Ever wondered how independent podcasters can shine in a sea of big networks and celebrity hosts? This episode of "Podcasting Tech" is a must-listen for anyone passionate about podcasting, especially independent creators striving to make their mark.

In today’s episode, we chat with Frank Racioppi, the owner and manager of Ear Worthy Publications and the brain behind the Ear Worthy Independent Podcast Awards. Frank shares critical insights about how niche podcasts can compete with mainstream media. He explains the Ear Worthy awards selection process, focusing on fair judgment rather than popular voting.

Frank, a prolific author and advocate for independent podcasters, talks about the improvement in audio quality over the years and the significance of good equipment in podcasting. He also discusses the impact of podcast length on listener engagement and the importance of respecting the audience's time with quality content.

Mathew and Frank have a candid discussion on the rise of video podcasts on platforms like YouTube and how this trend changes podcast consumption habits. They also explore the role of AI in podcasting and the balance between AI-produced content and the authentic voice of individual creators.

Tune in for a unique podcast recommendation featuring an ophthalmologist from Toronto, and an engaging discussion on various niche podcasts, including those about tattoos and sewing. Plus, don’t miss the spotlight on a podcast aiming to make Bruce Springsteen a gay icon.

Whether you're a seasoned podcaster or just starting out, this episode will leave you enlightened about the art of podcasting. Get ready for an insightful conversation that champions independent creators, reveals quality content strategies, and explores the tech that elevates podcasting to new heights. Don't miss this episode of "Podcasting Tech!"

In this episode, we cover: 

- The motivation behind starting the Ear Worthy Independent Podcast Awards: Frank discusses the need for recognizing independent podcasters and the competitive dynamics of the podcasting industry.

- Managing listener engagement amidst longer podcast episodes: The hosts talk about why respecting audience time and providing concise, engaging content can lead to higher listener satisfaction.

- The growing significance of video podcasts and their impact on traditional audio podcast consumption.

- Unique podcast discoveries: Frank shares intriguing niche podcasts that stood out, including "Hobo Code" featuring Bill Pullman.

- Insights into maintaining sound quality in podcasts and the importance of good audio equipment, with a nod to Jon Stewart's podcast as an example.

Links and resources mentioned in this episode:

- Ear Worthy Independent Podcast Awards: https://podalization.substack.com/p/announcing-the-2024-ear-worthy-indie 

- Follow Frank Racioppi: https://www.blogger.com/profile/18349230915758368191

- Ear Worthy Public Blog: https://podcastreports.blogspot.com/

-  Audio Technica AT 2020 USB Microphone: https://amzn.to/4bPUARg

- Riverside.fm for virtual interviews: https://riverside.fm/?via=mathew&utm_medium=Captivate&utm_source=Captivate&utm_content=signature

- Ophthalmologist’s Podcast: Preconceived Podcast - https://www.preconceivedpodcast.com/ 

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Well, this is definitely exciting. Something that I've probably should have done a lot earlier

in the show and I've wanted to do for a while is interview live in

person, and I am so excited to be doing it this episode for

the first time. Not only because I enjoy doing podcasts in person, but I get

to do it here at Sweet Recording, a studio that I have the pleasure of

being part of the origination of. And now, happy to support here in South

Jersey. But more importantly, let's talk to our guest. We are chatting with Frank Rasiop.

Did Did I say that right, or did I totally butcher it? It's Rasiopi, but

that's okay. Frank Rasiopi. We are going to get it right. He's the

owner and manager of Ear Worthy Publications. You can find that at podcastreports.blogspot.com.

He's also an author of several books. The most notable one you'll probably gonna

recognize as a podcaster is Earworthy, and he's the man behind the

Earworthy Independent Podcast Awards. Frank, thank you so much for joining us.

Matthew, thanks for being being here. Also wanna thank Joe for setting up

in sweet recording. This is fantastic. So thank you, Joe. Thank you,

Matthew. Glad to be here. Beautiful setting. Hopefully, the audience recognizes the

good audio and the nice looking video even though this is what they have to

look at. So Earworthy is been for a

while now, it's been kind of noted as this fantastic

source of independent podcast awards. Right? We have the ones from Iheart and

these bigger corporations, which usually they're promoting their own

stuff. So why did you jump in and decide

to start your own podcast awards, and what was that

process like? So, first of all, great question.

As you know, as big companies have

jumped into podcasting the last 5 years, notably, Spotify,

Amazon through Wondery, Iheart.

You have these large companies

essentially either pushing out independent podcasters

or just stealing the spotlight. So, for

example, most of the awards and in the article about the

podcast awards, there are a lot of awards for

podcasting. They range from the the signals to the ambies.

There's a lot of them. The problem is is that

most of them are for network supported

podcasts. And if you go back, I believe, Julia Louis

Dreyfus deservedly so won for best podcast. And

not that she doesn't deserve it, but there are a lot of independent

podcasts that don't get that recognition. And what

that, how that came to me was through a

podcast I reviewed. It's a British woman. Her name

is EMM. That's, sometimes with independent

podcasts. Weirdly, they don't want their last name out there. I'm

not quite sure why, but you're shaking your head so you've probably seen that. I

understand. Having worked in radio and worked with people who used, you know, weird nicknames,

I I get the privacy that they want. So I

I interview her, one day over Zoom, and we

start talking. And I said, so what are you up to? Her verbal diorama

is about it's a movies podcast. So she'll take a movie. She

doesn't review the the movie itself. She gives you the

history of the the movie, How it got started, who wrote it, what happened

during production, post production, so forth. So I said, what are you doing after

this? She said, oh, well, I'm the head of the British Independent

Podcasting Awards. And my reaction to that was, that's

interesting. Do we have an American version of that? And she

said, no. I don't know why you yanks don't. I can't do a English

accent, so I won't try. And that got me thinking, gee, I wonder why

we don't. So coupled with that

is a change in the focus of

Earworthy. So the Earworthy, the

publication, which basically does podcast reviews, recommendations,

and there are a lot of other people who do the same thing and a

lot of really good people who do that. Greatpods is a good

one. Bingeworthy is a good one. There's a lot of them out there. And one

thing that you know, Matthew, is that the podcasting industry

is collaborative and co collegial. It's not like other industries

where it's cutthroat. So we give credit to other people

basically doing the same thing. So most

of the reviews I do end up coming from a

marketing company from a a large company.

Like, somebody like Beck Media does some Spotify or Iheart Once. They'll

send me something. Like I got one the other day. Tom Flick is

a new audio fiction podcast from Iheart and

Tenderfoot TV. And it's got Owen Wilson and Cissy Spacek in

it. Terrific. That's that's great. Obviously, they've spent money

not just on the the sound production, but also on the

actors themselves. They've spent a lot of money on that. So there's not any

way that someone who's an indie podcaster can can

match that. So,

I just thought about how the field is becoming more and more

uneven, and it's hard for people to compete in

the indie podcast. And you know yourself, especially since

having, the other day you had, Pat Chung on talking

about Fanlist. And that really is about ways for

independent podcasters to monetize their

podcast. And, actually, it was a great episode because I learned

a lot about all these different methods that I had never even

thought of as far as monetizing. And he really did have

some, fabulous ideas. So but

even if everybody, an indie podcaster, adopted all those

ideas, they're still they're they're still

behind monetarily the large

network podcasts. Well, they're behind in attention. I always used to joke that, you

know, Shaquille O'Neal could put out a podcast of him farting for 40 minutes and

he would probably get a 100,000 downloads just because of name recognition

alone. Sure. And we are in a world where

oftentimes people think podcasters are competing with podcasters,

but we're not. We are competing with anything else that consumes

our time. And so in this world where

YouTube, Netflix, television, radio, music,

family, work, right, all these things are competing for our time,

It's hard for anybody to stand out, let alone anybody who doesn't have

a preexisting platform. So that's not to say that there aren't independent

podcasters doing amazing things. There are. Right? It's hard

to get through the noise when you have a

Julia Louis Dreyfus. Right? She puts out a podcast and, yes, it is excellent. Like,

what she's doing is excellent. The concept is that the it's a great show, but

she has a huge advantage because she is a Emmy award winning

Julia Louis Dreyfus. And so, yeah, I see where

anybody starting a podcast feels like they're at a

disadvantage. Exactly. Well said. And a good exam another good

example is the Kelsey Brothers. Mhmm. Their podcast, I think, is

I think it was Joe Rogan, Crime Junkie, and the Kelsey

Brothers. I forget the name of their podcast. Oh, I know if

Joe is listening, he's gonna he's gonna pop in and tell us what it is.

And my wife is gonna be very upset that I don't know this off the

top of my head because she's a huge, at new heights with the

Kelsey Brothers. But, yeah, they they right? I pod news would constantly

show, you know, who are the top podcasters. And for a while there, especially around

the Super Bowl and Taylor Swift, right, they were right up there in the mix

all the time. Sure. And it's the it's really the Shaquille O'Neal

metaphor, which is not it's not that it's not good, they're actually quite

entertaining, but it's because they're the Kelsey brothers. And so that's all

you end up needing in order to do that. The one thing

I will say about that whole concept is that a few

years ago, these big networks thought, you know what we're

gonna do? We're gonna take a social media influencer, and we're

gonna put them on a podcast. And that went on for

about 3 years. It slowed down a lot now because one of the things

they discovered is that someone that makes a 30

second TikTok video or an Instagram reel

sometimes can't sustain 40 minutes of a podcast. They don't have

that much in the tank in order to get a dialogue You

I get something from any one of the marketing media companies,

at least once a week. This person is starting a

podcast. Here's a good example is so we have, in the last couple

weeks, this has rocketed up to the top, is the

NCIS rewatch podcast, whose name

escapes me right now. I did write about it. And I listened to it, and

it's actually quite good. But those and there's

another one, which is Melrose Place in 90210,

which just came out. Those kinds of rewatch

podcasts, end up with a built in audience because everybody

it doesn't matter, actually, who's the host. So usually, they get people that used to

be on the show. But even if they don't, you're like, oh, wait a minute.

I used to love this show. I need to listen to this podcast. Right. You're

already a fan of the brand. And so it's it's really easy for

those people to come along. A great example, actually

so I listen to Conan O'Brien a lot. Which I love. And funny enough, I

never watched Conan. I just I had some time, and I

remember saying some you know, somebody said, oh, he's really funny. Check it out. I

went back and listened the whole thing. Well, recently, he got Ted

Danson and Woody Harrelson to launch a podcast on

his network called Everybody Knows Your Name Oh. Which is a reference to Cheers where

the 2 starred together And that same effect.

Right? Like, oh, I know these guys. I should listen to it. And I know

the guests that they're having, I should listen to it. Lovingly, I

don't love it. It's not it's Interesting. It it it's a very

calm, dry, slow energy, which just

doesn't do it for me. That's not to say that there is not a lot

of people who are going to love it, but I I fell

victim to that same thing. I said, oh, I recognize the names. You know,

these are stars and people who I know. I would enjoy the show and

turned out I really didn't. Interesting. Haven't unsubscribed yet, so you're still getting my

downloads, which is nice. So so let's go back to what you do. So Earworthy,

how do you figure out who is going to be in the

mix? Right? Who is nominating or who gets nominated, and

who ultimately decides who the winners are gonna be? Great

question. So, here so

I'm a South Jersey person like you, Matthew. But I have

in my travels, I have met some podcast people that are have a

there's a gentleman I know named Jim Driscoll. He lives in Minneapolis.

So we communicate. He's a podcast consultant there.

And another gentleman, George Witt, who's out in San Francisco,

and a woman I've known for years. I used to work with her,

LaShay Jones. She does a podcast, and she's in Plano,

Texas. Plano's right next to that. You're you're shaking your head. You know? I

had a frat brother who lived in the Plano. Yeah. So,

I talked to them. We get together. We spent

on Zoom hours trying to work this

out. First of all, because, it's hard to

corral independent podcast. What you I mean, you know there's every time

somebody reports on a number of podcasts, they're they talk about the 1,000,000.

But there's there's still even if you look at the number

of podcasts that are over 50 over 50 episodes,

there's still 70 or 80,000 of those. Right? Well,

I saw something, recently. There's only

330,000, what they're calling, active podcasts. Someone who's spent an

episode in the last, maybe it's like 50 days or something like that.

So, yeah. It's it's a broad market, but it really isn't

as big as it's often advertised as. And

so this is a technology thing. So when I first started doing

reviews, and I started that early on in the process.

I used to have a publication called Podcast Reviews back in 2010.

Oh, early. Early. And so that failed largely because there just wasn't

enough people paying attention. But back then when I did

reviews, if I listened to a independent

podcast as compared to the few network ones. So

back early then, TV Guide actually got a podcast.

PC, PC Magazine had a podcast.

Leo Laporte's been around forever. He had one.

You could tell the difference right away between a professional

podcast and an independent podcast simply because

the technology their technology generally wasn't very

good. They didn't have the mics. They didn't have the system. A lot of

times people were trying to learn Audacity at the same time as they were doing

their podcast. And so you could tell the difference right away. And I

went back and looked at some of my old articles. And I used to have

a section where I would talk about sound quality. Now it's

rare that I'll do that largely because most of the independents the the

sound quality, it matches the some of the best

professional podcasts that are out there. I mean, you can't tell the difference between,

say, a Jordan Harbinger podcast. He's an big

time interview guy. And a smaller podcast like,

Ayesha Khan does every single sci fi film

ever Oh. From England. You couldn't tell the difference in the sound

quality. I'll show the technology has come a long way. I remember when

I first started doing this on my own outside of a media company,

the first mic I bought was a blue snowball mic. It's

like $80. It was terrible. And now

for $60, I can get a Samsung

Q2U or an ATR 211100 and, right, it's

it's hard to discern the difference, especially now with the AI tools that are out

there to improve the audio. But yeah. Back in the day, I used to say

people sounded like they were podcasting from their mom's basements. Exactly. Yeah.

Because you could they they sounded, like, really far away. Sometimes,

2 people or 3 people tried to use one mic, and you could tell

they'd get the pops. All those things were going on. But that's for a

pod independent podcast that gets a good amount

of, listens, that's rare for that to happen now. You can't really

tell the difference between them. I mean, there's there's a podcast called,

6, Degrees of, Cats. It it's

one of the award winners. It's by this woman who's called, she

calls herself Captain Kitty, but her name is Amanda B.

She uses do you remember Rick Taylor, the

old comedian back from the nineties? He would have throw the Yeah.

And squeeze horns and everything. She throws

every sound trick and design and device that you have

at it. There's always something happening there, which for an independent guest,

she's got a lot going on. You would think, well, I'll just keep it as

simple as possible. But she's that good that she makes it good. It's

a deep, rich, sort of resonant tone to the whole

podcast. You know, it's funny you say that too because now I hear some

professional podcast and when they don't sound good, I

think to myself, why the hell can't you sound as good

as all these other people? I I, notably,

I listen to Jon Stewart's new podcast every once in a while. And sometimes I

wonder if he even has a mic. Oh. And I'm like, this is a guy

who worked in television. He's got, you know, he his quality should not

be an issue. And sometimes I find that it is, which is

strange. That's actually funny you should say that because he just started that weekly

podcast, and I listened to it because I'm a fan. My reaction was actually

the same way. I'm like, wait. Is he not doing this in in the

studio, or is he just doing this at home? Or what's going on here? Well,

he he was doing one when he had the Apple show too. Yeah. Uh-huh.

And that was similar. He must be doing it from home. And, again, somebody just

buy him a q 9 u or a a, you know, There are

mics for less than $300 you could buy that just plug it in work. It

shouldn't be that simple. But, anyway, so so you you know, there's

no difference now. Right? Quality is no longer an issue.

Right. Right. It's not it's it's a leveling factor now. Exactly.

So, I think one of you were talking about, podcasting

in relation to all the other activities that people can

participate in. And it's podcasting's not just competing with

themselves, but with Netflix and, video games.

And so one of the strengths of independent podcasting

that I think, the wonders of the world and Spotify still

haven't picked up on is that podcasting, right from the

beginning, was a niche is a niche within a

niche. So, for example, one of the things I love to

do is search for unique podcasts.

So there's a guy who he hasn't done one a little bit.

He does a podcast about tattoos, which isn't that unusual.

And he has a audio he has a video part, of course, to show the

tattoos. But the thing but the difference is he

does it about tattoos that people have messed up. And so

it's it's actually pretty hilarious. And so he he goes around,

apparently, takes pictures of people's tattoos. And he'll say,

well, somebody will have a misspelling or whatever. But the the whole

idea I mean, it's kinda quirky, but the whole idea is that you can have

a podcast in which the topic

is so arcane that no other format

would even touch it. They're like, okay. If I write a book on this, how

many people will read it? 50 people? But with a podcast, I think I

was telling you earlier, there's a woman that I used to work with.

She started a sewing podcast called Sew What, which is

a great name. She ended up with, she passed

during COVID, of COVID, but she ended up with 5,000 listeners

before she passed on a sewing podcast. It was amazing. And if

she didn't do it weekly, she would get people saying, well,

where's the where's the podcast? It just and so you would think,

well, who wants to hear about sewing? Well, apparently, at

least 5,000 people did. She didn't do any marketing, or she

didn't do any social media, no SEO, 0. And she

still got 5,000 people. So for a lot of these people that

are in these awards, these are a lot of them, if you look at

them, they're you they're unique topics

or they're topics that everybody does that are they've done

extremely well. And so a good example of

that I actually brought my list here so I could look at it so I

don't mess anybody up. So here's one, here which

is pretty unique. It's called Because the Boss Belongs to Us.

This is a pretty recent one. It's, 2 women

from, England, and their whole

concept is so they are part of the LGBTQ

community. Their whole concept is they wanna make Bruce

Springsteen a gay icon. Yeah. And that was that

was my reaction too. The state of New Jersey is gonna have some words with

you about that. And so, they,

they start out by saying, when you think about gay musical

icons, who do you think of? Shelton John. Cher. Mariah

Carey. But we're gonna work hard in order we're going to

make Bruce Springsteen a gay icon. And it's a

limited series, and I finished 4 episodes so

far. But it's terrific in which they do it. They

they took take some of his songs. They they look at some of the

lyrics related to their life and their lifestyle. It's a very

unique and different and quirky podcast. How do you find a

podcast? Like, are you just searching for podcasts or

are people submitting them? Sometimes both. Sometimes somebody because

of, so luckily, and thanks to the

people who read, I usually get in different formats

about 5 to 10000 people a week. So I will so people

will read and obviously podcasters will read. Somebody will send me a message.

Here's a good example of one of the

audio fiction podcasts. It's a podcast

called Hobo Code. So hobo

is is an older word from the depression. Right.

People that rode the rails, the hobos. And it

it was designed by a couple people. It's a Shane

Portman, a Paul Packler and Ruth Gamble. That's

Shane's wife. They're Hollywood people. They're not podcasting people.

They're video people. They're filmed. They have won a couple

awards in Hollywood. They decided to do on their own an audio

podcast. And so they I think Shane and Paul wrote

it, and it's called The Hobo Code. And it's about these 2 hobos

and this young girl, who her parents have

left her with this, cruel uncle. And her life is

so bereft of anything positive that

her toy is a soup can.

And, if you go out and look at their great job on the graphic

design. If you look at it, The hobo code's written inside the soup

can. But it's just absolutely a terrific audio

fiction podcast. There's no actors you would know. Oh,

I think that that actually there is, trying to think there is. They were

able to get somebody at scale, and I'll have to look it

up and who it is, but, they got one actor that we would know,

there. And, oh, it's Bill, Bill

Pullman. Oh, yeah. I know. That's Not a not a small name.

I know. I couldn't I couldn't think of his name. I was kept thinking Bill

Paxton because that's not possible, sadly. But it was Bill

that got Bill Pullman, to have a small role in there. But, anyway, it's a

terrific podcast. It, it came

out about 6 months ago. They sent me a message saying, hey. Can you

listen to our podcast? And listen to it and absolutely loved

it. Send it to the other folks that I know and a few other podcasters.

And I, you know, I

know a few people who do podcast marketing, send it to them. And

so now that he sent me a message the other day. So we started

out on episode 1 with

25 25 downloads and about

40% completion rate. And now he's up to

7,000 and a 70 2,

74% completion rate. So that's darn good.

That's pretty good. Yeah. So you're not

putting these up there and letting people vote? It's you and, like, a committee that's

kinda making this choice? Yes. We were gonna do it the other way.

That's actually I'm glad you brought that up. But we just thought that that

would mean a lot of because of these podcasts are

indies, so a lot of people have never heard of them before. So it would

be like, okay, you have to go out and listen to it. And we thought

that was such a long process. We need we wanted to jump start

this. I mean, some of these podcasts do get it's not like

they're they're not getting downloads. There's a podcast called Salad

with a Side of Fries. Yeah. And one of the things

I love about that is it's a health and wellness

podcast by this woman, Jen Trebek. And she's kind of interesting

because she since you worked for the Wall Street Journal, she worked in New York

City for a couple of investment firms. That was her background.

She decided that this isn't fulfilling enough. I'm gonna do something different. And she

got into fitness training. And from that, she started a podcast

and and a whole fitness regimen called salad with a side of fries.

And the whole idea that's, which I love is, which is kind of

baked into the to the name, is that salad, which

has this healthy halo effect, and fries,

which does not, her concept is you don't have

to you can still have fun, eat, cheat a

little bit, and still be healthy. And that that's so

she she'll go on and look at how

diets sometimes are counterproductive, and they don't work. And you

don't have to go and do something where if your mouth touches

a carb, oh my gosh, I have to cleanse myself. So it's it's

a great podcast. I I think it's interesting that you

decided not to go the voting route also because what you have often are

podcasters who will use their audience to and

not cheat, but, you know, they'll they'll put

their thumb on the scales. Right? If you have a really

great podcast but only has a few 1,000 downloads

and you have a decent podcast but has a few 20,000

downloads or 40,000 downloads, right, that person's gonna

probably win because they're gonna get their audience, they're gonna mobilize, they're gonna get the

votes, and it's gonna take over. So I like the fact that you're, you know,

you're listening, you're making a judgment, you and a a few others are deciding.

You know, it's it it almost feels like the difference

between certain award shows during the movie season. Right? Like the Oscars versus the

Emmys versus the, you know, the other ones. Right? Where the sag where

the actors actually vote versus where the, you know, the foreign press votes

versus this and this. So that that's that's interesting. So as a

reminder, we are chatting with Frank Raciope. Got it right back.

Excellent. Owner and manager of Earworthy Publication, podcast reports

dotblogspot.com, author of a few books, including Earworthy,

and you can check out we'll have a link, by the way, to the article

that announced the 2024 Earworthy winners.

So you can, you know, see some of these shows, listen to some of the

ones that we're talking about. Now that you've done this, do you

have plans for what you're gonna do next year? Are you going

to change things up? Are you gonna do some sort

of, like, you know, live reveal like we might get for, you know, some of

these other awards or anything like that, or still gonna keep it,

tight ship like ever right now? Oh, great question again.

And the answer is that we are gonna do some things different, largely

because we did get a lot of attention because of the

award. So to be honest, we would like to include

people like you. And

Matthew's a little if you didn't see that, Matthew's a little suspect on

that, but a lot of other people into the process.

Going back to the the voting thing, and you are right about that. But if

you look at a lot of the major awards, they're they always, generally speaking,

are by committee. The the committee are bigger names

than me, like James Crinlin or Ariel Nissenblad or

Brian Barletta, Bigger names, but it's still the same

concept. This committee gets together and decides who's gonna win the award.

So that may not change. It's just that the committee itself

would would grow and bring some people in, including

some of These winners. These winners and some of independent

podcasts. Well, I I think Ariel's on the

list of somebody who won this past year with her show, Ariel and

Ned's Daily Tips. Yeah. And Ariel, I believe, is the one

who drew my attention to. I believe she posted about it and mentioned and

talked about it. And, you know, she she is

a huge advocate and champion of independent podcasters. And

so when she said this was a worthy cause, I said, yep. Yep. I'm gonna

have to look into this and, check-in with Frank and and see what's going on.

So I am glad I caught that message from her. I'm glad we got the

chance to chat. While we have you, we have a couple of questions we like

to ask for all of our podcasters. Is there

a place in the podcasting world where you would

like to see improvement? It could be software, equipment,

right, anything. It's just is there just something about podcasting and you've you've paid

attention to it for a lot longer than most? Is there something today that you

wanna see done better? Oh, great question. I

I am a faithful listener of your podcast, and I love when

you ask that question. People have terrific answers. But it's a it's a

good ending question. There's a couple things. One

is, I think, just for existing

podcasters, both network or independent, they

really need to look at editing their podcast.

I I think we talked about this when you said a podcast is as long

as it needs to be. Yep. Right? Which is which is

excellent. But there's people that somehow because

of people like Dan Carlin and Joe Rogan, they're thinking, I'm you know

what? My podcast can go, 2, 2 and a half hours.

Especially interview podcasts where I've listened to podcasts where

the interview is excellent, except I listen to points where, well,

you're kinda saying the same thing again. You probably coulda edited this. And instead of

90 minutes, it could have been 40 minutes and just as effective. So I see

that trend where they're going longer. And

that that doesn't just have an effect on

that particular podcast. But so think about how most

podcasts, even with YouTube, are consumed.

Generally speaking, most people are consuming podcasts and they're

doing something else. So it's not as if I'm gonna sit down and

watch Netflix. Okay. I'm just doing that other than probably

looking at your phone. Right. We all do. But

podcasting is, hey. You know what? I'm need to go out and garden. You know,

I'll throw in my, AirPods and I'll listen to the podcast.

Well, for me, like, I did that the other day because the

heat broke in South Jersey and other parts of country. I was able to finally

get out, do my roses and things. So I was out there for about an

hour and a half. Well, that got me I listened to the

your episode with the gentleman about trailer, Graham Mhmm. Which I

thought was fascinating. I listened to 2 other podcasts. I listened to Double Take, which

is a

Always Always like, alright. What's coming on Netflix or Paramount Plus? They'll these two

ladies will tell you. But so I got to listen to all those

in 90 minutes. Yours was about 20. Hers was

about 20. So I listened to 4 4 or 5 podcasts in,

90 minutes. Now somebody decides,

oh, I'm gonna run 1 an hour and 45 minutes. I guess I could just

shut it off at one point, but, I'd like to get them to

completion. So it it kinda crowds out your ability

to to, do other things and listen to

multiple podcasts. Yeah. I find myself having

sometimes the opposite problem, which is I we got a dog

recently. So a lot of my podcast consumption, I was walking the dog. And so

I find myself listening to a show, finish walking the dog, and be like,

oh, I still wanna hear what happens next. I need to find something else to

listen to. But, yeah, I I I agree with

you that there are many, many podcasts who are going

long for the sake of going long, and you really have

to respect your audience's time. You are typically giving

this away for free, but we have to invest our

time. And time is honestly a

bigger valuable asset than anything else because

it's fleeting. So don't go long for the sake of going long.

Don't be short for the sake of being short. Deliver value, avoid being

repetitive and boring. You'll put out a good podcast. That's

my thoughts. No. Absolutely. I agree. And the and

and the other part of that is for the the time is that

now that video podcasts are a lot more popular and they're on,

I think YouTube now has become has it become the number one sort

of landing spot for podcasts? Or am I wrong? I

There are no. There are articles and there are claims that that may be true,

and it's it's really hard to measure. But Right. Yes. YouTube is a major player

in the podcasting world now. Right. So whether it's you can do

audio podcasts on YouTube. But whether it's audio or

video, when you put them up there, people can again,

especially if it's a video, they can only consume one thing at one time. So

if you have thousands and thousands of

podcasts, you need to look at, hey. At what

point here do, even for a person

who does independent podcasts, most of these people here, and this is

pretty common in the independent podcasting world, seem to have more than one

podcast. You're shaking your head. For some reason, I'll talk to somebody. Hey,

I really like your podcast. Oh, well, you know, I have like 4 more.

Which one? I have 4 more. And then, you know, like, well,

okay. I'm I'm gonna come back to my next

question usually. So the the question I was asking, this is hard because you do

the awards. But is there a podcast

in your library that when that one drops,

you will stop whatever it is you're listening to and go right to that

one? Great question. I listened to the gentleman the other day. That was a

that was a good question. The answer to that is I'm I'm cheating because

I'm looking at my list here. There's a

this is a different. There's a guy who won the award. His name

is Zale Mednick. He's a ophthalmologist from

Toronto, Canada. K. So I know that's you're like, wait, an

ophthalmologist. Going? Yeah. You worked for UPS, not a you were not a doctor.

So he is such a great

interviewer. As soon as his podcast drops, I'll

right away, they'll listen to it. Because he has the ability

to conduct an interview in which he draws out the

person so they can give you their insight.

And he also is able to address

conventional wisdom. And a lot of the times, these guests end up being

people who say whatever most people believe isn't true. That's why it's

called preconceived notions. But he's he's terrific.

I am I I never really do this, but I'm actually in my Overcast

app trying to find this podcast right now because that seems like a

very strong, recommendation. So,

Zale, if you are listening to this at some point, you just got a new

subscriber. There you go. Cool. Alright. And then

lastly, and I know you don't really produce a

lot of podcasting content. Right? You just write about it primarily. But is there some

sort of tech that you wanna see in the podcasting world or some sort of

device that would improve podcasting either from

the production or the listening side of things?

Again, a good question. And you're right. I'm not a technology person. However,

I did a review of a podcast from the Boston

Consulting Group. And in the podcast, they did something I thought was kind of

interesting. They created an AI

cohost. And yeah. I know. And so

it was a female, and I've forgotten her name. But, anyway, so there was

a a BCG, Boston Consulting Group. Had their host.

He was very good. And he would converse with her, and they

would talk about AI in the, workplace.

And then we they would talk. And I'm like, wow. This is, this is

pretty amazing that they would do that. So by saying that, I'm not

advocating I'm not an advocate of there's like a Joe Rogan AI podcast and other

people. So,

That'd put a lot of people out of business and not be anywhere near as

good as, people. But

I I think there are AI tools and listening to your

podcast and mister Driscoll, who's in Minnesota, there are

AI tools that can make your podcast so much

more seamless, flawless, better technically. And

not just from the technical perspective, but also from the perspective of

just the content as well. So, yeah, I am an

advocate for AI when used appropriately and not to

replace people. Not listening, I don't wanna hear an an

AI host. It's funny you said that because, yeah, there's a lot more.

I've seen, just recently, maybe even this morning in Pod News. I

think James had an article about a software that

will read a white paper and turn it into, like, a 5 minute

podcast, which is useful, but, right,

somebody should be doing that instead of the AI.

I remember seeing a great quote. It's like, I'd much rather have my AI

doing my laundry and taking out the trash and not having it

replace my artists. Like, that would make the world a better place, and we seem

to be Yeah. On the opposite side of the spectrum. And, of course, one area

that's related to podcasting that is impacted by that is

the audiobook narration industry because they're they're scared

about that. I I did I listened to, an audiobook,

by an AI. It was it was a short book. So it's only a 49

page book and by the author. And the idea was you're supposed to

kind of weigh them to see which one you thought was better.

The AI was quite good, but there's something there's something,

sterile and sort of vacant about the AI voice that the the author

put something into it. And I still would gravitate towards the

author than the, the AI voice. So I imagine that's

not too dissimilar to you're you're here with a journal that has the Beatles

on it. I imagine you're the same kind of person who would say, you

know, the CD sounds great, but there's just something about the

record. My gosh. Right? It just has a different warmth. And that's probably a very

similar thought with, you know, these new AI technologies versus

the, versus the actual person who is, you know, performing that

podcast. You must have been looking at my home because I have a great, vinyl

collection. Absolutely. You you and my uncle would get along very well. He's a

huge Beatles person. We'll we'll talk about the that is not a

value to the audience. So we'll take that off there, and we'll we'll wrap it

up. Got it. But, I this has been fascinating. I'm so glad. 1, I was

I was pleasantly surprised to see that you're in South Jersey, and so I'm glad

we got the chance to meet Thank you. And to talk about this. And I

I look forward to as you prepare for 2025,

hopefully, we can do this again and get more people involved and get more submissions

and get more excitement around it. But, we've been chatting with Frank

Graziope. He's the owner and manager of Earworthy Publication

podcast reports.blogspot.com, author of several books, including

Earworthy, and we'll call you the founder. Sounds like you have a few other

folks with you, but founder of the Earworthy Independent Podcast

Awards, which, we'll have a link to that article. You can check out all the

winners. A great list. A few names that you might recognize from this show,

including our friend, Danny Brown, who at this time, his episode hasn't

dropped, but it will soon. And so, I'm so glad to see that he,

he made that list as well. And, before we go, a special thanks to

Joe Gondjemi at Sweet Recording with Thank you, Joe. Pleasure of hosting us.

But, Frank, a real pleasure. Thanks for coming in today. Matthew, thank you. I appreciate

it. It was a it was a good time. Thank you. Thanks for joining us

today on Podcasting Tech. There are links to all the hardware

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