What they are playing at: Spotify (and YouTube) play counts
Spotify announced it was adding a “play” count to its podcast app last week.
Some in podcasting are really vexed about this. Courtney Elmer says it hurts independent podcasters; Jim Salveson says there are good but also bad things about the plan; others have pulled their shows off Spotify in a fit of pique; the discomfort has even made it to national US news; and some have chosen to post great screeds about it on any social media they can get their hands on. Including me, here.
A few thoughts:
a) Open statistics are good for the industry. Here are mine - they are calculated using an algorithm that is close to IAB v2.2. I highly recommend that every podcast shares their data. I have nothing to hide. I find it odd to think that anyone - particularly anyone who takes money from their audience in donations - would want to hide their numbers. (You can get started here).
b) But Spotify’s numbers are proprietary, so we don’t know how a play is calculated. And Spotify’s numbers will always only be data about how that podcast performs on Spotify, rather than data elsewhere. Podcasts about podcasting, like I do, are always poorly represented on Spotify. (How do we know this? Open consumption data.) Some claim that the numbers might be a bit misleading, but I’m not convinced - when we see a “play” in YouTube, we understand that it’s only YouTube data, after all.
c) It’s a little nakedly self-serving of Spotify to push these play numbers - since the way to increase them is for the podcaster to promote Spotify more. But Spotify can only display the numbers it has access to; and it does not have access to your download numbers; just the numbers for consumption in Spotify. (Unless, of course, you host with Spotify - but they’re not preferencing those shows, and in my opinion, nor should they.)
d) I didn’t hear anyone, in the desperate podcast rush to YouTube, complain about YouTube’s proprietary stats which have always been visible. I find it really odd that many people who have welcomed YouTube with their desperate, sweaty open arms as somehow being the future of the medium are also now complaining about open play numbers from Spotify. (YouTube publishes absolutely nothing about how YouTube play stats are calculated, by the way. A $36.1bn business, which doesn’t post anything on how its main stat works).
e) Respect for the creator is essential in the open RSS world. I don’t think Spotify is wrong to open its figures like this; but I think they made a mistake in doing it without any notice. That shows no respect for us, who make the content they monetise. I’d, personally, have said “Starting June 1…” to give people a chance to consider if they want to stay on the platform; but people are unlikely to leave it, given how big Spotify is anyway.
I put opinion on my personal blog, because I feel a bit uncomfortable about putting it on Podnews, the newsletter I write every day. That’s not really meant for my opinion, so I’m hosting this here instead.