Podcasts Types for Resonate Audiences

I know there are a few ongoing discussions around podcasts here already. That aside I wanted to offer up some content ideas for Resonate to wade into this area, as I believe it would a) be fun! Highlight new music!, b) Drive traffic to resonate in the form of unique/exclusive content.

Here are my ideas:

-A weekly or bi weekly podcast that is a 'New and Noteworthy podcast of Resonate Releases. This would be akin to a traditional radio show, where the host would curate what the highlights would be, with the support of the Resonate team (so that what is being championed on Resonate’s landing pages and socials reflect the same releases/artists), talk briefly about the artist/release and play a song or two. At the end of the podcast there could be some general news about Resonate- any new features or updates, and pointing people to join the community. It would be great to have this hosted by a taste maker (either known or some one about to break-either from within our community already, or some one we can bring into the community who has a talent for curation and taste making.)

Once that’s established, there are two others that come to mind.

-Tour Stories: Hosted again by a tastemaker/personality who is comfortable interviewing artists on Resonate. Once a month (at first) an artist will be asked on to tell, like a campfire some interesting or funny tour stories. They could be from a really long time ago, or recent. (I got this idea from Martin Atkins cause he’s been doing Zoom calls all pandemic where he picks a date he remembers from touring, and we all pile on Zoom, and he tells stories. Its a fantastic hang.) This would be a great way to have very unique content, deepen connections that listeners have with artists here, and help artists stand out.

-Studio Sagas: Similar to above its story based, but could include the finished music (if its on Resonate). The host would again be like above, and would interview artists/bands about the making of the recordings. There’s a Gear Club podcast I adore that does similar but its Recording Engineers/producers talking to each other, “Some Deep Audio Shit”. This could be just as technical, or less so depending on the artist, (but hey why not ask the egnineers and producers along? We like to talk to people too…occasionally. :stuck_out_tongue:) Again, for the reasons listed above this could be a great podcast, monthly to start.

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This is a great idea and especially love the tour stories aspect :grinning:

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This is a great idea, would love to help out or be a part of this if I can.

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Can we identify what is blocking someone from doing this today?

Added wikisurvey here All Our Ideas - Bringing survey research into the digital age

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I love these podcast ideas and feel like there is so much potential here. I’d love for us to figure out a solution. Alright, here’s my brainstorming.

known roadblocks

#1 - no payment model for podcasters
#2 - no payment model for artists featured on podcasts
#3 - no membership model for podcasters
#4 - artist dashboard (the track uploader tool) isn’t ready for use by artists or podcasters (it needs UI improvements)

For stream2own, the price per play of a track grows over the first 9 plays and the payment is automatically charged at the 45 second mark. Since podcasts would likely never get played 9 times, this makes them function very differently from what stream2own was designed to reward.

Any material put on the player that gets less than a few plays per user will basically never make any revenue, either for the podcaster or for the co-op.

As explored in another big Topic concerning stream2own and longform music, our current payment model stream2own doesn’t do a good job of rewarding longform music – and podcasts would suffer the same issues to an even greater degree due to having less replay value.

Potential fix through roadblock #2, still with issues to sort out:

If users could have the ability to upload podcast-ish segments which would be free for others to stream, these segments could be added by that user to their playlists between artists’ tracks, adding a personal touch: stories, convos, poems, commentary and more.

(A switch on the playlist could turn Segments on or off, so that listeners could enjoy the playlist with or without the Segments from its creator.)

Roadblocks #1 and #3 wouldn’t be fixed, but via Segments we’d have something sorta like a podcast and the artists who are featured on the segments-playlist would get paid as normal via stream2own. This wouldn’t be a good solution for professional podcasters who are already making long podcasts in the conventional style. I see this more as a way for Resonate users to connect with each other and make new material.

Segments would also be a cool thing for an artist to add to their artist profile, either to share news or to create commentary about their own music.

Segments on or as a playlist wouldn’t generate any revenue for the co-op or creator on their own, but if they were able to draw people to the tracks on these playlists, then that would be a win. And at minimum, we could probably get a “credit the creator” button on the creator’s profile so others could gift them some credits as a thank you.

Unfortunately, Roadblock #4 would still be in the way. Right now all music is uploaded manually by resonate workers like myself. This would apply to uploading Segments as well.

We’d also need a way in our system to label Segments vs Tracks and manage them differently on the player and dashboard. As a user creating Segments, I might not want my Segments to show up on my profile page independent of the playlists that give them cohesiveness.

As a listener, I would want the ability to filter out Segments from my search results while i’m looking for music.

We’d also need some way for creators (whether listeners or artists) to manage Segments they’ve recorded and add them to their playlists, which would be different from how playlists currently work. While I can add any Track on Resonate to my playlist, I could only add Segments that I create to my playlists. We’d need that distinction.

So this introduces a sub-roadblock which would need to be fixed if we took this route:

user uploading and management of Segments; how to add them to playlists; how to filter them and distinguish them from Tracks in search results

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I’m very confused as to why this ^ isn’t the #1 blocker - podcasters get paid currently by advertisements / product endorsements / patreon.

From a podcaster’s POV (I’m assuming here) Resonate would be just one additional distribution channel.

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@boopboop Those numbers weren’t meant to express the relative importance of the various roadblocks. The numbers on the list were to make them easy to refer to.

We could allow for podcasters to upload podcasts to the platform – approach them as users the same way we approach artists. They may have other means of getting revenue as you say, but we’d want to be clear with podcasters that our current strategy for helping artists make more money (stream2own) isn’t expected to help podcasters. They’d be on their own, which is a weird thing to have to explain.

But the podcasts in themselves wouldn’t directly generate hardly any revenue for the co-op. We’d be hosting the podcasts essentially for free, while sorta contradicting our own message about paying creators better. What do folks see as the benefits of doing this? I’m genuinely curious, not tryin’ to be sassy. Business ain’t my background.

It’s true that the “Segments” idea would also be us hosting podcasts for an undetermined economic benefit, but adding them to playlists to supplement music tracks would be a way to address that.

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since people usually listen to podcasts once maybe twice, they won’t make it to the “own” part of stream to own - 100% agree. The rewards for the platform would be like a side effect of podcast fans going off to explore other tracks.

BUT once thing podcasters seem to do a lot more than musicians is have their listeners buy something in order to unlock their next / special episode, something that seems like a perfect use case for the community credential.
A top-of-my-head use cases would be:

  • listeners get to unlock track B only after purchasing track A
  • listeners get to unlock track B after supporting the podcaster on Ampled / Patreon / wherever
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The segments idea seems pretty cool :slight_smile: , and a way to help contextualize playlists

Returning to the topic of podcasts once again, wondering if a partner / ecosystem approach could help us here? Rather than attempt to host everything ourselves, we could work with open fediverse platforms to deliver the content, while offering tipping and monetisation services for the podcasters at our end:

  • Podcast content hosted out in the open on the fediverse (see links below)
  • Resonate provides a community-centric monetisation layer for click-through to podcasts:
    ** Podcaster has artist account and profile presence on Resonate
    ** Listeners charged streaming credit on click-through links to access fediverse content
    ** Podcasters come back to their Resonate account to claim earnings (less our commission)
    ** Listeners to a significant series / subscribing to that podcaster do so via a Community Credential
  • Podcasters host Resonate return links to recommended music / artists on the platform to generate more plays / memberships for Resonate

See

https://podcastindex.org/

Anyone heard anything more about Castopod recently?

https://nlnet.nl/project/Castopod/

Here is a nice article and short podcast to listen to

…and maybe there is potential to look again at our PFCS proposals and reach out to Castopod / Podlibre as a potential partner / platform component… and community?

Just a placeholder idea… not really thought through… lots of other more important things on right now!

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Great to see the podcast conversation here.

It’s something that has been discussed in story team and I was hoping to action in the new year - or as soon as the problems with the self-upload are sorted out.

I think the original point @KallieMarie makes is about Resonate having it’s own self-made podcast content. This is a wonderful idea - and is being explored by @richjensen and other members of the co-op.

All three ideas Kallie highlights are wonderful - as comms lead I would be happy to help facilitate this. I would also like to add in giving the chance for resonate artists to make their own “meet the artist/band” podcast where they talk about their history, music, process, community, collaborators etc. without editorial filters.

The main block to Resonate podcasts not happening until now is basically - manpower. To do a good job, create something vital and listenable, then do it on a regular basis is a commitment the comms team have been unable to make. If members of the co-op artist and listener community wanted to take the lead on it, that would remove that block.

@Hakanto has illustrated the blocks that are in the road to bringing external podcast and also audio book content into resonate. I would like us to bring this content into resonate as soon as possible - initially in a curated way - to offer independent podcasters and authors a platform outside of spotify/audible/apple. Working with an agregator would not be my preference @Nick_M Once we are able to move in this direction - with the uploaders finished - the community can turn it’s attention to solving the issues with stream2own etc. chapters or subscriptions being obvious ways to do this that need some careful thought.

melissa

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While I realize there are lots of podcasters, and the known issues as stated above around that, my original proposition was different, and was proposing an official Resonate podcast, almost like our own radio show, to highlight artists etc, as mentioned in my post. The other known issues are hard to tackle, but this would be a start. A resonate community’s own podcast. This would help with some of the issues, as it would prompt artists within the community, and how are those artists paid? Well we could pay them for that one stream during the podcast, and hopefully they would get tons more following the podcast. We would have a known model for paying podcasters, but if the podcast was Resonate’s own, then maybe something else could be worked out. That was my original intent with my post, but I do realize that others are looking for more and for more types of podcasts and thats totally valid too. My offering was a starting point, and a way of offering some sort of community curation.

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Well, said, and thank you for catching my original intent. I know that podcasts are a huge can of worms, but rather than get stuck and delay having nothing we could at very least find some taste makers in our community, who perhaps specialize in certain genres to start a Resonate Weekly, or Monthly or whatever. The resources would be a little less in terms of man power if it was a Monthy Wrap up Releases at Resonate etc. Its once a month. In my humble opinion its much more engaging than an news letter email, and it gets people a few paid plays. Its also a chance for the host to drop a quick one or two liners about any important info like, “Dont forget to drop by our community we have a big member X happing soon…”
Once we have this going we can start building the infrastructure for outside. Working with only internal podcasts at first will help us build it better before we invite others to participate, and help us trouble shoot and experiment on ourselves, meanwhile highlighting new music at Resonate, as well as making our community have something a lot of streaming services dont, and that is: Reputable Tastemakers. (Maybe they are maybe they aren’t, but its a value and maybe they become reputable HERE.) Tastemakers are an important part of a healthy music ecosystem. :wink:

climbs down off of soap box shyly and slinks away

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Apologies, my fault for including a technology post in the Podcast topic. Castopod /Podlibre is a bunch of open source technology intended to make it easy for projects or individuals to host their own content WITHOUT using an ‘aggregator’. I was just saying that we might be able to look at it as tooling to host our own content ourselves, or perhaps collectively use in an artist / podcaster self hosted network.

This was only intended to help you and @KallieMarie realise your vision, which is great, and needs to be on the roadmap!

I’ll get my coat :grinning:

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Whoa, this is a really neat idea!

I agree a Resonate monthly podcast could be a great new channel of communication besides the other written forms that we have (social media, email, the forum, etc.) to keep people updated about Resonate and what’s going on in the community. This is something that maybe the communications team could spearhead? I’m not sure of everything that goes on at Resonate since I mainly just follow along in the forum, but if it’s only monthly, and would basically be like reading the newsletter, I may be able to help out here, if needed.

Just to also comment on some of the wonderful conversation above, I think podcasting would be best supported through the option of accepting monthly subscriptions/donations (Similar to Ampled’s setup) as a way to access the episode(s), with Stream2Own potentially still existing, for whatever additional revenue it may be worth. The Resonate podcast would probably be best as free to access to help keep everyone informed, regardless of their relationship to Resonate, and to also help draw more people to the Resonate platform to discover music too.

However, when it comes to more artist-focused/behind the scenes podcasts that Resonate could host/sponsor, then those could maybe accept subscriptions/donations to compensate those who are helping create the podcasts?

Just a few cents from me, but loving the conversation and ideas in here! Thanks everyone!

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Aww Nick! The clarification helps, and we need all the tools we can get. No need to get your coat. Grab a seat. :slight_smile:

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In the new back end accounting work we have made it easy to set up new subscription products in the checkout and collect monthly, weekly etc. (We’d still need to work out a transparent and sustainable way to make the payments out… it’s not a proper open collective or patreon-style model). One for the roadmap if there is the funding to do it one day.

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That sounds great! Maybe some potential to collaborate with Ampled here too, but definitely would want everything to be available for Resonate users in the Resonate platform.

Maybe, just brain storming here, a way would be for Resonate’s own podcast to also be a stream to own, and if they are playing Resonate music as a featured or new(s) maybe they play a portion of the song, otherwise podcast could get to long-and this way drives traffic to artist to get full streams. Maybe have to reach out to artist before podcast for permission to use excerpt? Just brain storming… I am sure there is a way.

Or in the case of taste making and interviews with Resonate artists, it can still be stream to own, and again excerpts…

Certainly for outside podcasters this will be different.

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Irrespective of podcasts I think this sounds really cool for like annotated playlists. Like a mixtape with the addition of a little personal commentary. More of a community thing than really resolving any of the podcast stuff. Possibly a new way of sharing.

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