9
July
2006

Clarifying things about Podshow…

Hi all,

We will have more to say about this on our next show, but we wanted to post now and make a couple of things clear.  Many of you may have heard of Podshow+, which is Adam Curry’s (former MTV VJ, then the self-described (and it’s fairly accurate) “godfather of podcasting”) new podcasting venture–the system just went live a day or so ago, and apparently anyone who ever submitted a show to Podcast Alley (which Podshow also owns) has now been added to that service.  Now we have nothing against new listeners, of course, but the problem is that from what we can tell, everything on Podshow+ which refers to Upon Further Review goes through Podshow+–that is to say, it looks as if we are sponsored, hosted, and produced by Podshow+.  Even show downloads look as if they are running through Podshow+–which would mean many people could happily stay on Podshow+ and never come to our site at all.

We haven’t yet decided what we’re going to do here, but we are not fans of having our show essentially misrepresented in this way, and we want to make clear right now that we are not affiliated in any way with Podshow+.  We may or may not pull our show from this service and from Podcast Alley–but in the meantime, we would strongly suggest that Podshow+ reconsider this way of doing business.  It may not be illegal (we’re not sure about that yet), but it sure seems pretty sleazy to us.  We’ll see you Tuesday.

3 Comments

  1. Rob S:

    I agree with your sentiments and have talked about these and other issues related to the re-distribution of podcasts on my blog at http://www.podcastnyc.net/blog.

  2. admin:

    Yep–even the mega directories don`t handle things this way. I`m not sure how this is all going to play out, but it`s good to know that we`re not the only ones who are really, REALLY irritated at this apparent land grab. We`ve left a comment on Adam Curry`s weblog entry about Podshow+, though, asking him to remove us from the directory and explain what happened…if he responds to that request reasonably (and affirmatively :) ), we`d probably be willing to give him the benefit of the doubt.
    T.R.

  3. admin:

    UPDATE: We`ve now talked with Adam Curry several times, and it looks as if changes are rapidly being implemented to address the concerns we brought up in our initial post (or rather to address the concerns of hundreds of our fellow podcasters, to be fair–lots of people had the same problems!). We`re still not overly pleased at being listed initially at Podshow+ without our consent, but we`re willing to accept that it wasn`t considered a deliberately sleazy act at the beginning. Obviously we`ll continue to monitor the situation, and we`ll still have something to say about it on tomorrow`s show, but it will be a heck of a lot milder than it would have been a couple of days ago. :)  We do appreciate Adam`s responsiveness in addressing the situation–it bodes well for the future success of Podshow+ if they follow through on his assurances.
    T.R.

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