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The audacity of Apple Podcasts

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Re: The audacity of Apple Podcasts

#261

Post by howinteresting »

mrkstu wrote: post #243
howinteresting wrote: post #34

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is all Apple bringing their usual dirty tactics into an ecosystem that has historically been open. Everything Apple does is designed to keep you buying Apple products and services forever.

Except that "pod"casts have always been Apple's ecosystem. They've introduced a new product that is less open, but haven't actually stopped supporting the completely open options that have always existed.

What? Something historically being named after an Apple product doesn't make it Apple's ecosystem.

I've used Pocket Casts on Android for many years, and before that on iOS. I don't even know what the Apple podcast app looks like -- I carefully chose a podcast player that wouldn't lock me into its ecosystem. Podcasts have always been an open ecosystem, one that I greatly appreciate.

Re: The audacity of Apple Podcasts

#262

Post by gymbeaux »

tomxor wrote: post #102

> That’s right: if you host your show with Apple, the only listeners you can have are folks with the Apple Podcasts app. This feels like an absolutely wild choice from a product perspective; it’s the mindset of a company who still thinks that they have dominance over the podcasting world. It’s ludicrous to assume that it’s a good thing for listeners to have to have specific hardware in order to listen to a podcast. I…

My iPhone 12 Mini had gotten slow and the battery life was becoming mediocre (after only 2 years), so I spent the last couple of months looking at phones. I use Linux primarily, so I was looking at Android phones because of course iPhones don’t talk to Linux or Windows computers. Unfortunately I ended up with an iPhone 14 because without an iPhone: - I can’t use (or update) my Apple Watch - I can’t use/track my AirTags - I can’t use most of the features of my AirPods Pros - I can’t use FaceTime or iMessage with 95% of the people I talk to who also have iPhones - I can’t utilize the free Apple Arcade subscription I get through Verizon (not a big deal obviously but this is why Verizon and Apple have this deal- to sell iPhones).

I’m getting rid of my MacBook because macOS is going down the shitter (another topic entirely). On a related note, I needed a second Mac in order to restore my MacBook, that is, remove the beta version of macOS Ventura I was running awhile ago to go back to a stable (“stable”) version. So yeah, the game is to get everyone to have to buy iPhones every couple of years whether there are any significant improvements or not. What can the iPhone 14 do that the iPhone 12 can’t? Absolutely fucking nothing.

Re: The audacity of Apple Podcasts

#263

Post by witheld »

mrkstu wrote: post #240
bastawhiz wrote: post #118

Earlier quoted context omitted.

No: this isn't just any random podcast from the iTunes homepage. It only applies to podcasts which are hosted by Apple, not ones which Apple lists in its directory. This is a very small percentage of shows. Here is an example. Curious if you can get it to work on Windows, because I physically cannot save the audio to a normal file on Mac. https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/test-podcast/id1667708...

Do you have an example that would be findable via iTunes on PC? This one doesn't seem reachable/searchable there.

My suspicion is that iTunes for PC won’t even show listings for DRM protected podcasts, which is why you can’t find it.

Re: The audacity of Apple Podcasts

#264

Post by mgrandl »

l33tbro wrote: post #45
paulette449 wrote: post #14

I listen to hours of podcasts each day (dog-walking, walking, running etc) and am fully immersed in the Apple ecosystem, but the Apple Podcast app is a turkey. Shallow feature set, bugs that never get fixed and an environment that doesn't evolve. It's software that can only be developed by a company that hates its user base. Ugh. I've been using and loving iCatcher for years [1]. [1] - https://joeisanerd.com

Overcast really destroys everything else I've used for listening to a podcast. Simple and intuitive UI, customizable streaming/download settings, quickly add any podcast - and that's at the free level. I would never go back to Apple or even Spotify. I rarely get enthusiastic about apps, but it's awesome when one clearly demonstrates a team having gone 'how can we get this right'?

Tried all the common choices for iOS like Overcast and Castro, but settled on Pocket Casts. It’s cross platform and open source (client only) and in my opinion has the best UX. Also the only one with a reliable offline Apple Watch experience back when I tested them.

Re: The audacity of Apple Podcasts

#265

Post by mgraupner »

gymbeaux wrote: post #262
tomxor wrote: post #102

> That’s right: if you host your show with Apple, the only listeners you can have are folks with the Apple Podcasts app. This feels like an absolutely wild choice from a product perspective; it’s the mindset of a company who still thinks that they have dominance over the podcasting world. It’s ludicrous to assume that it’s a good thing for listeners to have to have specific hardware in order to listen to a podcast. I…

My iPhone 12 Mini had gotten slow and the battery life was becoming mediocre (after only 2 years), so I spent the last couple of months looking at phones. I use Linux primarily, so I was looking at Android phones because of course iPhones don’t talk to Linux or Windows computers. Unfortunately I ended up with an iPhone 14 because without an iPhone: - I can’t use (or update) my Apple Watch - I can’t use/track my AirTa…

The iPhone 12 mini has an A14 and the iPhone 14 an A15 processor. Geekbench single core performance is 7% better in the newer one. I doubt you're "feeling" the difference in speed between these two phones. The battery life in the 12 mini was not considered good from the start, so it's understandable, that after two years the battery is in not so good shape anymore.

Re: The audacity of Apple Podcasts

#266

Post by bilekas »

> Sure enough, opening the m3u8 playlist, there is Apple Fairplay DRM info.

This is just straight up egregious. They are encoding your freely distributed content with their DRM. Without offering any method of removing it. Surely there is some licencing issue there.

Re: The audacity of Apple Podcasts

#267

Post by karel_3d »

b0tch7 wrote: post #217
MBCook wrote: post #170

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Apple has controlled the podcast industry through the iTunes podcast directory since day one. They’ve been benevolent and haven’t cracked down on things. They let basically any podcast in for free. They let 3rd party clients use their directory for free. They ARE the podcast industry. And they’ve been open. I see this purely as a reaction to Spotify and Google and others trying to grab and control the industry with p…

> Apple has controlled the podcast industry through the iTunes podcast directory since day one. > They ARE the podcast industry. And they’ve been open. Hmmm is this really true? I've been listening to podcasts since 2012ish which puts me fairly early in the adoption curve and I've never used iTunes once (always been PocketCasts on Android). Anyway, just another f'ing reason to NOT go all-in on Apple. Apple Podcasts k…

The "pod" in "podcasts" stands for iPod.

They even C&D the original podcast app, because it was named iPodder.

"Apple Takes Podcasting Mainstream" in 2005.

https://www.apple.com/newsroom/2005/06/28Apple-Takes-Podcast...

Re: The audacity of Apple Podcasts

#268

Post by _Algernon_ »

crazygringo wrote: post #15

> You could sign up to allow Apple to host your show and its audio (for a cool $20/year). In exchange, you could charge a subscription fee to your listeners... If you host your show with Apple, the only listeners you can have are folks with the Apple Podcasts app... The audio will be protected with DRM. The author presents this as "audacity" and bad... but doesn't it make perfect sense? If you're charging a subscript…

>why would you expect Apple to make it available to competing podcast apps?

Because a podcast is an rss feed that links to mp3s. It is an open standard where the user is in control of what client app to use. Anything that breaks this contract is no longer a podcast.

You want to monetize? Follow a structure such as relay.fm[1] where you can subscribe to an authenticated rss feed but still listen in whatever app you want. Or name it something else.

[1]: https://www.relay.fm/membership (No affiliation, just using it as an example of monetizing podcasts that still stays true to what a podcast is)

Re: The audacity of Apple Podcasts

#269

Post by kristiandupont »

MBCook wrote: post #192
Nullabillity wrote: post #190

Earlier quoted context omitted.

So the charitable interpretation is that they're trying to compete with Spotify's walled garden, by... doing the same thing themselves? This also doesn't help them compete with Spotify anyway, since they use their own directory and hosting system. The only ones hurt here are third-party clients and end users. The ones you think they're trying to "protect".

If a podcast was only ever going to be available to people who paid, it means people using the Apple podcast app might still be able to get it if they can prevent an exclusivity deal. If a podcast was available both free and paid, it will still be available for free. And maybe the paid option isn’t exclusive. In either case, Spotify (or whoever) might not be stealing users and market share they could use to force thi…

>If a podcast was only ever going to be available to people who paid, it means people using the Apple podcast app might still be able to get it if they can prevent an exclusivity deal.

I don't understand exactly what you are saying, but if you mean that they wanted to offer a way to publish paid content, that doesn't explain or justify why they would add DRM to all content uploaded, which is what the author is upset about.

Re: The audacity of Apple Podcasts

#270

Post by bongobingo1 »

simonh wrote: post #235
b0tch7 wrote: post #217

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Apple has controlled the podcast industry through the iTunes podcast directory since day one. > They ARE the podcast industry. And they’ve been open. Hmmm is this really true? I've been listening to podcasts since 2012ish which puts me fairly early in the adoption curve and I've never used iTunes once (always been PocketCasts on Android). Anyway, just another f'ing reason to NOT go all-in on Apple. Apple Podcasts k…

>> They ARE the podcast industry. And they’ve been open. >Hmmm is this really true? They’ve accounted for the vast majority of podcast listeners since the early iPod days. It’s literally why they are called podcasts. They only dipped below 50% of listeners relatively recently.

Wonder what they're called in the alternate universes? Zunecasts? (mp)3casts?
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