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BBC podcasts on third-party apps

bbc.co.uk

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Re: BBC podcasts on third-party apps

#101

Post by Mindwipe »

0815test wrote: post #94
Theodores wrote: post #79

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Actually there is a problem with the BBC. In the UK how do you compete for news eyeballs and try and make it pay when the BBC news is for free? Imagine your business is weather forecasting, the same applies. Then there is the small matter of the license fee. Most people just pay it out of fear of being caught by one of the legendary detector vans. But you can't have a TV or a monitor that also does TV without being h…

They should just fund it out of general revenues, and dispense with the "license fee" entirely. Treat it as a marketing expense for the country as a whole, basically. The argument that they need an exclusive tax base in order to preserve autonomy is bogus - the monarch gets government funding too AIUI, do they have a dedicated tax base?

I suppose with the monarchy the argument would be that it's technically the Crown's money anyway, and Parliament just gets to administer it with her consent.

Re: BBC podcasts on third-party apps

#102

Post by monkeynotes »

sjwright wrote: post #90
monkeynotes wrote: post #61

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Can you explain this a little? I don't really understand your point.

If this isn’t antitrust, then I don’t know what is.

Personally I've wanted a good podcast app on Android and the Google app ticked all the boxes. Maybe Google is successful because of good product design in this case. However, I do agree the overall size of Google's influence is of concern.

Re: BBC podcasts on third-party apps

#103

Post by frosted-flakes »

cheez wrote: post #57
Navarr wrote: post #52

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Google Podcasts is a replacement for the Podcast aspect of Google Play Music. They're splitting it into "Google Podcasts" and "YouTube Music"

Google Podcasts is TERRIBLE compared to Google Play. The UX is just so bad. You'd expect at least some podcast-specific features like mark podcast as listened.

Mark as played is there, but it's hidden in a menu on the details screen of the episode.

Re: BBC podcasts on third-party apps

#104

Post by untog »

Mindwipe wrote: post #99
msquog wrote: post #40

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The adverts are right there on the page still. Why would it be more profitable to send users to the BBC website?

It wouldn't in the BBC's specific case, but in general the behaviour sending users to the site where they would likely be exposed to more advertising (probably by Google) would be the more profitable scenario.

It's pretty clearly not the path Google has followed for some years now, though. They clearly have incentive to keep people on the search results page.

Re: BBC podcasts on third-party apps

#105

Post by driverdan »

eddieroger wrote: post #15
Jsharm wrote: post #8

I don't know why BBC pushes it's sounds app so hard. I get nagged to use it every time I listen through Alexa too. There's no BBC sounds smart speaker so why do they care? What do they gain from me using the app?

Because when you use their ecosystem, they get user data. They acknowledge that in their blog post: > We also want to make our programmes and services as good as they can possibly be - this means us getting hold of meaningful audience data. They claim it's because they're a public service and need to know what the public want, but there are other ways, and I'm torn on if it's a legit case or not. NPR has been trying…

Which is a lie. Podcasts are played directly from the source, meaning they have the stats already. The only thing they may not know are subscription rates.

Re: BBC podcasts on third-party apps

#106

Post by frosted-flakes »

lbacaj wrote: post #67
simias wrote: post #42

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Admittedly I don't consume a massive amount of podcasts but I don't have a problem with this move towards a more closed platform. If people want to make money from their work as podcasters they basically have three possibilities: beg for donations, ad tons of ads before, after and often in the middle of the podcasts or move to a subscription model (which means the podcast is no longer available for free). Since I veh…

I am 100% with you on the ads model, I think the internet would be a better place without all of the unnecessary tracking and crazyness used to make ads more effective. I love the trend toward premium versions of things that are ads free, if I don’t want to be tracked and have annoying ads I should have that option. I think the internet overall would be a much better place if every service offered this.. pay for the…

I don't have a problem with podcast advertisements because it's essentially a return to the old way of doing advertising, free of tracking and crazyness. Like on terrestial radio or in newspapers. That means advertisers need to make the ad relevant to the podcast somehow, because it's the only heuristic they have. Podcast players always have skip forward and back buttons, anyway.

Re: BBC podcasts on third-party apps

#107

Post by frosted-flakes »

ocdtrekkie wrote: post #92
scarface74 wrote: post #70

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I would say yes. It’s no more a podcast player than the old AOL client was a web browser. Funny enough, while HNers always complain about Apple’s “walled garden”, the Apple podcast player subscribes directly to the host’s RSS feed. Once you subscribe to a podcast, Apple’s servers are no longer involved.

This is why my podcast isn't available on Google Podcasts, but is on iTunes. I read the agreement required to put it on Google Podcasts (the usual "irrevocable worldwide license to do whatever we want with it" for uploading data to Google servers), and passed. Additionally, I do use bandwidth as my rough listener metric, so letting it be hosted by Google Podcasts would impact that significantly. Which is closer to th…

Google Podcasts serves podcasts directly from the original source, so it's not being "hosted" by them. At least, that's what I've read concerning the BBC podcasts.

Re: BBC podcasts on third-party apps

#108

Post by captn3m0 »

Mindwipe wrote: post #100
fenwick67 wrote: post #34

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If you stay on a search results page you're more likely to do another search after you're done listening, rather than browsing around on BBC's site.

I'd be fairly surprised if the metrics resulted in any measurable difference there tbh.

Even a minute change in this might convert to a non trivial difference in ad revenue for this feature.

This is the company that decides shades of blue by conversion numbers.

Re: BBC podcasts on third-party apps

#109

Post by jccalhoun »

lbacaj wrote: post #31

Technically speaking the way Podcasts work is a fascinating thing. Most on HN May be familiar with this already but Podcasts are completely open and a creator simply publishes an RSS that they then provide to a podcast App such as iTunes so it can appear on the Apple podcast app. In exchange most of these podcast apps share any listen counts and analytics with the owner of the Podcast. However, almost always the file…

>if your interested if you're interested
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