At the industry-only Hot Pod Summit at On Air Fest, I did something very unlike me: I raised my hand to ask a question.
The day had been spent listening to three companies lay out their visions of the future of podcasting: boutique studio Gimlet (now part of Spotify), Luminary (the new entrant to the Netflix for podcasts Thunderdome), and podcast platform Breaker. The one thing they all had in common? Exclusive content.
Breaker announced at the summit that it was interested in buying exclusive shows. While Gimlet and Spotify are still hammering out how their new relationship will work, Gimlet execs hinted at possible “windowing,” where podcasts are exclusive to one platform for a set “window” of time before being available on other platforms. And Spotify Studios—the content creating arm of the streaming service—was interested in potentially developing podcasts that would exclusively be available on its service. As for Luminary, CEO Matt Sacks couldn’t or wouldn’t…
