This week in US podcasting: October 19 to 25
A quieter week after the Spotify Memberships and Netflix news of the week before, with one big launch, a set of results and a run of show news. Here is what happened from Monday, October 19 to Sunday, October 25, starting with The Builders, the show that went straight into our chart.
The Builders with Walter Isaacson is already No. 7 in our Top 100
The Builders, Walter Isaacson’s new interview show about the people building AI, launched on Tuesday, October 20 with conversations with Elon Musk, Peter Thiel, Fei-Fei Li, and Dario and Daniela Amodei lined up, plus Alex Karp and Palmer Luckey. It is made by Kaleidoscope in partnership with Ramp and distributed by iHeartPodcasts, with new episodes weekly, the press release says. Six days in, it sits at No. 7 in our Top 100. Kaleidoscope’s earlier Isaacson series, the four-part On Musk, reached No. 1 on the Apple Podcasts charts.
Spotify’s Q3: podcast ad growth came from its owned and licensed shows
Spotify’s third-quarter update on Thursday, October 22 put Premium subscribers at 306 million (up 9 percent) and ad-supported revenue up 10 percent year over year. The deck’s one sentence on podcast advertising reads: “Podcasting growth was led by sponsorship gains within our Owned & Licensed portfolio,” meaning the shows Spotify owns or licenses itself. The deck also counts the Creator Memberships launch in 34 markets among the quarter’s product highlights. Nothing on the new skip-ahead button.
The Dropout is being rediscovered because of a film
Plays of The Dropout, Rebecca Jarvis’s ABC News series on Elizabeth Holmes and Theranos, rose on Spotify and Apple by nearly 400 percent during the week of September 7 to 13, when the teaser for the film You Can See Everything came out, and by more than 900 percent through the film’s US release weekend on October 16, PodcastingToday reports. Tuesday, October 20 was the show’s biggest single day since the film was announced. It is No. 52 in our Top 100 this week.
Unsolved Mysteries goes video on October 29
Unsolved Mysteries returns on Thursday, October 29 as a video podcast on YouTube as well as in audio, hosted by Jordan Murphy, produced by Unsolved Media with Audacy handling sales and distribution. New cases arrive weekly on Thursdays, with updates on older mysteries on select Tuesdays. The season’s cases include Amelia Earhart, Malaysia Airlines Flight 370 and the Gardner Museum heist.
Radio Rental is back, with a LEGO-style short to go with it
Tenderfoot TV’s horror anthology Radio Rental returned with new episodes on Friday, October 23, a day after Laura of the Woods, a ten-minute stop-motion short built from LEGO-style bricks by Kristian Stenslie and Twisted Bricks, premiered on YouTube. The story it retells has passed 3 million downloads on its own, and the show 85 million since 2019. Radio Rental is No. 91 in our Top 100.
Billy Porter, Leslie Jones and Phoebe Robinson get a 48-episode Acast show
Acast announced Places, Dahlingz! on Thursday, October 22: a weekly comedy series in which Billy Porter, Leslie Jones and Phoebe Robinson interview Broadway stars, then turn prompts from each guest into an original one-act show for a live finale. The Acast release promises a 48-episode first season in audio and video, with Shoshana Bean, Ariana DeBose and Renée Elise Goldsberry among the guests. The trailer is out now and the first episode arrives Thursday, November 5.
TikTok Podcast Network adds three shows
TikTok and iHeartPodcasts named three new shows for the TikTok Podcast Network on Wednesday, October 21: Oh My Kosh with Hannah Kosh, a weekly look at the stories behind the scroll, from October 28; Born to Become with flag football world champion Diana Flores from November 5; and Caroline’s Closet, with fashion editor Caroline Vazzana, from December 10. All three are published by iHeartPodcasts.
Afford Anything leaves Cumulus for True Native Media
Paula Pant’s personal finance show Afford Anything, which has passed 45 million downloads, has moved its ad sales to True Native Media after being represented by the Cumulus Podcast Network since 2022, True Native Media said on Tuesday, October 20. For listeners, the only change is who sells the ads.
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