February 28, 2007

The Cynical Blend

Those of you who create podcasts know that, in some circles, Podshow does not have a very good reputation. Most of the hatred comes from supposedly leaked "contracts" that the company wants producers to sign when they come on board. Let me say now: I have signed a contract with Podshow and it is NOT anything like the leaked versions you find online. I'm a pretty smart guy who's been podcasting for free for almost two years. If I had any doubts, I wouldn't have signed. My experience with Podshow has been positive. I could not ask for better treatment.

And then there's Keith and the Girl. KATG is one of the most popular podcasts around. They are independent, which is great if you have a large enough audience and the time to seek advertisers on your own. I do not. From what I understand, KATG has never been approached by Podshow (they went with Dawn and Drew instead), which may be part of the problem. Early on, it was assumed that Podshow would offer them a contract. When the months went by and they did not, KATG turned ugly towards Podshow.

I have never listened to KATG until their last show (Episode 451). In it, Keith claims that the ENTIRE Podshow network only has 12,000 downloads a day. Really? Wow. Let's look at my Hipcast numbers for comparison, shall we?

podcast_downloads_daily.php.png

The current dip has occurred since I started asking people to begin using the Podshow feed of Matt's Today in History instead of the Hipcast feed (or Old Feed, as you see in iTunes). See that last peek? That's 9,000 downloads, folks. So if I get nearly 10,000 downloads on a good weekday, how many is a really, really popular podcast getting? Hmmmmm....could Keith be talking out of his ass?

Me thinks so.

One more thing, Keith: to have a funny show, you actually have to be funny.

Posted by Matthew at February 28, 2007 10:16 PM
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Comments

Not that I like Keith and the Girl at all, but, I'm sorry, and you actually think Dawn and Drew are funny? Or even interesting? Of course, I'd love to have either show's numbers.

As for their comments about Podshow's numbers, yah, they're talking directly out of their rectums. Hmmm, actually if they were, THAT would be interesting.

Posted by: Phillip at March 3, 2007 02:03 AM

While I don't think Dawn and Drew are a laugh riot, I do enjoy their show, simply because it's different than anything you'd ever hear on radio. KATG is a just a small town radio morning show with obscenities.

Dawn and Drew are honest in their presentation, which I think I appreciate more than anything else in a podcast of that nature.

Posted by: Matt_D [TypeKey Profile Page] at March 3, 2007 10:29 AM

Nice post. It's refreshing to see real figures in the debate

A couple of questions though,

I don't understand the part about the dip. Could you explain it again in more detail

Also - how are the figures generated. I'm a scientist and I can't understand a graph without knowing
- how it was created
- what figures were used and from where
- how those figures were generated
in detail

Thanks!

Posted by: Nigel at March 4, 2007 03:41 PM

Nigel,
You will notice a series of dips on the graph. These represent weekends and holidays. The slow decline towards the right-hand side of the graph began on the day I announced a new Podshow feed of the show (which is not represented on the graph). Thus, as more people moved to the new feed, fewer people downloaded the show from Hipcast.

The graph is auto-generated by Hipcast. I honestly do not know how they derive the values, although they seem to match the number of individual downloads of episodes on a daily basis.

Posted by: Matt_D [TypeKey Profile Page] at March 4, 2007 09:15 PM

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