Damage and Fallout: the Revisionist History of Podcasting
It’s a commonly held rule that ‘history is decided by the victor,’ and it seems that right now the history of podcasting is becoming a prime battleground, especially on it’s Wikipedia Page (and Digg the story). As you all know, there’s a number of viewpoints on the actual timeframe, who did what first, with whattool, and who asked who to do what. So why is this so important to get right? Because I actually think that we should have a neutral point of view on the entire podcasting phenomenon, because if we leave the interested parties to push their viewpoint there could be a huge amount of trouble a few years down the line.
Okay, cards on table first on my view of it all. IT Conversations got there with the principle of MP3 interviews hosted on a site, and for the technology of the final step, I’m inclined to go with Kevin Mark’s version, with a demonstration of podcatching 8 months before iPodder, purely because their’s documented evidence from third party sources (Real .rm file), and he has very little business interest in making sure that his version of the victor. Plus he’s ever so ‘English’ when he points out what’s happening.
I can also fully understand Curry’s actions in making sure that the public records favour his viewpoint. Podshow has taken on VC Funding, and while it’s never been disclosed how much of a percentage Podshow went to the VC for their investment, the fact of the matter is VC’s always want their money back. Now they can do that by a super long term view, or a build it up, float it at IPO and run away. All the indicators that I can see (management, stafffing, accquistions, employee relations) point to a company that’s running to IPO as fast as possible. Which in my mind is a float/buyout for around $80 million in about two years (please discuss) and everyone cashing.
Now that’s fine, that’s business. But to get there Podshow is going to need an net income of around $20-$35 million per year, with upward hockey stick projections on these numbers to get the investors. Which means Podshow needs to be seen as “The One” in podcasting. If you think podcasting, then for Podshow to succeed you must immediatly go there and nowhere else. That’s why all the paper trails have to point to Podshow, why all the views and all the ‘facts’ show that they really are “The One.”
My worry of course is that in doing this, Podshow is going to seriously hurt the grassroots of podcasting. We’ve already seen the damage that can happen when Podshow decides on a course of action that isn’t in the best interests of the community. Tim Bourquin, in the Podcast Brothers show #41 (mp3 link) details the approaches he made to Podshow regarding the keynotes at the recent Portable Media Expo. It gets interesting at about 25 minutes into the show. The lead up and fulfilment of Podshow’s cashing out is going to be a critical time for the nascent podcasting community. Yes it’s two years down the line but we’re all going to get tarred with the same brush if we’re not careful.
If every bit of info out there points to Curry leaving the medium he started single handed with the help of Al Gore, then the media are going to rip podcasting to shreds, and you can confidently expect ABC, NBC and Fox to use up some petty cash to get control of all the Podshow tools, catalouges, and contracts.
History needs to show there is more to podcasting than Adam Curry. Curry suggests on his post the following:
Maybe we should get five or six key figures on a skype call and podcast a conversation about the ‘definitive history of podcasting’.
I’ve a much better idea. Get the five or six key figures to write their own version of the history and then let everyone who’s remotely interested read over each account and let the facts and the emotions become clear.
PS: For those of you browsing to here, I’m part of The Podcast Network, the world’s first commercial podcast network, and naturally have a vested interest in the whole monetisation, advertising and financial models that surround podcasting.
PPS:
Comment from Adam Curry from curry.com’s commenting system (ooh too many ‘c’ words in there)
Listen to today’s show. I never denied editing out the KM entry, only this time I wanted to write the reality from my perspective. Isn’t that what WikiPedia is for? Am I not allowed to ‘change history’? Surely being there I have at least the right to an opinion. Anyway, what I tried to enter is now explained on the podcast.
Actually, no. Wikipedia is designed to generate a neutral point of view. If you’d like a guide on the best way to edit an entry when you are part of the subject of the entry then may I recommend you glance over Cory Doctorow’s Wikipedia page and the attached discussion page which includes Doctorow explaining his thoughts rather than blind IP editing and hoping nobody notices.
Sounds like Curry is currently revising his revision.
“…only this time I wanted to write the reality from my perspective. Isn’t that what WikiPedia is for? Am I not allowed to ‘change history’?”
Egad. He’s obviously lost his mind.
Now they can do that by a super long term view, or a build it up, float it at IPO and run away. All the indicators that I can see (management, stafffing, accquistions, employee relations) point to a company that’s running to IPO as fast as possible. Which in my mind is a float/buyout for around $80 million in about two years (please discuss) and everyone cashing.
Well I would say that VCs (at least the ones I’m familiar with) are looking for the big cash out pretty much 100% of the time. I don’t know of too many VCs (any) that are really interested in “long term” investments. 5-10 years tops.
I am interested in your numbers though. It’s so speculative at this point, it’s hard to say, but I wonder where you got the $80 MM number from? I’d say it’s more likely to either crash and burn or become the Google Adsense of audio and make some “real money”.
I just saw an article linked to on slashdot yesterday about how Google says that 2005 is the tipping point for print advertising moving online. Sure, it’s taken 10 years to get there. But my bet is it’ll be faster with radio. And the radio advertising pie is a lot bigger than $80 MM.
My two cents, from an outsider’s perspective.
-m
A great day for Pocast history/gossip 101. What a waste of a day off reading all this. I should be at work getting paid to absorb all this.
all this has done is expose wikipedia as a heavily biased (in multiple directions at once) source of information. curry wasn’t any more opinionated and malicious than anyone editing that entry.
and now dave winer is adding his thoughts to the matter…which always makes everything worse.
Michael,
My numbers are speculative, but the thinking goes like this. That 8 million is likely to be for a significant percentaage. Let’s say between a third and a half(40%). Now let’s give Podshow two to three years, which means two years from about now. VC’s will probably want a return of 4 to 5 times the investments at a minimum. So they’ll want a minimum back out of around 32 million. Which means a float or a sale in the region of 80 million.
Glitch,
It may show that Wikipedia can be biased, but it also shows that Wikipedia is also self correcting over the medium to long term.