New technologies have a way of catching on rather slowly at first, before eventually hitting critical mass and taking off. This can definitely be said of podcasting. According to a recent eMarketer report, the numbers have reached an impressive benchmark of 18.5 million listeners in the US alone for 2007 (a 285% increase from 2006). More significantly, 6.5 million of those are considered "active podcast listeners", meaning they download on average more than 1 podcast per week. According to the eMarketer crystal ball, this market is destined to grow to a 65/25 million listener split over the next 5 years. To put those numbers in perspective, the number of US satellite radio subscribers is expected to grow to 30 million in 2015, from 13.6 million in 2007 (according to a summary of another eMarketer report on radio advertising's future).
What's really interesting about this latest report is the suggestion that the medium is still mainly accessed through a PC, rather than a mobile device like the iPod. Mitch Joel, a highly-regarded socialmedia marketing podcaster over at Six Pixels of Separation, has offered his own take on the eMarketer report, in which he hints that the number of podcast-listeners who use their PC as the primary play-back device may be as high as 70%. His rationale for why Podcasting is finally catching on: because once people try it, and subscribe to their favourite shows, it's hard to go back to traditional media (i.e. radio). Time-shifting, Mitch suggests, is the killer feature, along with the ability to pause/fast-forward/rewind. I agree, and while I think that radio will always have a place for live and up-to-the-minute information and discussion (news and talk radio, essentially), where the podcast format is really going to have an impact, and probably already has, is on the mix-tape and mix-CD scene. Seamless integration within iTunes makes the entire process of managing your podcast library a breeze. And this last point will, I suspect, eventually lead to greater mobile device usage over time as people realise they can download fresh mixes of music and play them back in their iPod-enabled cars and while working out - domains long-associated with mix-tapes and CD's.
One last note about podcasts and podcasting: less than three weeks from now, Ryerson University will play host to PodCamp Toronto 2008. This free event takes place over two days, Feb 23-24, and features dozens of information sessions and presentations covering a ton of podcast-related topics by some very respected individuals. More info is available at the Podcamp Blog.
So, are you into podcasts yet? And if not, what's holding you back?
Back in January during his MacWorld Keynote Address, Steve Jobs hinted that Apple was going to be really busy launching new products and innovations this year. True to his word, there's a lot coming out of Cupertino these days.
