serendipitous and it's fun . It's fun to be like .

Alban 14:18

I am reading some book series now and I really enjoy it , but I got into it because of my brother and so now every time there's a funny part in the book I can reach out to him . The book is good on its own , but the fun thing about it is now that my brother and I are connecting over something that we both enjoy . Yeah , and that's the promise of like web 1.0 . And now we're on to this algorithmic world where what are the weekly top shows ? I mean , it's probably going to be about the 10 same shows . It's going to be number one Rogan . Number two Call Her Daddy . Number three New Heights . Number four , my Favorite , murder . It's going to be the same 10 .

Alban 14:55

And it's just going to promote the top 0.1% of shows . That are all good . They're well-done shows , they get good engagement . That's why they're up there . But there's something fun about just connecting with something that's not always the most polished , the most perfect thing . It's something that feels like it was made for you and you found it through like an interesting way , and so it was what was fun about blog roles , it's what's fun about pod roles , and I love that it's now getting implemented in more and more places .

Jordan 15:24

Of course , true to form Spotify . When they announced their new discovery tools , one of the things that they mentioned was cross content links , and so creators can now link to like other podcasts and stuff like that , and it's just like . Of course , it has to be done in their platform . They can't just like pull it in from the RSS feed . It's like you're making more work for yourselves .

Kevin 15:45

What they're making more work for ourselves , yeah .

Jordan 15:47

They're making more work for everyone . Everyone has more work , just stop .

Alban 15:51

Well , it's the business model is fighting the technology . The technology is do it once and it goes out there for everybody and it's free and it's easy to get and grab , and the business model is you've got to convince people to bring free content to Spotify so that we don't keep getting these painful negotiations with the record studios . So I understand it . It just is not a great fit . But what is a great fit is pod rolls and this is fun , and I think we need to go back and look at our shows that we're recommending , make sure we recommend all of them and they're all still putting out new stuff , because now these are going to have a lot more visibility than they did a few months ago .

Kevin 16:29

Yeah , and let me end on two quick notes . One , don't get hung up on the term pod role . A lot of people don't like it , I get it . It is the silly throwback to blog roles . That's where it came from , that's where the idea came from , so we kind of wanted to pay homage to that . Technically , the people who were helping shape the spec right and all cards on the table . I was a big part of that , so I kind of got a big say in choosing the name . It's a dumb name , I get it , but I like playing paying homage to old things , and especially when they heavily influence the new thing .

Kevin 16:58

But don't get hung up on that . Recognize what it is . It is a way for you to recommend podcasts to your listening audience . Okay , so I really love the pocket cast implementation , which is you might like , you tap that and you see the shows you might like , even in buzzsprout itself . I think we do call it pod role , but we then explain exactly what it is . It's a way for you to recommend shows to anybody who's listening to your podcast . All right , so that out of the way . I will then say this it is now more important than ever for you , as a podcaster to have a pod role . We pushed this when we rolled it out and then we've continued to mention it from time to time on this show . We mentioned in our newsletter our educational materials and all that kind of stuff , but we need to up the volume of that now , because now there is a app that across the board for Buzzsprout accounts for 1% of total plays that happen through the Buzzsprout network , and for a lot of shows it's 2% , 3% , 4% , 5% , and so it's very important for every show to be recommending whatever you're listening to , whatever you think your audience might be interested . Take the five minutes , log into Buzzsprout , click on podcast info , pod roll , find your shows that you want to recommend , put them in the order that you like . It doesn't take a lot of time , but I'm hoping that this can start to get a lot of momentum and that people get excited about finding new podcasts this way .

Kevin 18:12

Right , the discoverability engine doesn't work if there's no recommendations out there , and these recommendations are not driven by an algorithm , they're driven by humans . So humans who are listening to this , I'm telling you go and do the human work . It takes very quick , but it's really important , and I know like I use Pocket Cast a lot . Most of the podcasts I listen to I listen to in Pocket Cast . I'm going to be tapping into those shows now and I'm going to seeing what they recommend . I'm going to be looking for that little sub tab that says these are recommended by the show's creators .

Kevin 18:40

If I don't see it , I don't care what the recommendations are , but if I do see it , I'm going to pay a lot of attention and they give you a very quick way when they show you that list of podcasts that the podcast creators are recommending . It's one tap to follow those shows , and so I think it could be a great way for indie podcasters to promote other podcasts they like and hopefully your shows get put on other people's pod roles and you start picking up followers . But it starts at the podcasters . We have to make the recommendations . So please , if you're listening action item , pause the show right now . Log into Buzzsprout . You can do it in the mobile app too . Super

Summer Listening Challenge

Kevin 19:15

fast in the mobile app .

Jordan 19:17

So get it done , Okay . So this next story that I want to talk about . I'm kind of like , in my own way , hoping that it's an update to our creative marketing ideas , because I noticed that some podcasters that I know to be at least in the past Buzzcast listeners and Buzzsprout podcasters are participating in a summer listening challenge I might accidentally say summer reading challenge . Alban , you might be in the same boat . We both have background in libraries , and libraries always do a summer reading challenge every summer . I was always in charge of that . I was always handing out tickets and prizes to the kids when they turn in their sheets . Alban , do you remember this ?

Alban 19:56

No , I was . I was over in like the multimedia area and they mostly just had me shelving books , so I wasn't doing anything fun .

Jordan 20:04

Yeah , I was . I was always with the kiddos , so this really struck a chord with me and it made me just very excited about gamifying , listening to podcasts and I think this is a really cool thing . So it's eight children's podcasters . So it's like what If World , koala , shine Stoop , kids Stories , girl Tales , dork Tales , story Time , culture , kids by kids , for kids , and the weekly roar , and what they have posted is a really simple PDF tracker sheet for parents to print out and as kids listen to two episodes of these podcasts , of these eight podcasts , so it's 16 episodes total throughout the summer . Then they get to like check it off or put a sticker on it and then the parents scan it and they send it in and if they complete listening to all episodes , then they get a video from the podcast host sent to them .

Alban 20:59

Oh fun .

Jordan 21:00

I know it's not so fun , it's almost like a cameo , but I just was thinking . I was like man , there's a few podcasts that I know of my kids like listen to it and I like wrote in and the they received a video , even if it was just a hey , congrats , you finished this . You know , saying something in like a character voice , they would lose their minds . They'd be so excited .

Alban 21:20

That's fine . I mean , podcasts are a great way to take a little bit of break from screen time and not just sit there and look at the iPad for a whole summer . Keep learning . And I love that it's eight podcasters all got together . They all have this common interest and they started it off when I was little . We used to do book it , where if you write a book , pizza Hut would give you a coupon for a personal pan pizza , and those are , to this day , the best pizzas I ever had , because it was like you got your bucket .

Alban 21:50

Everyone went together . You got a personal pan pizza . You could pick it was cheese or pepperoni and it was like , oh , what a huge win , and so I love that . Like podcasters are doing something like this .

Jordan 22:00

You know what ? This is actually another use for a pod role . It'd be so cool if they would add the other podcasts that are doing the summer listening program to their pod role .

Kevin 22:07

Yeah , yeah , they definitely should . I noticed you posted a screenshot from their message for grownups into our outline today and I just read it . That first sentence . I love this . This is such a great way to describe podcasts . It says podcasts are a screen-free way to boost listening skills , spark curiosity and make learning fun anytime , anywhere . And in this current professional podcasting space where there's a lot of chatter about , do we need to move into video podcasting and yada , yada , yada .

Alban 22:38

Because the big issue is we don't have enough screen time . I've been saying that to everybody . I know I'm like we're not looking at our screens enough . You know there's way too much outdoor time , way too dangerous . We got to be locked in on the screens .

Kevin 22:53

This message is if we're not careful , in a couple of years this message might not ring true anymore .

Jordan 22:59

Yeah .

Kevin 22:59

Like right now I read this and I'm like , yes , this is a great description of podcasts and why podcasts are such a healthy thing for young kids to engage in , especially as a fun summer challenge , right , yeah . But if people start associating the word podcast with watching a video on a device , then this message for grownups isn't going to work anymore . If a mom reads this five years from now and in her mind she just thinks , oh , podcast , that just means YouTube watching or Spotify watching or something it's going to be like what . This doesn't make any sense . I don't want my kids just watching more TV , just on a smaller screen , which might be big for the summer reading challenges out there , but it wouldn't be good for the summer listening challenges and we need more summer listening challenges , and so I love this . They get podcasting , they understand why it's special and it's the right messaging for the grownups . But us in the professional podcasting space like , take note , this is what's great about podcasting , let's not give it up .

Jordan 23:58

Yeah , and if you want your kids to participate in the summer listening challenge , or if you are a kid and you want to participate , I'll put a link in the show notes to Jonathan from Dark Tale Storytime's webpage .

20 Years of Apple Podcasts

Alban 24:13

So , Kevin , you're talking about what does podcasting look like in five years ? And , at the same time , I'm thinking about what did podcasting look like 20 years ago ? Look like 20 years ago . We're coming up on WWDC , which is like when Apple announces all their software updates and what they're planning on doing for the next year . And 20 years ago in June , it's probably going to be passed in the next few weeks is when Steve Jobs got on stage and said iTunes , like four , we're going to add this new thing . It's like radio for your iPod and it's called podcasts and they're awesome . And he played a little bit of Adam Curry cussing at his computer .

Kevin 24:55

Of all the rehearsing and stuff that we always heard about Steve Jobs doing before a keynote . I don't know how that clip made it into the live presentation .

Jordan 25:03

Wait , this actually happened .

Alban 25:04

Oh , Adam Curry's convinced it was intentional . You think it was intentional ?

Kevin 25:08

Maybe it was that's right .

Alban 25:10

Adam says , oh , I know for a fact , it was intentional , not like he's highly confident because it's so perfect . He goes oh , let's play this podcast . And he pulls up Adam Curry's podcast and he double clicks on an episode and it starts and he's like I'm having a effing bad day because of my Mac computer keeps crashing on me . And he's like okay , let's move on .

Kevin 25:32

Yeah , it's a dig on Macs .

Jordan 25:34

Oh , that's funny .

Alban 25:35

But 20 years ago , and so it kind of got me thinking about you know what the last 20 years of podcasting has been like , especially with in the age of Apple having a big hand in podcasting . As soon as they launched it was like a day later millions of people had subscribed to their first podcast . And there's all these press releases from like two days after they announced it about how big it was , and Adam's quoted in all of those . And then it just grows year after year . You see big shows like the Ricky Gervais show launched right after Adam Carolla's podcast becomes the biggest podcast ever at some point after that .

Alban 26:17

And I was just thinking back through this history and Apple's role in it and it's just like it's so surprising . You know we think of how hard it is to convince big companies to adopt podcasting in an open way . We're really excited now that PodRoll is getting some adoption , but it's pretty hard to convince . You know , youtubes and Spotify's and Facebook's and Amazon the big companies of the world hey , this thing called podcasting is cool . Part of what's cool about it is that you don't control it . It's kind of open and free . I still just think it's like such happenstance and luck that Steve Jobs found these and goes man , this is cool , and it is cool the way it's implemented . Let's just take it as it is , rather than saying Apple needs to own and control all of podcasting for us to ever add it to iTunes .

Kevin 27:09

Yeah , and like embracing it the way it was working Right .

Jordan 27:12

Yeah .

Kevin 27:12

To the point that you're making , albin . It's very counterintuitive and I wonder if that was the long-term plan , like I wonder if he was thinking let's implement it as it's currently working . It's the easiest way to see what the interest level is and to see how many people engage in this type of content once we add it to iTunes and if it starts picking up , maybe we'll make a different move or go a different direction . But I don't know that that's really what he was thinking , because he lived for many years past that and podcast listening became a pretty big thing and at any point in time there was certainly an opportunity for Apple to say we are going to make it easier for people to launch podcasts into iTunes . And there were companies that were popping up , buzzsprout being one of them , that were solving that problem , because it was definitely a problem . And now Apple is not afraid of Buzzsprout and they're not afraid of Libsyn and they're not afraid of Blueberry and a few other people that were popping up . And so it's a little bit puzzling that Apple didn't just say we're just going to squash Buzzsprout and Libsyn and Blueberry and we're going to own podcasting , we're going to launch our own podcasting host . We're going to do it . We're going to undercut them on price and we're going to overdo the quality because we've got 10,000 engineers and they've got four . They could have done it . We probably would have lost , but they never did , and I don't know if it was intentional or not .

Kevin 28:32

Apple doesn't talk about stuff like this , and who would you even talk to anymore ? Right , like cause it's . It's a . It's a big , distributed company , but for whatever reason , this little piece of the internet remains open and there's no real gatekeeper . It's still the self-publishing model to this day . There are some movements in a different direction . Youtube is a different direction . Youtube is like we're going to win the video space and if you want to do video online , we're going to own it , and so the only real way to get any traction or audience around online video is basically to concede to YouTube and their game , their rules , their structure , their algorithms , their everything , their structure , their algorithms , their everything . Might not always have to be like that , but that's where it is kind of today . But audio even though you have Spotify and YouTube both taking some level of interest in space , it's still largely uncontrolled .

Alban 29:19

And I think that that's because there was a 12-year period where it was pretty much iTunes . It was iTunes and third party apps , right .

Kevin 29:27

And for whatever reason , they've resisted the temptation to control it , to own it .

Alban 29:31

Yeah , in fact , right before I started working at Buzzsprout , was when Apple said you know , we really love this thing called podcasts and we're going to add something new . We're going to make a podcast app for the iPhone . And they added that . And then , in 2014 , they made it a default app on everyone's phone . And so 2014 , the first time ever , everybody starts getting this purple app on their phone and clicking it and going what's this ?

Jordan 29:55

Yeah .

Alban 29:56

And checking out Apple podcasts for the first time , downloading shows , and I don't think it's a coincidence that that happened and that's announced I guess it's this time in 2014 . So it would have been out in like September , october . And do you know what happens right after that ?

Jordan 30:11

No .

Alban 30:12

Is Serial .

Jordan 30:13

Oh yeah .

Alban 30:13

Serial launches at the end of 2014 . I would not be surprised . I think it would be cool to go back and look at some data , maybe if Serial knew where this place came from . But my guess is it had this cultural moment and for a lot of people it was the first podcast they ever listened to , and I think if we don't have Apple Podcasts pre-installed on tons of devices , it would have been so much harder for it to break in to the mainstream of everyone talking about this show . I think a lot of people they're like oh , that app on my phone . So much easier to click it rather than go and try to set something up and download episodes and then move them over from iTunes and do this whole thing . Instead , they were just able to click it , download and start listening to what turned out to be an incredible show . 20 years later , and how many things Apple has done that I did not love , from the butterfly keyboards to taking a big percentage of apps , payments or magic mouse charging the keyboard switching .

Alban 31:17

The only lightning cable I have in the whole house is this one plugged into my keyboard . Whatever it may be , this is one that I just feel so grateful for . It's a whole area of the web that I think there was a 12-year period where Apple could have just on their own said this is ours , now we're taking it , and we could have all fought it . But it would have been very painful and Apple at least could have stymied the growth of open podcasting quite a bit . And it's just such a special area of the web and I just feel I guess I'm saying I feel grateful that Apple was a part of this and , for whatever reason , decided to say hey , we're going to promote it , we're going to highlight it in our apps , but we don't have to control it . We're going to let the creators have much more control in this area than they have almost anywhere else .

Kevin 32:07

Yeah , I'll speak a little bit about my personal experience with interacting with some people who work on the Apple podcast team and , at the same time , try to address some of the criticisms of Apple over the years . And that is when Apple decided to bring podcasts into iTunes . They did launch a new namespace for podcasting which was a supplement to the RSS 2.0 spec , and the criticism around that was that Apple was dictating what lives in a podcast feed and what doesn't . And they all have this iTunes namespace and everyone has to follow these rules . And I think the biggest criticism is that that largely went unchanged for years and years and years . There was no innovation , there was no adding of anything . When the podcast namespace project launched , that was in response to that was that we have sort of this benevolent dictator , but the dictator's not . While they're not doing anything bad , they're also not doing anything good to move the space forward , you know , except for the fact that they're leaving it open , which is a really good thing , but they're not helping to advance it or whatever , and so that's some of the criticism that they've had . I will say that I think that , again , this is just my experience and not necessarily the viewpoint of Buzzsprout or anything . So general disclaimers out of the way . Everyone who I've ever interacted with who works on the Apple podcasting team . What comes through is that these people care and love the podcasting space . They care about podcasters , they care about creating a great experience . I always feel like they are doing their absolute best to curate the podcasting experience through Apple perspective and through their products , while operating within the organization in which they operate .

Kevin 33:44

So Apple is a huge corporation . We all know this , if not the largest , one of the largest in the world . There's a culture there , there are rules , there are regulations . There are things that they bump into from time to time , like fees on subscriptions and how you're going to make payments , and other podcasting apps that are trying to get into the app store have to play by the app store rules , which is a different team than the Apple podcasting team , and I think they navigate this stuff brilliantly .

Kevin 34:11

I'm sure there are times when people on the Apple podcast teams are feeling the frustration that is a result of some of the criticisms that they get , like does Apple not care about creators ? Does Apple not care about developers ? I'm sure they feel that same way too , but they know that there's a bigger vision , which is they have this massive reach . They have these hundreds of millions of devices that are out in the world and , even though it might take them much longer to roll something out like transcripts or like subscriptions and they have to do it the Apple way and it's not gonna please everybody , there's gonna be a lot of critics they really do their best to sort of to manage this tension between we're operating within a huge company with a lot of responsibility and legal regulations and the Apple way of doing things , and we're also trying to promote this thing for the open podcasting space and for people who love podcasts and people who love creating podcasts and are very open-minded as opposed to silo thinking .

Kevin 35:06

I don't know how that happened , but it's this magical thing . There are these just great people of this small team that work at Apple who manage this tension really well , never say anything bad about the company , never criticize the ideas of the open podcasting community , somehow manage all this tension within their own little team and then , slowly but surely , make podcasting better on Apple platforms . And I think they're brilliant , they're nice and somehow , 20 years later , apple I think it's hard to point to anything that they've done in the podcasting space and say this was actively harmful for open podcasting . They just haven't done it .

Alban 35:40

Yeah , I think the criticisms are oh , we got a top 2% world , we didn't get the top 1% .

Alban 35:46

Oh , you know what would be cool If they never tried to control podcasting , but then they also improved the namespace collaboratively with all of us .

Alban 35:56

Yeah , I guess that would be better . There's ways we could improve on it . It's just every once in a while I think I get a little bit nostalgic and I thought about it when I was looking at this and I was like this really is a very fortunate way that it all panned out , and whether it be just Steve Jobs' vision or the people who've worked at Apple Podcasts the last 20 years and worked on this product , or a combination of all of it and it's a very fortunate space to be in and I do feel pretty grateful where everybody else , including Buzzsprout who's jumped into the podcasting game all of us have a financial incentive to be here . Everybody else is as much , as we're all helping the ecosystem and we're all participating , whether it be Spotify or YouTube or us or Libsyn or any other companies , we're all trying to make money as well . Apple has actively lost money on podcasting until they launched Apple podcast subscriptions .

Kevin 36:49

Yeah , I'd push back on that . I mean , the financial motivation for them is that . It's another reason for you to use an iPhone , right ? I think that's the big thinking behind making it a default app is it's super simple to just tap the purple icon and there's a whole bunch of shows there that you probably like . One of them and it's another reason I love my iPhone is that podcast listening is so easy on the iPhone . So I do think they have a financial reason .

Kevin 37:11

But you're right , the team doesn't get to go back to Apple corporate and say look how much money we're bringing into the Apple ecosystem .

Kevin 37:19

It's super clear in these financial reports that we're making all this money , so we should get to do this . They don't get to do that , and so that again they have to manage that tension and it's probably why things might take a little bit longer , Like as the corporation is figuring out . Like if we invest in services , if we invest in hardware , if we , you know , add this camera system to the new iPhone and if we do the make the iPad , you know , 15% lighter , we're going to sell this many more , all that kind of stuff . The Apple podcast team doesn't have that same type of leverage , and so I'm not envious at all of the job that these people do , but I'm just saying that I think they do a really good job and they have open communication with people working in the space and they show up to podcast events . If you attend a podcast event , you might not ever notice it and know that they're there . They're not big , they're not flashy , they have meetings

Alban 38:02

Except for the podcast show where they spoke .

Kevin 38:03 Kevin 38:04

They did speak .

Alban 38:04

Yeah , I feel like bummed that we didn't know they were speaking , or else we could have tried to go out there .

Kevin 38:08

Yeah , but I feel like a little bit of unnecessary criticism around that Apple only has closed door meetings and stuff like that . Yeah , but they have them and almost anybody who works in the space can get a time if you want one . There is another large company who has recently started pushing heavily into podcasting . That doesn't operate that way that you can't get an audience with them . And if you do want to have a candid discussion about open technologies and what are you willing to embrace or what are you not it's just a different vibe altogether At least Apple will come sit with you face to face and say we can't comment on that . I hear your point here's a counterpoint but I can't say anything more than that . Like they tell you where the lines are and where the boundaries are and again , I just think it's . I don't think it's necessarily one culture is better than another culture , I just think it's people . And so if for nothing else , I just want to give my experience with the Apple podcasting team is I think they're stellar group of people .

Sound-Off!

Jordan 39:05

It's time for sound off . Let's get into some of our fan mail messages . Alban , do you want to kick things off with a couple of responses to our subscriptions ?

Alban 39:13

Sure . The first was from Alaska and they said oh , I wish there was a name your own price feature for donations and subscriptions . For donations , they can give up to $10 . Subscriptions For donations they can give up to $10 . Subscriptions they can add $20 onto whatever the subscription price is . So here's the feedback that you'd like a little more customization there . So we always appreciate your ideas . And then from Rhode Island . They said I was hoping you were going to announce improvements to the show supporter page , which they'd sent in some ideas about . We've got lots of ideas for both of these and ways to improve them . So if you have ways that you would use them specifically , please feel free to reach out . We might not read all of them on air , but it's always interesting for us to hear how you would use Buzzsprout subscriptions or the support page .

Kevin 40:02

We got a message from the Kitty Wink crew . We'd love to hear your thoughts , specifically on subscription models for kids content . Our goal is to stay accessible to all children , but we're also looking for a sustainable way to introduce a subscription-based revenue stream . Do you know any models that work particularly well for this type of podcast ?

Alban 40:19

I would say early access . Early access is a great way to give people a way to support the show . You know they get a real benefit . They get early access . If you have kids , they've listened to every episode . They'll be excited to listen to the ones that are behind the paywall . But then eventually it's free for everybody and it's open for everyone . So you could put shows behind that paywall for five days and and then afterward it's available to all of your listeners or your potential listeners , so everybody can get it . But there's a real benefit for people to upgrade and it helps , you know , support your show .

Jordan 40:52

Yeah , so I have children that subscribe to my show and they go to it for the bonus episodes . So I just record like two bonus episodes a month and then I have had kids write in saying that they earn the premium subscription through like an allowance base kind of thing . I think a lot of parents do that with like Roblox , like Robux and stuff like that . But you can also offer that with a podcast subscription .

Kevin 41:18

Okay , yeah , a couple of great ideas there . I will tackle it from just the support side , not the premium content like subscriber side . From the support side , not the premium content like subscriber side . From the support side , one of the default benefits that we have is an option that you can choose is get a shout out on the show . So you could just open up listener support , which is basically one click within Buzzsprout , set your benefit message to get a shout out on the show and then , if any of the children that listen end up being a supporter , you just give them a shout out on the show . You could talk a little bit about maybe the fan emoji that they choose , or you could get their email address and you could drop them an email and you could say hey , if you want to write a message that we'll read on the show , you can do it that way . I love that idea . Great idea .

Kevin 41:57

Yeah , I think kids love like hearing their name again . You know like be intentional about protecting identities , so maybe first name only , or first name like last initial and stuff like that . You know cause you do a children's show . You know the appropriate way to handle this , but I loved when I was younger . This is something I've been doing high school . All the time I'm trying to call in on a radio show to win tickets to the uh , you know the minor league baseball game or the local hockey team or something like that . Just like getting on the radio was a huge reward . So I imagine a kid hearing their name on one of their favorite podcasts would be a huge reward for them and maybe something that their parents would say hey , well , if you do these chores or whatever , we will support the show at $3 a month , at $5 a month , so that you get a call out every episode .

Jordan 42:36

I'm actually going to take a page from the summer listening challenge , where the podcasters will send a video message to the kids and it's like a prerecorded video message that's going to apply to anybody and I feel like you could email that to somebody . Just prerecord a message , as you know the host of the podcast , telling them how much you appreciate their support and maybe saying something that you know resonates with your fan base or like an inside joke from the show , and then you can email that to the parents or to the kids that sign up .

Kevin 43:08

Yeah , this is one of the things that's a little bit different about how Buzzsprout does support and subscribers is that you actually get access to the email address that they use when they sign up to become a supporter or a subscriber . If somebody subscribes , like through our Apple podcast integration , you don't get that , so you have to be a little bit more creative in how you could reach out to them directly . But if you're just doing Buzzsprout subscriptions and Buzzsprout listener support , you can email them directly .

Jordan 43:30

All right . And then we got a message from Devin that says I have a Patreon , just one subscriber , a relative but I personally subscribe to a few networks like GZM Shows and NPR Plus . I love their models ad-free plus early access or ad-free and bonus content and I'd really like to see Buzzsprout subscriptions support combos like that and ideally across multiple podcasts . Great feedback and we're working on subscriptions and support as we said , so put that in there .

Kevin 43:56

Yeah , I will say this If you use the Apple podcast subscriptions integration , there's no reason that you can't do this stuff over there today . And so go ahead and set up your Buzzsprout subscription and that might be a simpler model . But then you can log into Apple Podcast Connect , modify your subscription there , you can create a channel and you can put multiple shows in that channel and you can merge different types of benefits so you can do ad free and early access and all that kind of stuff . So for people who subscribe through Apple Podcasts , that's an offering that's uniquely there and you can maybe even talk about that on your show .

Jordan 44:28

Awesome and great news , guys . Uh , Devin also said I love the Spotify rants . It's why I avoid publishing there or on YouTube music too .

Kevin 44:36

Oh hey , good for you . Good for you . Like we said , we it's . It's not a small price to pay . So I really am proud of when people say that they don't like the way that somebody's operating in a certain space . So I'm just not going to use it Like that's powerful . Thank you .

Alban 44:50

Scott with talk with history , reached out and said I subscribe to everything's 80 movie review podcasts on Patreon . It's an extra show from the free everything's 80 podcast host does a great job with the free version and I had to sign up for the patreon only episodes as well .

Kevin 45:08

I do like that . Everything 80s podcast . I mean , I'm an 80s child and , oh my gosh , some of those episodes are so good . David john clark from the late bloomer actor wrote in and said I use buzzsprout subscriptions . I don't offer premium content because I podcast to share info freely , but still I do offer subscribers a chance to join live recordings and ask questions . That is that's , I mean , a huge , huge benefit . Can you imagine if you're an avid listener of a show and you say , hey , if you become a subscriber , I will interact with you and give you a chance to come on the show ? Huge , so I love it . It's completely creative and unique . Great job , david .

Alban 45:44

All right , so we've got a bunch of people who wrote in about remote recordings and all the different tools you use and all the different pitfalls you run into . We've reached out to Riverside . We talked to them a bit about what we've had , so if we figure out the solution we will let you know . But some of you wrote in with your ideas as well . So Kelly is first . She said if you find anything that's really reliable with audio and video , she wants in . Kelly uses Squadcast , which seemed to be most reliable for them and it was good because they're not interviewing other podcasters . They're mostly interviewing people who are new to podcasting . Kelly said the most common issue that she runs into is guests not having at least 10 megabytes per second upload speed , which I guess for Squadcast seems to be really important . So they try to catch that during the screening process . I think we're all good there , but another good thing to check out . So thank you , kelly , for reaching out .

Jordan 46:40

All right . And then Matt Purdy from what it's Like To Be and Chris from Podtastic Audio both recommend Clean Feed as a remote recording software and they swear by it , so that's kind of cool to know .

Alban 46:51

I used Clean Feed once .

Kevin 46:52

Yeah , I have heard so many good things about Clean Feed . I just you know we would miss the video component , but maybe we can do without video . Who knows ? Caitlin from Our Kids Play Hockey said you guys got to try StreamYard . We do the local recordings Never had an issue with gargling . In fact , I can count on one hand the amount of issues we had in two years . I didn't know . Honestly , I didn't know . Streamyard was just a remote recording solution . I thought it was just for setting up live streaming , which we are not interested in at all .

Jordan 47:19

I thought so too .

Kevin 47:21

So I just didn't have them as a competitor in this space , but maybe worth checking out .

Alban 47:26

Katie and David both reached out . They have kind of similar issues or they experienced something like we have with garbled audio before . Katie says it's frustrating . David said I think I have a solution , but it involved turning off all Chrome extensions , closing all other programs , disabling OneDrive and any other backup services . But since doing that my recordings have been smooth .

Jordan 47:48

I'm just thinking about like having my outline up , like that'd be impossible .

Alban 47:52

I think there's got to be a solution that's simpler than that , but it's good to know that David has been able to get it down so that he doesn't have any of these issues .

Kevin 48:01

Steve Vaughn from the photography pod said I'm a podcaster and a wedding photographer . Okay , steve , you're like what is it when you're addicted to stress or cortisol , like the most high stress things ever ? But he says I use Riverside and rarely ever have problems . I think the answer is to do as much of the editing in the app itself . Okay , well , that's , that's possible . Um , that's not a workflow that we use . Jordan downloads the raw audio files and does editing outside of the app . But maybe if you do editing inside the app , I don't want to .

Kevin 48:31

I know you don't want to , but maybe it does resolve some of those issues , but that's great to hear . I'm excited to hear that Steve is not having any problems .

Jordan 48:38

We actually have a final recommendation that came in while we were recording , so this was from Derek , from Intentional Teaching , saying that he uses Zencaster and also experiences the garbling that I mentioned . Hmm , it's interesting .

Alban 48:54

I think that that probably leads more to this theory that Kevin had earlier , that this more is likely connected to things with Chrome and the libraries that everybody else is using , rather than specific software .

Jordan 49:07

Yeah , well , I guess we'll see if we get any answers for that and then follow up .

Kevin 49:12

All right . So , wrapping up that segment of remote recording feedback from our last episode , I do want to say that , of all the companies that we spoke about , there was one company that proactively reached out to both Alban and I and said we are interested in solving any issues that you guys are having with your remote recording , and that is the company that we currently use as our remote recording solution . That is Riverside . And so they reached out to Alban , they reached out to me and they said if you're having any problems , we want to fix them , and so we are actively working with them , and Jordan is getting audio examples , and so we are optimistic that we will soon have a follow-up story that says here's what was happening , here's why it's happening , here's how it's been resolved .

Kevin 49:52

We'll let you know to be determined , but I do want to give them props because they are maybe they're the only company that listens , I don't know , but it does go hand in hand with what we've thought for a long time , which is that the people at Riverside are good people , they're interested in building good software and they want to work with their customers to provide the best solution they can , and so here's evidence of that . So thank you to the team at Riverside that's reaching out , yeah , and we're excited about continuing to use your product . So hopefully we can get these minor issues resolved and we'll report back once they are .

Alban 50:21

Sarah from Wish I'd Known Then reached out and said , in response to Kevin's quandary about what to call a side hustle or a hobbyist podcaster , my co-host and I say we're semi-pro podcasters . I love it . I've got to say I'm not a fan of corporate advertising , feed drops or displaying play counts .

Kevin 50:42

I want less algorithms in my life , not more .

Alban 50:43

Well , Sarah , then you know what you're going to love Pod roll , pod roll . You got to get on . You got to recommend the shows that you love . We can be the algorithm that we want in the world . That's not the catchphrase . We're working on the catchphrase .

Kevin 50:57

Be the algorithm that you want in the world .

Jordan 51:02

That's our next merch line .

Kevin 51:04

What's the saying ? The change thing , be the change you want to see in the world . Be the algorithm you want to see in the world . Maybe that's it .

Jordan 51:11

D Sparkling Life Coach , wrote in and said I'll scratch your back . As believed , it was started in the 17th century English Navy . Back then , sailors were punished with a cat-of-nine-tails , which is a whip . Sometimes they'd make deals to go easy on each other , just scratching the offender's back in exchange for a favor later , it's dark .

Kevin 51:28

Yeah , it's dark , but I do think the saying makes a lot more sense in that context .

Jordan 51:32

Yeah , it does yeah .

Kevin 51:33

You know , because today I'm thinking somebody wants me to scratch their back because they want to feel good , which creeps me out .

Kevin 51:45

I'm just imagining people who don't have one of those long forks to scratch the back . Oh yeah , and then Matt Purdy wrote in he's the producer on what it's like to be podcast and says I got a question for y'all . How do you handle transcripts in Apple ? I see that you're uploading them yourselves rather than relying on Apple to translate the episodes for you . Do you upload a properly formatted transcript in Apple podcast for creators each time and then upload a transcript formatted in a different way via Buzzsprout dashboard for all of the other platforms ? I haven't been able to figure out a best practice for this yet , jordan . What do you do ?

Jordan 52:12

Well , I let our episode run through co-host AI and then I edit the transcript in Buzzsprout and hit publish . That's all I do . Yep , Very simple .

Kevin 52:21

So that is the simplest workflow . It does require that you have the co-host add-on added to your Buzzsprout account in order for that to happen , but that is the simplest way to have a consistent transcript across all platforms . Now Apple still has their discretion whether they will use the podcaster created transcript or use their own . That is a bit of a black box . Well , I say a bit . It's a total black box . We don't really know the rules . They just say a high quality transcript and they are the ones who determine whether the one you're providing is higher quality than the one that they automatically created or not .

Kevin 52:53

There was a time in the beginning when we couldn't seem to produce a higher quality transcript than they could , according to them , and we did our best to make it absolutely perfect , and they would still say it's not high quality enough . I think that's changed . I don't know for a fact , but I do think they are pulling at least some of our transcripts now , even if they are edited perfectly . Sometimes some ones still won't get through . But that's the best you can do , which is provide the highest possible transcript that you can . It does have to be in the right format , which is SRT or VTT . That will be automatically created for you if you use co-host . If not , that's what you have to upload to Buzzsprout to get it into Apple .

Alban 53:28

Yeah , all right , for our next big episode , jordan will be on her sabbatical . She's been at Buzzsprout for three years , is going to take some well-deserved time off and I am going to be your host . So I'm putting together an outline . I want to try something new . We're not going to have a sound off segment . I don't want to have a whole section of feedback . Instead , I want to incorporate your feedback into the entire episode . So we're going to do an episode about what did you wish you knew before you started podcasting . Kevin and I have been podcasting for over 10 years each , so we're going to come with a couple of tips , things that we wish we knew , but we want to incorporate your feedback . So tell us how long have you been podcasting , whether it has been a single episode or you've been doing it for 20 years . Tell us what's something you wish you knew before you started podcasting , and to have your answer featured text the show . Click the link and we will get that and we will incorporate it into the full outline .

Kevin 54:23

Yeah , and if you're wondering what makes Alban and I so uniquely qualified to answer these questions , not only have we been podcasting for 10 years , as Alban mentioned , but we are also a top 2% podcast in the podcast about podcasting niche Trader Space . This is one of the many things that are on my long list of the top 2% club that I'm in . It is indoor skydiving , pickleballing and podcasting about podcasting .

Jordan 54:48

I'm excited for that episode . So until next time , keep podcasting .

Post Show: Going Down to DFW

Alban 54:57

So last week we had Jordan in town and it's one of the few times a year that we see you in person . We don't see you on video screens . It does make me think of how much I enjoy living in a world with all these cool digital and internet products and that we can all work remote and we don't have to go to the office every day . It's really nice , but there is something about just going and seeing people in person that is so much better and it's so much more rich , more fun . So it's great to more rich , more fun . So it was great to have you here .

Jordan 55:25

Yeah , I mean we record this episode for like two hours and by the end of it I am toast , I am exhausted . But it's so funny because when I get to work in the office I will be in a conference room hanging out with you literally the entire day brainstorming projects , working on stuff , and I'm not exhausted . And then we like go out at the end of the day and it's just . It's such a different energy and environment than just being in a zoom call .

Kevin 55:52

All right , I'm looking at Alban , ping me a question and said are you going to go to podcast movement this year ? And I'm looking at the dates for that and let me tell you I'm thinking about this because that's the next time that we're probably all going to be together , right ? If I say yes to this question , which I'm trying to say yes to , what are you thinking ? Is the answer yes , I'm going to have to make this work . I don't know exactly how I'm going to make this work , but my daughter is . She's going to be transferring school , so she's going to TCU , which is in Fort Worth , which is right next to Dallas Whoa , and I have to help her move in the week before podcast movement .

Alban 56:30

So I wonder am I just going to spend the whole week ? Yeah , stay there , come to . Uh , jordan and I are going to go a day early . Uh , so is Megan , and we're going to have like a day to work together . We'll probably do that Monday , and then Tuesday , wednesday , thursday , we have podcast movement . You could come work with us on Monday , I'll hang out .

Kevin 56:49

All right . Well , I'm going to need help from the buzzcast listening audience then , because if I am going to be in Dallas , fort Worth , for almost two weeks because I'm going to have to be there a few days to get her moved in ahead of time , then I'm going to have a few days of downtime and then you guys are coming in the next week for podcast movement . You know I'm a four oh pickleball player .

Kevin 57:08

Now I can't go two weeks , I have to find some local courts and a local community to challenge me on my game . Keep my skills up .

Alban 57:15

Wait . So you're going to go with your daughter , you're going to go up there like the week before , like the eighth or something , and then you're going to stay a whole week .

Kevin 57:22

I think she said that she wants to needs to move in like the 11th , 12th , 13th or something . Okay , so somewhere in there .

Jordan 57:30

Well , have you ever been to Fort Worth ?

Kevin 57:32

No , I've never been .

Jordan 57:33

Oh , so last summer I went to Fort Worth because my in-laws moved to Texas like a couple of years ago , and so we took the kids down there and we went and did their daily Longhorn cattle drive that they do down like the old road in Fort Worth and it sounds really lame but it is so cool . I was way too excited . I think I was enjoying that more than the kids were .

Alban 57:56

All right , so cattle drive , it's on the agenda .

Jordan 58:00

Yep , there's some great pubs around there .

Alban 58:02

I've already texted a friend , friend kevin . 10 years ago we went to our first podcast movement and that's where I met my friend reggie , who was at podcast moving with his show , and he ended up becoming good friends . He's come to jacksonville a handful of times so I'm going to stay there an extra day and hang out with him . You could probably connect with reggie . I'm sure there's other podcasters in the area you could go out and do stuff with , maybe play some pickleball .

Kevin 58:26

Oh , yeah , yeah . So now , now , this , uh , this trip to move in my daughter has turned into a . I gotta have an agenda . Yeah , I gotta get some pickleball on the calendar . I got a . I got some sort of cattle drive going down main street and , um , I'm sure the Rangers will be in town at some point , right , rangers ?

Alban 58:43

are in town , yeah , and so are the Cowboys . You could go to a preseason football game .

Kevin 58:48

Probably going to pass on that .

Alban 58:50

You can see I've already started . As soon as we decided we were going to be there a day early , megan and I start pulling up what sporting events are going to happen , and she's like Rangers and they're going to be out of town , but they're there the week before where you're there , and then we both love football games . So we looked it up and we were like , oh , the Cowboys just the week before . So that opportunity is there for you , kevin .

Kevin 59:11

Well , if anyone's listening from the Dallas Fort Worth area , not only should you go buy a ticket to podcast movement , because we'll be there and it'll be fun , but shoot me some ideas , tap text the show and tell me what I should be doing in Dallas , fort Worth and , especially if you're on the pickleball scene there , tell me which courts I need to hit and where I can find some good competitive play .

Alban 59:30

There we go .