Episode notes
Podcasting 2.0 June 19th 2026 Episode 264 - "Podcast Plebicide"
ShowNotes
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Justin Jackson's post: We Have A Communication Problem
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00 - PODPING.ALPHA STABLE + INDEX / PV-ALPHA HYGIENE
<b>Milestone:</b> Dave — "I think we can safely say that podping.alpha is stable now. It's been many weeks of 100% uptime." Lead the boardroom with the win.
<b>PV-alpha 500s:</b> @mitch + Dave debugging the "get a list of feeds that have updates over the last X" endpoint throwing 500s; @mitch adding a delay between paginated requests in case it's a too-many-requests block.
<b>Feed de-listing puzzle:</b> Dave to @ChadF — a feed marked dead with no spam flag; aggregators de-listing it for some other reason. Open question.
<b>Iroh 1.0</b> — Dave flagged it: "Dialing keys instead of IP addresses." p2p networking, boardroom catnip — worth a riff with Dave.
Discussion: also surface your own snags — Sovereignfeeds webhook "Unknown Error sending to Server" and ladder.podcastindex.org appearing down (to @StevenB / Dave).
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01 - SPAM + AI-SLOP — TOWARD A "SPAM-COP SCORE"
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02 - MEASUREMENT: AMP'S 30-SECOND "PLAY," ROUND TWO
AMP defined a "play" as 30 seconds; Spotify immediately adopted it. You and Dave already called 30s "bullshit" last week — push total listen time + percent-completed as the real metrics.
<b>The walkback:</b> AMP's original press release said "30 seconds of content played… once per user per session" — and quietly DELETED "once per user per session," leaving a woolier definition. James flagged it on-page with the HTML5 del tag.
<b>YouTube is in AMP:</b> Google confirmed YouTube "has been participating in the AMP-led conversations" — implies YouTube uses a 30s play. Apple's stance still unknown.
RSS.com test (Alberto): moving the DOWNLOAD threshold 60s to 30s changed totals by ~1% — negligible. So 30s for both plays and downloads is just simpler.
<b>The HLS gotcha:</b> playing 10s of an HLS video podcast still downloads ~60-72s, so server logs can't tell real play — only player-side instrumentation (Spotify, future Apple) can. James: it's all too "cloak and dagger."
<b>Watch July:</b> AMP's implementation doc is due July and the group is light on technical people — needs to be real technical work, "not a sales press release."
Understanding podcast stats (PodNews)
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03 - BEYOND CPM — INDIE + MISSION-DRIVEN ECONOMICS
<b>Losh Moodaley ("Beyond CPM"):</b> the indie middle class (5k-25k downloads = only ~1-1.5% of all podcasts) can't survive on CPMs. Roadmap: audience-as-economy, sell exclusivity not inventory, scale outcomes not audiences, "owners of trust, not renters of attention."
Pure V4V-adjacent framing — Sam Sethi tied it straight to TrueFans activity-based value (a share or comment is value, not just dollars) and "creator portals." Easy on-ramp to your worldview.
<b>Vox Topica (Richard Fall):</b> full-stack agency for nonprofits/mission-driven orgs — speaks engagement/reach/"depth of message," not downloads. Nonprofits resist AI voices (authenticity) but use AI for scripts/cleanup/show notes; now recommends video to ALL clients.
Beyond CPM: Surviving the New Measurement Era (PodNews Daily)
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04 - NUMBERS + MONEY MOVES
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05 - AI BUBBLE / EDGE COMPUTE — DATACENTER WATER
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06 - CROSS-STORY: COMMODORE FLIP-PHONE
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07 - QUIPS / TRANSITIONS
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