Public media has served as a defender of these voices through traditional media, and in partnership with our public media ownership, we’re now doing the same.” It’s important that someone stands up for the independent voices and the important stories these creators bring into the mix. “Mostly because a paywalled podcast industry does not benefit the vast majority of listeners or the hundreds of thousands of creators out there. “The podcast industry needs business model diversity, but I don’t believe that paywalls are the long-term answer,” Grover told VentureBeat. Although Pocket Casts is switching to a subscription business model, it’s worth highlighting the core difference here - the content itself isn’t being put behind a paywall, just premium features. Owen Grover, who became CEO of Pocket Casts last May following its acquisition, has previously questioned such moves, suggesting that podcasting as a medium may not be mature enough to switch from ad-supported to something that looks more like Netflix. Certainly, exclusive podcast content is one approach that Spotify is adopting too, and although this isn’t yet paywalled, it is further evidence that platform owners are morphing into content owners too. This “Netflix for podcasts” model has led to some concerns that this is the beginning of the end for podcasting as we know it - walled gardens requiring separate subscriptions to access all the podcasts. However, Luminary also offers an $8/month subscription that unlocks exclusive and original podcasts sans advertisements. Earlier this year, a New York-based podcasting platform called Luminary launched after raising $100 million in funding - similar to other podcatcher apps, it offers the usual library of shows aggregated from myriad publishers. It’s clear that the business model behind podcasting is shifting, as companies begin to wrestle with new ways to monetize beyond advertising.
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This also raises questions for those who have previously paid for the web or desktop apps - will they be forced to upgrade to a Plus subscription to continue accessing Pocket Casts through their Mac or PC? Eventually, they will - however the company is giving those users three years’ worth of free access to Pocket Casts Plus.
However, those on a paid plan will also be able to store their files on Pocket Casts cloud, meaning they can access all their audio content across platforms. Those who have locally stored audio and video files, be it music, audiobooks, or anything else, will now be able to use Pocket Casts as the media player for those files. The paid-for premium plan will unlock access to the desktop and web apps, a suite of exclusive themes and app icons, and cloud storage for “custom audio and video files.”
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Now, however, Pocket Casts is switching to a freemium model - the mobile app will be completely free to download and use, after which users can choose to pay $0.99 per month or $10 per year to access Pocket Casts Plus.
So far, Pocket Casts has charged its users a one-off fee of $4 to download the app from Google Play or Apple’s App Store, while those tethered to their desktop could pay $9 to listen on their PC. Today, Pocket Casts announced a notable overhaul of its business model, as it looks to capitalize on the growing appetite for podcasts. One of those is Pocket Casts, which has built a reputation as one of the best so-called “podcatcher” apps - so much so that NPR and a bunch of other public radio stations acquired the app last year. But podcasting has been around for a long time, and a number of independent players have managed to build businesses off the back of the growth of spoken word audio content.
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