Here’s a quote I’ve been mulling over: “Even podcasting’s most ardent evangelizers would have to acknowledge that many podcasts are oriented around a very basic premise: ‘Here are some people talking.’” So went a recent New York Times Magazine piece on the rise of the athlete-podcaster, pegged to the recent brouhaha around The Draymond Green Show. (Perhaps predictably, the essay came down on the opposite end of the matter as myself.)
It is, of course, far from the first time I’ve heard the sentiment over the years, typically delivered as a statement of deficiency. I suppose it’s literally true, though no more true than the notion that many books are simply a collection of words strung into sentences, paragraphs, and chapters, or that many burgers are just slabs of meat between buns. Which is to say, sure! But also, sure.
Anyway, lots and lots of people continued to talk into mics over the past six months. Each passing week sees the release of ever more new podcasts, not to mention new episodes from existing shows, once again contributing to a growing sense of unease around the core math problem at the center of it all: Is the growth of talking being matched by the growth in listening?
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