Edison Research Senior Vice President Tom Webster speaks often on podcasting and the trajectory of the medium, and his recent trip to Podcast Movement Evolutions inspired him to consider what could loom as Podcasting’s Biggest Mistake.
Yes, podcasting sprang from the loins of radio — so stipulated. But over the course of about 11 years, from 2004 to 2014, it became its own dog. There was no Big Podcasting. You might quibble about NPR/This American Life, but really, the audience sizes were nowhere near where they are today, so it’s hard to think of anyone in the first 11 years of podcasting as Big Podcasting.
Podcasting didn’t start in control of the monied few and gradually become democratized. Podcasting started as a democracy, and now faces the incursion of the monied few.
