Companies like Spotify have been spending a lot of money to acquire free podcasting services and are moving forward with their plan to make paid podcasts the norm. "Previously, the potential for paid podcasts had been stymied by the 'complexity' involved in gating content on an open RSS feed." The trick is to put the payment part into the reader, and close off the feeds to everyone else. But this means eliminating the free competitors. "Having the ability to collect payments is not the same as having an audience that is willing to pay. A recent YouGov survey found that 83% of podcast listeners said they were 'not very' or 'not at all' likely to pay to access podcasts." But they will if there's no other choice. And eliminating choice is what the commercial marketplace is all about.
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