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Comment by dna_polymerase | Hacker News Reader

I guess I don't know the right podcasts, but in my opinion, most of them are lazy marketing efforts by large corporations. I don't want to listen to native ads. And this is basically everything Spotify seems to suggest to me in the podcast section.

I fled Soundcloud because they couldn't get their shit together, it seems Spotify won't be competing forever as well. Their app has random stutters on modern hardware, and is cluttered with podcast stuff. All I want is music.

I liked JRE, but even as a Spotify user, I don't listen to him anymore.

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>I liked JRE, but even as a Spotify user, I don't listen to him anymore.

I used this long podcasts to fall asleep to but had to stop now with spotify. I cast it to a google home mini and set the volume to pretty low, so I just can hear what they say pretty much, but at a random point spotify stops it and plays an ad at volume level 9000+ and doesn't resume play. How bad isn't that? Oh and Joe is getting less likeable lately... not sure if we should blame spotify for throwing all that money on him or what...

> Joe is getting less likeable lately...

Agreed - he always had a noticeable tilt on issues but lately it seems to be all about scoring sick dunks on SJW's. I was also surprised how little prep he apparently does before podcasts. During the latest Elon Musk episode he learned on-air that the reusable rockets land propulsively (as opposed to using parachutes or otherwise). It's odd to have possibly the richest man in the world on for 3 multi-hour podcasts and not know the most basic facts about their accomplishments.

Haha yes! How could he not have seen the ring of fire video and still be Elons number one fan???

Could we confirm parallel universes now? Because the one Joe lives in is different. Think he lost touch. Also noticed him being more of a dick lately, the "I'm a nice person"-Joe is off in yet another universe doing something else...

> lately it seems to be all about scoring sick dunks on SJW's

I'm surprised you'd say that considering that Spotify has banned controversial episodes with Stefan Molyneux, Gavin McInnes, Milo Yiannopoulos, David Seaman (the pizza gate guy not the footballer), etc.

I'm not sure he'll be able to have them on now. He did have Alex Jones again, but it was more fact checked than the previous episodes.

I'd say he's less conspiratorial now.

>I liked JRE, but even as a Spotify user, I don't listen to him anymore.

Same. I don't know why that is though. Perhaps because he sold out open podcasting? Especially as he has had Adam Curry on a couple of times. But then I defy anyone to turn down such a payday (I wouldn't).

Perhaps it's the abandoning of a very large community (YT comments). That doesn't affect me personally but I know it affects others.

A subconscious sour taste somewhat?

Couple reasons for me:

Mainly, when I'm looking for something to listen to, I go to my podcast app. There's a list of latest episodes. I browse and pick one. JRE never appears on that list, so out of sight, out of mind.

But also, his show has taken a nosedive in quality in the last 6 months. Feels like discussions are always (a) COVID mask rules are dumb (or maybe they're not?, depends on the guest), (b) The Comedy Cellar was hella tight back in the day, (c) Texas is awesome, California is basically a dystopian hellhole.

None of those points bother me that much. Whatever. But when they're recycled ad nauseam on every episode, it's just boring.

So now I just don't bother. I have the Spotify app. But it's not something I think about for podcasting.

Wonder if the pandemic, combined with moving to another state, has impacted his ability to find new guests or guests with new stories to tell. IIRC, he has lots of hunters on his show, right? But if the world is more or less locked down, those hunters aren't going off to interesting places and coming back with stories to tell. Same for any other activity that requires travel. The fallback are the types of shows you mentioned. And being in a new state means creating a new network of contacts, which will take time and is slowed by the pandemic regardless of how loose Texas might be in their restrictions.

> There's a list of latest episodes. I browse and pick one. JRE never appears on that list, so out of sight, out of mind.

That’s a good point.

How about montonony and repetition?

There are > 1000 episodes of JRE, each 1-3 hours long. An enormous amount of repetition results from this. I have watched less than 50 episodes and I know I have to FFWD when Rogan starts talking about divorce laws in California, using the same example of one unnamed friend who lost everything to his ex-wife.

Podcasts with other comedians are unlistenable due to the constant navel-gazing about The Comedy Store and cancel culture.

> How about montonony and repetition?

Fair point. Although I would add that recording thousands of hours of your own conversations would result in much monotony and repetition.

> Podcasts with other comedians are unlistenable due to the constant navel-gazing about The Comedy Store and cancel culture.

Yup. One notable exception to this is Bill Burr. I'll listen to any of those because Bill doesn't put up with it.

Yes, I have noticed that as well. But Bill Burr is a significantly higher profile guest than the usual comedians whose careers revolve around the LA/Southern Calif area.

> I liked JRE, but even as a Spotify user, I don't listen to him anymore.

I'm not a spotify user and I will not move over to it for JRE.

I'm more of a youtube user who found JRE interesting when it was on that platform.

But that's just Google controlling your content rather than Spotify. Not really open either way.

Not sure what you mean by "cluttered with podcast stuff". I'm a happy Spotify user and I'm barely aware that the podcast stuff exists.

It's gotten worse recently. The second row on my home screen are now dedicated to "Spotify original & exclusive shows" (when it used to be your weekly recommendation channels). There's another 2-3 rows dedicated to podcasts as you keep going down.

For reference, I don't listen to podcasts in Spotify.

Maybe we are in different A/B groups but for me the podcasts are now in row 3 minimum, sometimes in the second row on home screen. So at times I see them.

Fair enough. I never linger on the home screen and head straight to playlist/liked music, so I suppose it's not something that's ever jumped out at me.

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