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“Wherever you get your podcasts” is a radical statement (www.anildash.com)

submitted 10 months ago* (last edited 10 months ago) by veeesix@lemmy.ca to c/fediverse@lemmy.world

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[…] being able to say, "wherever you get your podcasts" is a radical statement. Because what it represents is the triumph of exactly the kind of technology that's supposed to be impossible: open, empowering tech that's not owned by any one company, that can't be controlled by any one company, and that allows people to have ownership over their work and their relationship with their audience.

What podcasting holds in the promise of its open format is the proof that an open web can still thrive and be relevant, that it can inspire new systems that are similarly open to take root and grow.

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[-] victorz@lemmy.world 52 points 10 months ago

Could someone explain to me (I'm a developer so use whatever terms you like, maybe), how does the massive amount of podcasts reach the world? Say if I wanted to make a podcast app (I don't, I love Pocket Casts), where would I sync the massive list'o'casts? Does it work like that? Or do you scrape the entire internet? What is happening?

[-] s0ckpuppet@kbin.social 85 points 10 months ago* (last edited 10 months ago)

It's done via RSS feeds that the podcast creators then submit to aggregators. Then apps pull that information down from said aggregators. This website explains the gist of it.

https://rss.com/blog/how-to-create-an-rss-feed-for-a-podcast/

[-] victorz@lemmy.world 4 points 10 months ago

So how do the aggregators sync with each other to get all the podcasts? Or is it up to the podcast to "post" to all the aggregators?

[-] QuarterSwede@lemmy.world 3 points 10 months ago

The aggregators don’t sync with each other. The podcast creators upload the new show to each aggregator (or use an app that uploads to multiple).

[-] victorz@lemmy.world 2 points 10 months ago

Okay cool, that I think explains everything I've wondered about this topic lol. Awesome, thank you!

[-] NightAuthor@lemmy.world 2 points 10 months ago

And they don’t even have to go through an aggregator, it’s just for ease of use and discovery, pretty much every app will let you put in an rss feed url, so podcast could be self hosted only reliant on having an internet connection… well, hell…. Only reliant on having a shared network connection with your target audience

[-] capital@lemmy.world 1 points 10 months ago* (last edited 10 months ago)

The one paid podcast I pay for does this.

You pay on their site and then you get a personal RSS URL to put in your catcher.

[-] ipkpjersi@lemmy.ml 10 points 10 months ago* (last edited 10 months ago)

The protocol used for it is a bit of an older protocol, but basically it uses the RSS protocol. It came out in the 90s and hasn't been updated since 2014, and I haven't touched any code related to it since before 2019. Otherwise, it'd just be standard HTTPS for websites like Spotify etc and whatever podcast discovery system they have on their site etc.

[-] victorz@lemmy.world 1 points 10 months ago

Does the protocol have its own name?

[-] yogurt@lemm.ee 7 points 10 months ago

iTunes api, and if apple turns evil there are other list-o-cast apis like fyyd.de.

[-] woelkchen@lemmy.world 21 points 10 months ago

iTunes api, and if apple turns evil there are other list-o-cast apis like fyyd.de.

Whoever downvoted this has no clue. The Apple Podcast directory is currently unrestricted for any podcatcher to crawl and to get the RSS feeds. That may change at some point but for now it's actually the best maintained RSS feed directory. The aforementioned fyyd.de is a good but less complete alternative. It relies of community submissions. fyyd.de itself is not an open source service, though.

[-] TrickDacy@lemmy.world 20 points 10 months ago

if apple turns evil

Lolol yeah like that could EVER happen! /s

[-] yogurt@lemm.ee 13 points 10 months ago

Compared to Reddit or Twitter anyway, they haven't killed their API yet so apps like pocket casts are mainly using iTunes for search

[-] victorz@lemmy.world 2 points 10 months ago

Ah-ha. Interesting. Thanks!

[-] TrickDacy@lemmy.world 1 points 10 months ago

Are you sure about this? I was under the impression there were several aggregators out there who all sort of shared data, iTunes just being one of them. Maybe you are totally right, but if you are that sort of undermines the original post, which is saying that the podcast ecosystem doesn't depend on any one company/org.

[-] Skelectus@suppo.fi 2 points 10 months ago

Maybe if Apple realizes they have this running somewhere behind their mountain of money.

[-] wheeldawg@sh.itjust.works 0 points 10 months ago

Apple has been evil since day 1. When have they done any single thing that wasn't evil? The EO is family a terrible, wireless person. I'm so confused what you mean.