2025-11-26
17 分钟Hey, before we get started,
I wanted to let you know that we are in the middle of our Radiotopia fundraiser.
This is the time of year that I ask you to directly support this podcast and the work that I do.
These times are bananas everywhere, including the podcast industry, as in all media,
news organizations, cultural institutions, websites, magazines, radio.
We are in a time of tremendous change and contraction.
Corporations who swept into my industry and threw a bunch of money around and made a bunch of shows hired a bunch of people They have taken that money away and with it they have taken shows that people love to listen to and to make and the livelihoods and Dreams like honestly of so many people so many people I know friends of mine the fact that the show still exists despite all that after 17 years and that I have been able to make a living doing it for Maybe a little bit more than half of that.
Sometimes it feels like a miracle to me.
The show does not fit into the marketplace.
It is odd in its format and in its length.
It is too idiosyncratic in its approach.
It's not supposed to work, but it does and that can feel like a miracle, but it is not.
It is radio-topia.
Years ago when podcasting first started to be a real thing and it looked like the industry was finally mature enough for me to make a living doing it with the show,
I had a bunch of choices about how to try and do that.
There were some big companies that had big money.
There were some famous brands, both starting up and starting to diversify.
And I said, no, I turned those things down and I chose Radio Topia.
And now when I look at those roads not traveled,
I look at those other companies and literally all of them are either entirely defunct or have been bought and sold and paired back to a shell of its former self,