I Fucking Love Podcasts

And god damnit, you will too.

If you saw me on the subway this past winter, you wouldn’t have described me as looking happy. That’s probably true of 99.9% of people on the train. But we all know that .1% of the population that’s completely unhinged, happy to be jammed into a subway car that’s more akin to a sausage casing.

Except I’ve changed. I discovered podcasts. And if I happen to be listening to one of the many amazing comedy podcasts like Two Dope Queens, or my current personal favorite How Did This Get Made, it’s very likely I’ll be shamelessly cackling amongst the masses.

Listen. No seriously, if you’ve never listened to a podcast, stop and listen to one. Whatever you’re into, some jerk with a microphone is creating audio just for you. Can’t decide what to listen to? Check out this How Did This Get Made episode about The Avengers (1998), I think I peed myself a little during it:

Tom Scharpling of The Best Show joins Paul, June, and Jason to discuss the 1998 action spy film The Avengers. Recorded LIVE from the 2016 Vulture Festival in New York City, they discuss Sean Connery’s “evil” plan, Uma Thurman’s clone “2ma Thurman”, and the bear costumes. Plus, we hear the very first 4th Opinion in the history of the show!

Our smartphones have unleashed a shit load of previously unavailable activities during our free time. Even when we’re filling our time with leisurely activities like binging season 4 of Orange Is The New Black, we’re still on our phones Snapchatting, ogling Airbnb treehouses, or creeping on that hot bear from Astoria’s Instagram account.

Like I said, we’re increasingly doing multiple things at once, so why not have one of those things be listening to podcasts. Whether I’m on the train to work playing Two Dots, or at the office waiting to go home playing Two Dots, it’s super simple for me to throw on some hot takes from Bill Simmons or get educated on the cosmos with Neil deGrasse Tyson.

Neil deGrasse Tyson looks past politics to examine climate change, clean energy, the future of life on Earth, and spider goats with environmental activist and former Vice President Al Gore, blogger Andrew Revkin, and comic co-host Maeve Higgins.

True crime super-podcast Serial seems to have contributed in a large part to the resurgence of podcasts. If you haven’t heard of the cultural phenomenon that was Serial season one, you need to find better friends on Facebook. This home run, on-demand radio show is certainly the belle of the ball, and a great example of how quickly the podcast market feels like it’s growing.

In November 2015, Pandora announced they would stream Serial with the backing of major advertisers, Esurance and Warner Bros. Not only does that feel like a strong vote of confidence for the medium, but also I think we can expect more of these innovative sponsorships to occur.

You may still be unconvinced about podcasts, because they can be so hard to find sometimes. I’ll admit podcasting has its quirks that still make it a bit inaccessible. Really, they’re different versions of problems every medium has: discoverability and format.

Veterans of online text will tell you discoverability is a double-edged sword. In the quest for scale and ad dollars, building audience relied on third party platforms (Google and then Facebook), only to become cogs in those platforms’ wheels.

Ben and James discuss the present and future of podcasts, and how media companies need to take a holistic approach to their businesses.

Format iteration has always been difficult, but it’s the way the media industry stays relevant. Think about the glory days we’re living in, we’ll be able to tell our grandchildren about the birth of the listicle and vertical video! The difference is that BuzzFeed relies on other platforms, while Snapchat still makes its own rules.

In making talk radio available on-demand, podcasts were already innovative, but since their inception in 2004, not much has changed. Given the influx of money and attention though, it’s hard to see the podcast industry not experiencing fundamental changes. Whether podcasts become dominated by a single platform for discovery or remain distributed in media networks is yet to be seen.

You probably don’t care where podcasting will be next year, let alone five years from now. Though hopefully by now, you’ve listened to at least one podcast and figured out how to subscribe to updates. Maybe you’ve already figured out what the next movie review will be on How Did This Get Made and rented it on Amazon Prime.

If nothing else, get yourself signed up for a politics/news podcast and you’ll sound infinitely smarter at the watercooler. Need another podcast suggestion? I’ve been a big fan of Slate’s Political Gabfest lately (seriously, there are so many amazing podcasts).

Now all that’s left to do is for me to launch my own podcast and for all of you to listen religiously. To show you how flexible the format is, I leave you with one of the oddest podcasts I’ve stumbled upon, Welcome To Nightvale, a twice-monthly podcast in the style of community updates for the small desert town of Night Vale.

A new dog park opens in Night Vale. Carlos, a scientist, visits and discovers some interesting things. Seismic things. Plus, a helpful guide to surveillance helicopter-spotting.

Happy listening!