
2016: the year the podcast came of age - brownbat
http://www.economist.com/blogs/prospero/2016/04/easy-listening
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pjmlp
Maybe it would be considered a niche thing, but I started hearing demoscene
podcasts around 2000.

Eagerly waiting for the day to download the mp3 or RealAudio file with the new
show.

~~~
ghaff
The first real hype phase was back in about 2005: Adam Curry, the death of
radio, etc. [1] A lot of it was "Look at me. I'm podcasting. And I don't even
need a studio!"

With smartphones it became a lot easier to sync content from NPR and the like
which removed a big hurdle to routinely listening to podcasts as a matter of
course. But, anecdotally, it certainly feels as if the population of quality
content has gotten significantly broader. (And obviously there have been the
breakout hits like Serial which have helped create a lot of mainstream
awareness.)

[1] [http://www.wired.com/2005/03/curry/](http://www.wired.com/2005/03/curry/)

