The “Black Box” effect
Unlocking the value of podcasts
To unlock the true value of podcasts we need to create tools to unbundle the content. Steven Sinofsky and Benedict Evans do a beautiful job of explaining the concept of bundling & unbundling in general in the episode below.
Unbundling for podcasts means making it easy to share a moment of a show, without sharing the entire show. Let me explain.
Podcasts are amazing things!
At they’re best they’re like being on the phone with a friend as he shares the things he’s most passionate about. They’re great essays by top authors delivered in their own voice with the exact right intonation and emphasis.
Beautiful.
They’re a weekly call with your best friend where, overtime, you can build a deep understanding of his character and life.
But, there’s a problem.
Podcasts are a severely under-utilized resource. So many things we take for granted with the written word are hard to impossible with podcasts.
- It’s hard to share them — The Podcast app for iPhone lets you share the iTunes link, but that only works for other iPhone users. Bummer.
- It’s impossible to excerpt the interesting bit — Good luck if the thing you want your boss to hear is buried 26:35 minutes into the episode. Yea, SoundCloud can do it, but it’s 15 clicks away.
- It’s impossible to create mashups — “That podcast I heard the other day talked about the same thing! I really want to share those two parts together.” Not a chance. That takes 20 steps — too much pain.
- It’s impossible to search for a part of an episode — “Remember when Jason was talking about Tesla last week?” Yes, but I’d have to listen to the entire thing to find it.
- It’s impossible to comment on a moment — “I really disagreed with that thing he said 26:35 minutes in!” That’s cool. Keep it to yourself :).
Gold is hidden inside.
Podcasts are nuggets of pure gold hidden within a Black Box within another Black Box. The episode is an mp3 file that few machines are even attempting to understand — a black box. The episode is hidden within a show, the core unit of discovery in the iOS Podcast App. It has a title, description, and other metadata, but that totally gloss over massive differences that may exist within the episodes. The show is a Black Box too!
Lots of opportunity.
Inside the episodes.
Inside the shows.
In the amazing content.
That’s where the value lies. That’s the value that Product Hunt Podcasts and a crop of other podcasting startups are working to unlock. It will be fascinating to see what strategies get traction and are able to unlock this value at scale.
