As traditional chat shows and entertainment continue to struggle in the face of digital, global entertainment platforms like Netflix and YouTube, music streaming services have hoovered up the market from other traditional platforms like CD, vinyl, and iPods. Despite the rise of such dominant alternate media, there were few avenues where formal-style interviews and chat shows had found a digital alternative – until the rise of podcasts.

Podcast Genres

There are dozens of groundbreaking podcasts, hyper forms of specialist entertainment, and media. Two decades ago, say you liked a specific sport, you might have to wait until a particular time of the week to listen to a radio show about it. However, nowadays, YouTube, Spotify, and Apple Music have all helped to propel podcasts to the front and center of media and entertainment. You can sit and listen to your favorite comedians, niche sports experts, or an outrageous, incalculable amount of documentaries tailored to your test.

You can use podcasts to learn about innovative new financial topics like cryptocurrency or polish your knowledge about casino card games like poker or blackjack. There’s so much to explore. In today’s market, you’d do well to find a subject that doesn’t have a podcast about it. Although this market is becoming saturated, it seems like everybody has a podcast. Learning about hobbies or topics that you want to understand more about, such as digital assets and card-based casino games, are just two examples. The internet has allowed both of these examples to combine and create a popular unique avenue of entertainment where you can play Bitcoin online casino or use digital assets for a wide selection of other casino games.

Podcasting has flourished thanks to the likes of Spotify and YouTube, allowing people to locate media that appeals directly to their preferences. But suppose you’re aiming to find informative media about cryptocurrency, blackjack, poker, or hundreds of other topics. In that case, it’s also the go-to choice, and podcasts are now enjoyed by millions of people worldwide daily. As cryptocurrency trading sites and apps launch competitions to get people on board, podcasts are a great way to educate people for free before deciding to invest in digital assets or use cryptocurrency to play blackjack.

The Origins

Podcasting is just a digitized format of the chat show, which proved to be one of the most popular forms of media in Western culture for over half a century. Ricky Gervais, Stephen Merchant, and Karl Pilkington are credited with taking the current format into an internationally successful model. The idea itself emerged a couple of years earlier. Still, without sounding too dismissive, it was a more or less identical structure of a radio show or an interview, but released on iTunes, that was the basis of it.

While the likes of Ricky Gervais helped to bring it more notoriety, the idea of sitting around in a room and talking about topics was hardly groundbreaking – it was just that the internet had allowed a more convenient way for this topic to emerge as a genuine contender to traditional media.

Why Have They Become So Popular?

Many of the reasons we’ve already touched on today are the reason behind the success of the podcasting industry. Specialist, niche topics you can seek out include long-form discussion topics from your favorite comedians, which are bound to be something you will seek out and be happy to pay for if the content is good enough. As the industry continued to swell and millions more people started listening to podcasts, it snowballed into a multi-billion dollar sector, with dozens of economists predicting that it could grow to ten times its current size within the next decade.

Final Words

The DIY nature of podcasting, where you can buy a microphone and a relatively basic set of recording equipment and start releasing your podcasts on Spotify and YouTube, is what has allowed so many people to turn their venture into a monetary success. The immense success of companies like Patreon, which provided a facility for people to bring subscribers on board, completely removed any need for an agency or manager to handle publishing or advertising costs.

Social media allowed entertainers and creators to start their podcasts from the ground up and connect them directly with their fans. Patreon then provided a facility where creators could offer exclusive content directly to their fans. Cutting out the middle man has led to a surge in a new-age version of media and entertainment, spearheaded by the creators themselves.

Podcasts have allowed creators to develop products and avenues of entertainment that they don’t have to tailor for a specific audience. The audience comes to them.

Ultimately, this results in a more authentic product and allows organic engagement to grow, so with these variables to contend with, it’s no surprise that podcasting has accelerated far beyond legacy traditional media as the primary source of DIY entertainment.