First Podcast Movement Evolutions speakers announced

First look: Podcast Movement Evolutions at SXSW has unveiled the first wave of speakers, including the acclaimed storyteller MrBallen. There will be live programming through the weekend, as well as a morning keynote from YouTube.

Opting in for Spotify Video? You'll harm the measurability of your podcast, warns Podscribe in an email to subscribers today. This harms your measurement whether your listeners choose video or audio, since even if your listeners choose an audio version of a show that's available in video, they still get served the audio track of the video direct from Spotify - with no measurement from Podscribe or similar. Podscribe describes a part-workaround.

Spotify breaking open RSS in this way also extends to some podcast rankers like the Triton Digital ranker, which is based on logfile analysis. This led to Australian publisher Shameless Media coming out of the Australian ranker, as we reported last week. Analytics tools like OP3, which is based on server redirects, also cannot measure any plays on Spotify if that episode opted into video. It also means that you can't serve dynamic ads on these shows as well, which means you may significantly lower your revenue. A Sounds Profitable piece from April 2025 highlights the issues - and bluntly tells the podcast industry not to take part.

UK podcast production company Goalhanger has formed a strategic partnership with The Chernin Group to accelerate the company's US expansion. TCG is Goalhanger's first external investor (the company has been entirely bootstrapped until now, though co-founder Gary Lineker is a multi-millionaire). TCG has also invested in Audiochuck, Barstool Sports, and Substack.