Welcome to Hot Pod, a newsletter about podcasts. This is issue 212, published June 4, 2019.
Spotify begins tests on podcast playlists feature. This came in overnight: Fresh off its run of podcast company acquisitions, Spotify is now taking a crack at the problem that’s perhaps most groaned about in the community: discoverability.
Starting this morning, the platform is kicking off what is being described as “a very small test” around a discoverability feature in the form of podcast playlists. If you’re familiar with Spotify’s normal music playlist products at all, then you already broadly know what’s up: Each playlist will give users a collection of episodes constructed around a specific genre or theme. In these early goings, only five playlist genres will be available: “Comedy,” “True Crime,” “Geek Culture,” “Walking (Motivational),” and “Relaxing (Mindfulness).” (Shout-out to Headspace.)
A source at the company tells me that the feature will…
