Podcast empire-building

Silicon Beat: Podcast Alley, the grassroots podcast directory that played a big role in spurring the popularity of podcasting, has been acquired by PodShow. The deal happened last month, we're told, and founder Chris McIntyre is already making the move from Nashville to San Francisco.

A very interesting development in an embryonic but fast-expanding industry that's attracting more and more entrants. As the Silicon Beat post points out, Podcast Alley now has nearly 7,000 podcasts and 120,000 podcast episodes in its directory, including For Immediate Release, the bi-weekly show Shel Holtz and I co-present - look for us in the Business category ;)

Podshow is owned by Adam Curry and Ron Bloom who last month received nearly $9 million in venture capital funding. You can get a clear sense of their plans from their "strategycast", a near 2-hour podcast they recorded in April in which they discussed the podcasting market and how they see it developing.

No fanfare for the Podcast Alley acquisition - I couldn't see any mention of it in the Podshow site nor on Podcast Alley or its blog.

Comments

[Rob S]

If there's an award for publishing a piece of very old news than it should go to Silicon Beat for their story on PodShow's 'acquisition' of Podcast Alley. Adam Curry mentioned that Podcast Alley was under the PodShow umbrella several months ago when the PodShow team was first announced.

[Neville Hobson]

That's interesting, Rob. It must have been a pretty well-kept secret so far judging by the volume of blog posts in the past 24 hours talking about the acquisition!

http://www.technorati.com/search/Podshow+Podcast+Alley

If Adam mentioned it in a DSC episode, obviously none of the blogs writing about it today listen to DSC :) I do but clearly not that episode.

[Jeff Clavier]

Adam mentioned that PodCast Alley was one of their property in this video interview with Bambi Francisco (free but reg req'd):
http://www.marketwatch.com/tvradio/playerFull.asp?media=0&band=0&remPref=1&guid=%7B6D10DF90-2674-4EFA-80C5-D56510EA9838%7D&siteid=mktw
I referred to in my post rationalizing the PodShow investment (from a VC perspective):
http://blog.softtechvc.com/2005/08/why_the_podshow.html

[Neville Hobson]

Jeff, thanks for that link.

I didn't hear either Adam or Ron mention Podcast Alley in the interview as their property - Adam referred to it as a community. Or is that splitting hairs? I did like Ron's elevator pitch about Podshow - succinct and believable.

Incidentally, that Market Watch sign up is about the worst process I've ever seen on a website. Multiple screens with loads of offers, where the default with most of them is set to accept them. So if you don't pay too close attention before you click, you'll find a bunch of spam (effectively) in your email. Pretty poor practice.

[Jeff Clavier]

I did not watch the video again before leaving this comment, but I do remember getting the feeling that there was/would be a tight link between the two. Which was subsequently confirmed by a friend of mine involved in the podcasting world. But I don't blog about rumors :-).

[Neville Hobson]

Heh! In your business, blogging abour rumours probably isn't a good idea. Me, on the other hand... well, I'm in the communication busness ;)

[Rob S]

Can't remember exactly where I heard it, but I definitely heard Adam say that Chris McIntyre and Podcast Alley were part of the PodShow family. I assumed that to mean that they had acquired Podcast Alley. For once I guess my assumption was correct. And you're right Neville, judging by all the blog posts over the last couple of days this is news to quite a few people.