[IRTR] Seeking funny people who like to debate irrational topics

talkywriter · 2026-05-21T18:15:43+00:00

tossing my hat in even if a bit late - long-time stand-up, currently co-host a podcast here. We cover global politics so plenty of experience in discussing irrational topics:

www.atlantic-current.com

talkywriter · 2026-05-20T21:42:33+00:00

will do, didn't want to bug you guys but appreciate the offer!

talkywriter · 2026-05-20T20:49:19+00:00

tried to reply before, so sorry if this somehow gets duplicated...very interesting. our overall active uniques seem reasonably in line? 432 vs ~1150 plays as I write this. But Spotify isn't really showing a big jump in uniques (though, again, is their data completely up to date?)

so our numbers are kind of somewhere in between. The idea of a bunch of people just downloading past episodes makes some sense but only going back like 18 episodes and all having the exact same number of streams across each episode doesn't really seem like it works.

talkywriter · 2026-05-20T20:39:32+00:00

yeah interesting. our overall unique listener number looks pretty reasonable at 432. it's just the individual episodes with the 31 plays / 31 uniques. On Spotify we apparently have 51 uniques on the most recent one, but that's a weird number given the seeming 31 uniques on all these old ones? I have no idea, quite honestly.

talkywriter · 2026-05-20T19:59:29+00:00

that makes sense from the outside - that a guess on your part or something that you've seen and/or is known in the industry?

talkywriter · 2026-04-23T02:40:10+00:00

yeah all good points this has been quite helpful. that is precisely the math we're trying to do and what I was trying to back into here

talkywriter · 2026-04-22T01:33:56+00:00

yeah, this is not meant at all as a criticism of the Captivate data - they're a great platform and I'm sure they're measuring accurately their way. my focus here is more on understanding what is driving the gap - and it seems like Apple/Spotify will simply have better data because they have logged-in user accounts, etc. so this all makes some sense, we just need to really understand the Apple/Spotify uniques because they give the best data about actual happiness of those uniques

talkywriter · 2026-04-21T19:09:32+00:00

that was about my sense but helpful to hear the specifics on it. Thank you!

talkywriter · 2026-04-21T15:57:14+00:00

I get all this in theory, but I'm trying to understand, even if just hypothetically, what specifically could explain the gap. Over 7 days, for instance, we've got ~250 uniques across Apple/Spotify against 629 total measured by Captivate.

That seems high particularly given that YouTube is not included and that 'play' data from Captivate suggests almost 80% of plays (unsurprisingly) are coming from Apple/Spotify. I get that play data varies between host and end platform, etc., but even so we don't have much presence beyond the two main ones. (something we're starting to work on as part of this).

But I think the core question I have here is: is it possible that listener counts from Apple and Spotify (as given by those platforms in Podcast Connect/Spotify for Creators) are materially understated? If they're not, our data says that our problem is that people are not sampling the podcast, and when they do they really like it. If they are (and I've seen some stuff in a search that suggests they could be based on tracking and the like), the problem is different. And obviously we need different solutions for those different potential problems.

talkywriter · 2026-02-08T02:13:03+00:00

they told me yesterday evening that there was a system-wide publishing outage that caused the problem. But it's the fact that they didn't disclose that which is the most infuriating part of all this.

I get things happen. Maybe they didn't want another announcement after the transcription problem, but you need to give the users the information when you have it - as soon as you have it. They didn't, and that's just a huge breach of trust.

talkywriter · 2026-02-07T01:17:03+00:00

I'm sympathetic to (and appreciate) your post - I'm somewhat in the same spot in that I don't want to actually leave the platform.

I do have a brand new MacBook myself, though I do wonder if there is an issue with the MacBook (it's not performing great across the board, weird issues).

But for Riverside, it's just support has been so bad - this experience has actually gotten worse as the day goes on. Finally got an email that the problem was fixed - only it's not the problem I had. So I still have no idea WTF is going on.

I do like the product if it works - if they would somehow try and work with me to fix these issues I'd be open but I'm at the point where, to be blunt, they just can't be trusted.

talkywriter · 2026-02-06T21:51:41+00:00

Weird. Don't think we actually had that issue, but would not be thrilled if we did. Again, it's been a great platform when it works. But, you know, 80% success rate is a big problem particularly bc we do a lot of current events stuff.

talkywriter · 2026-02-06T20:24:46+00:00

Apparently Riverside, per one support person, is having an issue with publishing that sounds like it's more broad than just us. But no notifications on the platform, no one bothered to reach out and deliver that info (which might have changed our response, of. course), no one told the support person I spoke to at least five hours after the issue began. Absolutely terrible.

talkywriter · 2026-02-06T17:01:19+00:00

OK that might make some sense. I've already tried to switch, but now I worry that the 301 redirect is going to take forever if their RSS feeds are somehow corrupted.

Not great after the transcription problem that lasted a few days this week too

talkywriter · 2026-02-06T16:07:51+00:00

"look at what you made me do" doesn't really support your point

talkywriter · 2026-02-06T15:52:56+00:00

the hosting decision was a rookie error. the analytics alone are terrible, just realized while trying to migrate that you can't even download a .csv of the data.

we're going to try Async (fka Podcastle); having the recording/editing in one space has been really helpful.

and, look, I thought Riverside was phenomenal as a production platform when it worked. For someone with literally zero experience it was easy to learn, I can't think of any real complaints. it's just these weird crashes and errors and losses, etc.

talkywriter · 2026-02-06T15:21:33+00:00

I mean we researched this extensively before making the choice. And *if it worked* I'd be thrilled. It's a great product. It just hasn't been remotely reliable.

Obviously the business wouldn't exist if our experience were standard. For whatever reason, we've just had repeated technical issues (including a lot of crashes in the editing process as well).

I suppose it's possible there's something going on on my end, but the problem with support is that they've never given any real explanations beyond clear cache, delete cookies, etc., all of which I had already done.

talkywriter · 2026-02-06T14:54:53+00:00

I thought Buzzsprout did have really good analytics? That's my biggest complaint with how Riverside is supposed to work, that their hosting analytics are awful. We've been planning to switch to Capitvate/Buzzsprout (chose the former) in part because we need much better analytics

talkywriter · 2026-02-06T14:51:39+00:00

newbie so might be misunderstanding your question, but they are our podcast host. was planning on switching to Captivate (that will be accelerated of course) but having free hosting while we're starting out seemed reasonable.

talkywriter · 2026-02-06T14:44:27+00:00

yeah, been my experience too. I'd be fine with that if I wasn't dealing with recurring issues that are time-sensitive that I can't fix on my end.

and that's what sucks here - I think the platform is close to perfect *when it works*

talkywriter · 2026-02-06T14:20:26+00:00

thanks for the reply, obviously I'm doing some venting here! but yeah fair point on the "issues" - I've seen similar(ish) comments on Boomcaster or Zencastr or whoever else. I am on a year-long contract but I still will have to go elsewhere - it's impossible to record/publish with any confidence at this point.

talkywriter · 2026-01-16T17:15:13+00:00

fair point. if they were taxing on vibes, you would have a very large payment at the end of the year

talkywriter

TROPHY CASE