Sam Sethi: 0:12

Hello and welcome back to Podnews Weekly. I'm joined today by a friend of the show. His name's Russell Harrower. He's the CEO of PodToo. Russell. Hello. How are you?

Russell Harrower: 0:21

I'm good. Sam. How are you?

Sam Sethi: 0:23

I'm very good. Now you've put out a press release about something very interesting called the Pod Fund. What's the pod fund?

Russell Harrower: 0:32

Well, the pod fund is a initiative by Pod two to help the podcast to point. I play our ecosystem. We are hearing on Mastodon and other platforms that really talented developers are thinking about chucking it in there, thinking about they would rather go get a job, put food on the table for their family, which they should be doing. And they're highlighting some issues with the podcast to point out the way that we do business. I guess we as hosting providers earn revenue. That's the crux of it. We make some money and here we are collecting money from our podcast creators and it seems to be, let's just shout all this content out to the public and anyone can use it. However, we're seeing that developers are putting time, energy equity into these apps and getting little to no return whatsoever. It takes a community to build an empire, and I know that the pub fund will do that because we will help those struggling podcasters who have five or more podcast 2.0 features in their app and a little bit more revenue.

Sam Sethi: 1:55

Yeah, the podcast seemed to show app developers are putting time and talent into creating the apps that support the tags that the community wants to be displayed. We know that Apple, Spotify, YouTube, while Apple has put one in, but we know that they're not going to put many more in. So all of the hard work that they podcasting to the community has done over the last three or four years, led by Adam and Dave, will die on the vine if the podcasting two to oh apps die on the vine, you're.

Russell Harrower: 2:30

Saying correct there. But the additional thing to that is the podcast hosting landscape is also changing. At the moment. We are better off as hosting providers to focus our energy on supporting podcast 2.0 apps over recommending the YouTube, the app or the Spotify because of what they're doing to entice people into the walled garden Podcast RSS. I think everyone can agree that it's meant to be the open standard, and yet these major players are trying to get you on to their platform, get you locked into their system and realistically would do that. We lose a huge part of the community and all the work that the community has done over the last few years will be for nothing.

Sam Sethi: 3:20

Okay. I'm going to play devil's advocate for a second, Russell. We're all a business, right? And we have no right to exist if we can't generate a revenue, we have no right to exist. We're not a charity. So why should anyone help anyone? We're all in an ecosystem where capitalism says that the winner takes it all as opposed to the community helps each other. So why should you help podcasting Twitter apps?

Russell Harrower: 3:53

I think at the end of the day, there is a communication that is happening with the podcast 2.0 players and the application developers and us hosting providers saying, Look, we want this feature, you want that feature, we want to help you grow. So you can't really make a really delicious cake if you don't have all the ingredients. So if you don't help the community, then what the heck are we doing? Like realistically, we're not really doing much and value for value. The clip diversion, as I call it, is fantastic. I'm not knocking that one bit, but I know that you said on Mastodon that you only take 1% of a very small percentage. So if I put I and I let's say $5 in my true fat wallet, you're only going to take 1% of that. And realistically, that's nothing. You can't pay your developers, you can't pay your servers. Realistically, that's not where you're going to make your money. And the pub fund isn't designed to cover your cost. It's designed to buy you that cup of coffee. Or maybe, look, I would hope that the other podcast host and providers jump on this where the first one. But I would love to say that the support from the community actually goes, okay, guys, I've got to have POD 2.0 features in my app, but I'm not making revenue. I can't get raise funding or I fail at my next round of funding. What can I do to support you? At the end of the day, there's features that podcast hosting providers would love, like we would love to know how long I want to three fans. An example how long a user of listening to one of our shows is actually engaged for now. Yes, there's some really cool things happening with Activity Pub, there's some really cool things happening in other aspects of the community, but realistically it seems to be a little bit like I'm going to make that feature behind a paywall. I'm going to do that, and I'm like, Okay, cool, that's great because you're going to make money, but if there's a way that we can go, okay, well, how can we support you? How can we work with you and how can we grow the community? I just think that there's a lot of people asking for help at the moment, and we know cost of living is going up. There's a lot of developers who are quitting and yeah, it kind of breaks my heart to say that a community that Adam and Dave has put together could collapse just because there's not enough money.

Sam Sethi: 6:39

Yeah, I mean that to be fair to you and the hosts, we have had great support. They have been helping implement the tags. We are in a friends and family round right now, so that's fine and that's going well. And we have a couple of VCs that we're talking to so we aren't doing the work to go and build the runway. The conversation you and I had a couple of months ago listening to Mitch Downey from Pod verse saying that he's going to have to step back. Thankfully, Mitch is back and he's not building a new version of pod verse. Martin over at Pod Friend has a full time job, so he's building pod friends as a part time thing. And I think he's sort of slowed down. I know Jason's over with podcast guru. He's living in one of the South American countries. Oscar I have no idea. But I know he's had a round of funding, so hopefully Oscar as well. And you know, these are the Prime Maori platforms for the podcasting 2.0 apps. We're all working our socks off day in, day out. This is my full time role with true fans. I don't have a secondary income, so I'm not looking for charity. That's the first thing I don't want is charity. But I do think just in the same way that the podcast index gets time, talent and treasure given to it by the community. So on a Friday night on Adam Dave Show, there'll be a whole bunch of people who have boosted or streamed the show or made a PayPal donation, and that goes into a podcast index fund that sits there for longevity of that index, which is the right thing to do. And I think what you're suggesting with the pod fund, if I've got it right, Russell, is that the community members who are currently making a revenue from podcasting to Dodo or because podcasting help the apps get a little bit of a longer runway to continue to develop before we can get a further external injection of cash?

Russell Harrower: 8:44

Look, it's one of those things where there are developers who are doing it to make a business like yourself and there are some developers who are doing it because they can't find an app that meets their needs and they might not have the business smarts or they might not have the time to go and pitch to VCs. Trust me, it is draining to be pitching the VCs. They're very tough. That will tell you everything wrong with your system, and some people just got it. I just want to do this as an open source project. I've got a GitHub support link or I've got a port LP, they have a PayPal donation button and that's how they accept some income coming in. To me, it's like, okay, well look, we want to support the players that want the support. That's why for us, yes, we go by the podcast index app page. So that's how we know that those features are actually inside those apps. Also, look, it's clearly an opt in thing, so you do have to register on pod two dot com forward slash pod fund because I don't have all the contacts in the world to know all the developers at the moment. So it's a good way for us to get to know each other. And it's also not open to any player that is owned by a large company. So if you are funded by a Spotify or an Apple or someone like that, then clearly you don't make the cut because your revenue is coming from other means and you've got the backing of someone large. For us, it's about supporting indie developers. Like we can never give you all of the money that you need to, for example, treat fans with a cost when just hypothetically, say, hundreds of thousands of dollars to actually do and your team has done it, most probably not taking a big pay to play. No pay has been.

Sam Sethi: 10:47

3000.

Russell Harrower: 10:50

Join the club I know that feeling but it's that is the part of a start out that is the part that I love. And but we are most probably the smallest podcast hosting provider and the newest on the market. Don't quote me on that one because I haven't done my research on whether we're the newest, but I just think you have to give back. Like there's a great company called Noise House who does dense radio shows. They took a chance on me when I told them that I had to go for surgery. They loved the idea of their own dashboard, their own white label, and at that grey pod, too. So with that support, we're able to go, Well, let's support the community, because realistically that's what we need to be doing. We need to be picking people out when they're having a hard time. We need to be going, Cool, You're doing that great feature as a podcast host. I need to integrate that as quickly as possible and we know that there are some hosting providers. They're a bit slow at integrating features. We're hoping, at least I'm hoping that the pod fund will allow that communication between app developers and us and other podcast hosting providers that jump on to actually go, okay, well in the next three months, these are the features that app developers have said they're releasing. Let's integrate it. Yes, the GitHub Hive on the podcast 2.0 is a fantastic repo to watch and communicate with, but we're all running businesses, We're all doing different things, different times. Realistically, I just need like you do sounds. Hey Russell, I'm launching this feature, make sure you have it and then we're going to call. Let me figure it out. So yeah, it's about creating a community.

Sam Sethi: 12:41

So I go to Pod two, I go for it slash pod fund, I fill in that form. You then check out the validity and then you're going to create the wallet with splits. And it would be a good way of doing it. Maybe one way not everybody will qualify that way. You might have to do some pay pals or stripes, but it would be lovely if it was using the podcasting to to otec to actually enable the payment out to the actual developers. And then I think longer term though, if other hosts join in the pod fund you and I have talked offline about, I would love to see the fund itself managed and hosted by Adam and Dave so that Adam's node would be the central repository for the 5%. So let's say from each host. And then Adam and Dave would then look at the apps that are registered in the podcast index and then put the split allocation into a wallet. And I think that would remove one of Adam's concerns, which is the administration of this, the overhead and the amount of work. I think we can use technology to seamlessly do it.

Russell Harrower: 13:56

The way that we're going to be doing it is the more features you have, the more piece of the pie that you get so clearly to fans, at least in that way, I think you said of about 31 of the features you'll have in total by the end of this week or something like that.

Sam Sethi: 14:10

Crazy. Yeah.

Russell Harrower: 14:11

It's crazy. I can't keep up. So the administration of it, just to be clear, everyone, that obsession for lightning payments, yes, we can do a split payment. So that it's very easy for people to see. It will be 100% transparent. We are upping it to a minimum of$100. And I want everyone to have a piece of the pie. So would this be a great thing to be under the podcast index potentially? I think it comes down to does Adam and Dave really want another thing that they have to look after? They do a lot for the community and there had been some great initiatives that have failed externally, a podcast index dot org, maybe it's a safe bet is to say, okay, Adam and Dave, do you mind doing this? Look, there needs to be transparency. That's number one. And the only way we could do transparency is say, look, we're going to be really truthful with all of you and say, this is our expense, this is our income. And here's what technically 5% would be.

Sam Sethi: 15:19

Yeah. I mean, I don't think everyone to be fair, Russell's going to declare that because, you know, the bigger companies like the bus sprouts, the blueberries, they probably don't want that data in the public domain. So I don't think that will be made public even for the sake of transparency. But I do think the PSP, the podcast this project was going to be, I was hopeful the community that would take on board many things. One one would be the podcast taxonomy, the podcast license, the music license, the music categories, and they would host that. Their hope was that we were going to do conferences as the hope was that was going to be the marketing arm. And potentially this community, the PSP community, would have been the right place to do a fund. Now I'm still going to be an evangelist for podcasting. Ted Oh, that's not going to change. But I do think that there are conversations potentially, I won't say who because that's out there, that they want to put a fund together. So I think the larger hosts also see the same issues that the podcast did. I apps have been working hard for a couple of years to implement stuff, but the well will run dry. Now as you said, the amount that true funds will earn will be a small amount, but the gesture and the generosity is massive and that's what I will take on board. We will use that money, by the way, to bring new users on board. And part of what we do is we give them a wallet and we give them some slots to start off to try and help them understand and educate them on this new pay as you go model. So that's going to be amazing for us. And I think, you know, other apps can use the micropayments that they receive in whatever way they wish to. And as more hosts hopefully get on board, that amount will increase. And then, yes, maybe some of that will go to paying for the developer or paying for the hosting or paying for designer. It could be for anything. Right. So thank you. First of all, thank you for stepping up to the plate. Thank you for taking the bull by the horns and doing it rather than talking about it, which often we hear lots of people say things but never do things. So, yes, remind everyone, Russell, if they want to apply for the pot fund, where would they go?

Russell Harrower: 17:45

Firstly, then any time like, you know, Mave, I would hope very well. We've known each other for a few months. But firstly, if there is a developer out there struggling, reach out to me. If there's a way that we can help you, we definitely will make sure that you do register pod two dot com for such pod funds. Just quickly, your app does need to be listed in the podcast index, the org site. It does need to have all valid features that you have. I will be personally testing your app if I've got a device that will work it clearly. Paul LP, I don't have one of those devices, but you know, it's just the more apps out there, the better for us because at the end of the day, if we let the major players continue that tight grip on podcasting, we will lose this beautiful community that we have worked so hard to build.

Sam Sethi: 18:39

I think hosts need to be aware. I was liking the poem by Pastor Martin named Mula, which was first they came for the Communists. Well, I think the first they came for the apps and then they came for the hosts. I think if you look at how Spotify keeps building features and they are all proprietary and you look at YouTube and the fact that they take the RSS and it's not passed through and then Spotify uploads video, then they just remove it from their original feed. They are not interested in podcasting. They know all the community, all the hosts. And I've heard people like Tom Cochrane talk about we shouldn't put our podcast over there. Adam does not put his podcast on Apple or Spotify. I know that certain other hosts don't do that with their own podcasts. You know, I guess this is an initiative and we'll see whether it gets traction. But to last point I'd like to add, one is if true fans get to the point where we have got external VC funding, then we will stop taking money from the pot fund, but we will turn around and contribute to the pot fund. And then the last part you talked about, and this is one of the critical things we had bumper on last week and we talked about first party data dashboards. You know, listen, time percent completed value paid. The three metrics I think we really want to promote and I've said to you that you've stepped up to the plate to help us when we need it. We will then give you back that data in the form of an activity pub example feed. So an activity stream of all of the podcasts that you host that are visible on true funds so that you get that first party data. I think that should be part of the deal. Certainly from truth answer any host that supports us, we will give you back that data as the quid pro quo, I think. And you know, that's again supporting the community that quickly because hosts will lose out on that first party data Spotify Apple and I know YouTube's got an API, but I know how much of that they're going to give out will certainly not give you the lion's share of that data. So again, I think all the podcasting Twitter apps could give you back that data that enhances your analytics dashboard for your podcast creators.

Russell Harrower: 21:00

Well, as I said to you, Sam, and I've said it on the podcasts indexed on social, that we have a thing called podcast performance, which we are trying to push, which basically allows anonymous data to come back to us about a player and how much of the episode they heard. And then all of our social tiles will actually watch whoever's at the top of that list. So whatever players at the top of that list, their branding will go at the end of all of our social tile. So it might be, for example, one of our shows, The Nightlife, they might have a 32nd preview and then it will say subscribe on three fans. That to me is how we work together. It's not about, Oh, I'm going to put the major players there. We are saying these major players and of course Spotify out for what they do in that Creators dashboard. They now have a host with us button. What cheeky sods like you're coming from my industry as well like you actually coming for the host providers. So this is where the host providers actually need to step up and go, Actually, let's help the little guys, let's push them. One of the things that we will be pushing for as well in in Porto is we don't get wrong, we have an embed player that's great, but we want to give creators the opportunity to switch out our embed with, say, true fans or Overcast or whoever offers and embed Pleyel so that way it's not up to us to say, okay, we're going to do that. It's actually up to the creators to say All I want for you, for me. So what players support basically, and that to me is what we can do with the pop fund and working together.

Sam Sethi: 22:43

Exactly. First I came for the Alps and then they came for the hosts.

Russell Harrower: 22:46

And I know.

Sam Sethi: 22:47

Russell, thank you so much, mate. Let's see what the community says. It'll be interesting to see the feedback speak today speeches I.