Todd and Rob in the afternoon. Afternoon delight. With Todd and Rob. Oh, yeah. Alright. Well, back with the new media show. It's great to have, you back with us watching. Todd's here as well, and he's back in in the US and Michigan. So he's joining us from his studio build. So how's it going today, Todd? It's not the student. Right behind me is not the studio build. I posted a picture on Facebook that showed the partial studio build. So Yeah. It's cool. Maybe next week we'll be ready. So Okay.
We'll see. But, yeah, I went I've been making multiple runs to the storage unit and dragging stuff back here. So the the I could not have anybody here right now because it is an ultra well, let's just put it this way. I cleaned up behind me. And for Chris, if you didn't know, I lost my other studio. I didn't get evicted. I got at least terminated. So I had to vacate the location I was at. So I had no idea how to make sense. Yeah. It just sucked, but, you know, it's
life. But and, hopefully, this new setup will work, and if bandwidth willing, we'll be okay. But matter of fact, I was talking with an alternate party, yesterday about some additional bandwidth, so we'll see. I asked the company, how much to bribe you guys to bring fiber down my road a mile and a half? And the guy says, you know how much it cost a mile to bring fiber? And I said, no. I said he said, 70 $1,000. I'm like, I mean, if you said 10, I'd have to say, I'll write you the check, baby. 70?
We're gonna have to go on a Kickstarter to get that done. Yeah. Right. Yeah. And that would probably just to you. Right? Is that the is there any other customers that could get on that? Yeah. Yeah. Just to me, but there's not enough customers from their point, like, 6 houses or something. So no no and no one's gonna say, oh, yeah. I'll give you $10,000 at Fiverr. Yeah. No. That's true. But, anyway Well, we're Here we
are. So, yeah, so we're lucky to have Chris Kramitzos with us, the founder of Podfest Expo that goes on every year down in Orlando. And, Chris, thanks for joining us. I appreciate it. Oh, thanks for having me. Last time I saw Todd, we were hanging out in the Philippines in Manila, so that was awesome. Yeah. That was. And I was able to Yeah. Hang out with Aya Sabu here recently myself as well. So you guys got the royal treatment. Her her and I just went
from business to business. I think we we visited 5 different companies in, like, 8 hours. So, yeah, so a little different visit with her, but, yeah, it was good. Well, thanks to both of you because your support really helped us get Podfest Asia off the ground. It was a shoestring, but we did it, and it was awesome. Yeah. And it's a little bit of a sign of the direction that you're going to. And that was a nice event and definitely different perspectives, I guess. It's always every
Yeah. I think you're lagging on us a little bit, Todd. So, yeah, so I was wanting to have Chris here to talk about his big announcement that he had Yeah. A few weeks ago now. But, yeah, a new kind of partnership and folks in in his company, actually, Cutting Edge Events, I guess, is the new company. Well, Cutting Edge Events is new company or No. No. No. Cutting Edge Events is a holding company for Podfest, and it's Got it. And the different things
that Podfest does. And we added 2 managing directors, so 2 investors that are gonna be working in the company to help us expand. Nick Pavlinis, who is he's been podcasting for quite some time. He started with 5 minutes with dad. He's also owns, part of Morgan James Publishing Group, and then doctor Glenn Vo, who is a big influencer in the medical space. So that's gonna allow me to do one thing, which is focus on building community,
going out to different places. We just announced that we're going to Bogota, Colombia at the end of the in early September. So we're looking at really growing the international, not only the US, North America, but really growing tentacles into other parts of the world. Yeah. That's awesome. So so are you guys actually gonna have an event in Colombia? Is that the plan? Yeah. Yeah. I'll be sending out some information
shortly. So that one's gonna be a little bit different than, Podfest Asia, which was a Podfest specific event. This is Podfest is going to a festival that's being held with creators in Colombia, in Bogota, and we'll I have translator. Neil Gilarte is coming down with me from Wow Style Media. And then we're also gonna invite them to Podfest. So think of that almost like a foreign exchange program. Like, hey. You guys come. So they're gonna have a room at Podfest.
We're gonna have a space at their event. Issa is the head of the that that conference that we're part of. She's really big in the voice over space. So we're excited. Podfest is all about the independence and helping the creators, but also now we're finding this really big source of editors that also we wanna bring to the fold. So you can see a lot of stuff that we're gonna do for the technicians behind
the scenes. We've always been very supportive, but we're gonna be doing a lot more moving forward. So I also saw that you guys made a change to the hotel venue as well as the dates of the event. So, you know, I have it up on the screen so everybody can So, yeah, I I could, I'm gonna tell you guys a great story, but, basically, we had a hotel confirmed. They They knew they were gonna close down, but they didn't tell us that. A month later, they shut the hotel
down. I can't say much more all than we have lawyers right now dealing with that. Luckily for us and our relationships, we got a better hotel. They felt bad for us. They really found something for us. So we found a home, and it's at the Renaissance, which is an amazing property. They gave us a really great deal for our community. But, yeah, the the hotel literally I don't even know if it exists anymore. Oh, wow. Yeah. So I mean, I'm sorry. I wanna
be very clear. The one we're gonna have it at, we have a great hotel now for next year. Everything worked out. But, you could imagine it's stressful enough with these kind of, businesses. Having your hotel just shut down on you just adds a whole different element of stress. Well, and also if you have to, you know, if you have to change the dates too. It's a big cost too if you think about it. All the materials, all the things. So there's all kinds of stuff that
goes into it. Luckily, we're working on it, and we have really great members in our community that are helping take on that case. Mhmm. Yeah. That's great. Go ahead, Todd. I there must be some serious lag going on here because I we're stepping all over each other, so I apologize. So that's that losing venue like that, it I guess, maybe you can't even say, but they still have your money? Or It it let there like I said, there's
attorneys involved now. Unfortunately, a lot of these bigger companies, when they see smaller events, they'll say, hey. Go get representation. If you we're not we're we're good. They try and say it's force majeure. I I don't wanna get in the weeds. That basically means it's an act of god, which it was not. So, anyways, we we got a really strong case, and we're gonna be fine. But in the moment this all happened, Todd, while I was heading out to Asia, by the way.
Like, while I'm flying out to Asia, this is what I'm dealing with on top of trying to get my flights there. So it was great. So it all got settled. That's why I was so happy when I got to Asia even though I hadn't slept for 2 days. And then all these amazing people were there, and Todd could attest. They were so grateful, And that's what I really loved about Podfest Asia in Manila. Thanks to Ron, who is amazing, that helped us with Pod Machine. I, who's amazing, who has architect my business.
We had some really great local leaders that helped us put it on, but for those that don't know, I almost didn't make it because of just flights getting delayed all the way through. And then the language barrier in Japan, I didn't understand exactly what I was being told. But I wind up getting on the right plane, and I got there with an hour to spare. So it was so much fun. Yeah. You you when you come dragging your suitcase in, I'm like, oh. Yeah. You had just got off the flight,
but that's one thing. You you hadn't slept in a couple of days, and you you did real well. You weren't too punchy. I could see you near the end of the day. Yeah. I probably got but I was I loved it, Todd. It was so good. And seeing you, like, there was a bunch of us from the US. Once we saw each other, we were making sure that everybody in the Philippines was welcome, and then they would I I mean, people come up to
Todd, say, can I get a selfie? It was really nice just seeing how grateful everybody was there. It was great. And for Todd to share that with us, and thanks to Todd, we had lunch provided because of blueberry. So people were really that was one of my favorite events we've ever done, Todd, just, from the gratitude perspective of the audience. It was really amazing.
Yeah. It was. And I think what it really shows me and, of course, with the big event in Florida in the I guess in I I guess it was we termed this in the winter. It's not even the spring. Right. I just it sets a different, perspective for me because I'm sure some of the folks that were in Manila may come to Florida. And and I think it just this would be a good extension. We'll see if you guys are able to do this next year.
But I think that just the seeing what's going on in the international market, I and I talked to Rob about this quite a bit when I got back. I I didn't know what to expect from the panels. I just really sat back and listened. And the folks that are running networks out there, it would have been the education that they were providing was equal to, if not greater than, maybe, a session I'd set in at a regular event here in the United States.
So it would the level of content, the level of information being shared was really right there at at level 10. It wasn't like we were year 1 into event and the content and the the speakers and stuff weren't up to speed. No. The education level of the content was really up there and then the nuances of the of the community. And one thing I always just thought that was interesting is no one was talking about CPMs or anything. I was like, okay. Is this a big secret?
And I think just culturally wise, they don't necessarily go too deep talking publicly about money because I got 2 or 3 of them cornered and then said, hey. You beat around the bush a little bit, but what are you guys actually seeing for advertising? And they told me. I was like, oh, it's same as the United States. Awesome. And to me, that kind of solidified the whole conversations that they were sharing with the folks
that were there. Now, obviously, there was a lot of VAs, a lot of creators, a lot of editor not a lot as many creators, a lot of editors. So, hopefully, round 2 of that event will have more of the actual creators come as well. I was shocked at how many amazing editors that we had and what really cued me in because I know I'm putting on the event like Todd. I was discovering the same
thing he's saying. We were discovering in real time, and that's why you have to do these events because that's how you discover this stuff. When we had Jack Baldini, our attorney, go up there, and they were not asking the same questions that US people would ask. They were asking very detailed trademark copyright infringement stories, and I think a lot of them have dealt with so many different creators. And in Asia, they rip off things a lot more quicker. Like, things get
ripped off left and right, I guess. So it was very eye opening to how astute they were in that field. Whereas, like, in the US, someone will ask a question, what is a copyright? What is a trademark? That's not what they were asking. They're asking, what happens if I'm working on something and this guy stole it, but I'm the editor, and
now they wanna sue me? So it's interesting to hear these kind of questions, and it was eye opening what you're saying, Todd, how how in-depth this audience was, the people we were pulling from. It was really eye opening for me. So, Chris, on this new strategic partnership that you've got with these 2 new gentlemen coming in, and and I know this is you've been a one man band along with the support team, of course. Yeah. We have a great support team. Right. Yeah.
Yeah. But, you know, I'm excited about this from just a because you stretch pretty thin, my friend. Correct. And so I find that to myself all the time. I think, oh, man. I'm a little bit too stretched too thin. So it's good to see you've got these other folks coming in and helping you out. And how's that changing? What what's it been so far for the business and for the event? How do you feel today? Here we're August, and we're, what, we're 4 or 5 months away, whatever the
date is. Rob, maybe put that back up there. But how are you feeling today as far from an organization standpoint as compared to where you would be normally without this extra help? I I probably feel overwhelmed. I don't feel overwhelmed. I actually you'll appreciate this. I feel like I'm not doing enough, and that's the whole point. Does that make sense? So because I'm used to doing a lot of the things. Now I have teammates that could hand off
different things. So we have already had record sales this far out, people purchasing tickets way in advance than we normally would have. And Nick, I believe these is part of Podfest. So we had other people that were interested, but they just weren't part of the community. And you guys know this community is very special, and I've kept it that way. So finding a cultural fit was priority number 1. So Nick Pavly has been a great partner to work with, so has doctor Glenn Bo.
They also have a lot of connections on there and that they're gonna be bringing in just different sponsors, different access points that they have that'll help the conference grow. But one thing that they have told me and I've told them, they go to community comes first, and that's the key to Podfest. That's what makes us so special. So that's where we're focused. And, I mean, I I start the pod
tour next week. I'll be in, in Georgia for the pod tour, and then I'll be at CreatorFest, which is not our event, some other event, but we'll have a booth there. And then we'll be going to at least 20 to 25 cities on the low side across North America, making sure that we reach podcasters where they're at and just keep growing growing Podfest.
Do you see a lot of the changes, Chris, being really on your outreach, marketing, local events, just trying to drive more attendance to your events and also on on the international side? Or is it more diving into what actually goes on at the events, or is it just a combination of both? So a happy number for us for Podfest would be for Podfest US, somewhere around 3,000 attendees overall would be great.
And then, focusing internationally, and that's where my focus I'll be doing a lot of the US, but that extra time, what Todd just said, that frees me up. Mhmm. Building those relationships, just trying to figure out where we're gonna be in Asia because I could just tell you my gut feeling, and part of this is gut and also numbers is we could attract about 500 people next year in Asia. Well, that takes some research and work to figure out where we wanna be at while the operations are running.
So we're excited about the expansion inside the US as much as outside, but we think we could tie this in. So one of the great case studies is a bunch of people did hire people out of Asia to work with them side by side at a premium, but the US podcasters obviously still get a good a good deal, but they're also paying a little extra because they want people that are well versed in our community. So I I know we have one YouTuber that hired a full time person to work for themselves
out of Podfest Asia. I know a few other relationships got made. So we wanna creep keep creating those extensions of people working together across culturally. We are in a global world anyway. So Podfest is getting internationalized, and it's gonna happen very fast. Do you see a lot of growth potential for the event outside of the US too? I mean, are you thinking about Europe? Are you thinking primarily about Asia right now?
We like Latin America and Southeast Asia, if I were to be honest with you, for our growth. For a couple reasons, Europe is slightly mature, but we also like, like, the scrappy independence. So that's our MO. Mhmm. And we find that, like, Colombia, Philippines, Indonesia, possibly maybe down the road, we do Singapore, but, like, those are areas that we think lend really well to our brand. And I wouldn't be surprised if one day in the near future,
there's a Podfest that's getting 10,000 people. Might might not be the US, but it'll be somewhere in the globe showing up. Obviously, we'd have to figure out if we can even do that, but don't be surprised if there's a huge event outside the US that's pulling thousands of people that are coming forward. Our our our community is special. I mean, Todd was there. I mean, people loved hanging out with them. They loved hanging out with us.
I literally could I people didn't stop coming up to me, thanking me for us coming out there. I'm sure they were thanking Todd. They were just coming up to us. Thank you for being here. Thank you for acknowledging us. We see those individual part of our community. Yeah. They've had no they've had no events. They've been on their own. So they either do something virtual. There may you know, there was another event that happened just here recently in either Singapore.
I can't remember. Some event. I I and we didn't hear too much news. Yeah. Malaysia. We didn't hear too much news out of that event. Just like when I went to Saudi, it was the same thing. It was just a huge eye opening to me. And there is definitely, you know, takeaways that I brought back to the team. This is why I went to Cebu here recently. To be to be honest with you, the quality of people that the workforce in the Philippines has largely been known for many years to be They work
a lot of jobs overseas. Matter of fact, when I was coming back, the guy that was sitting next to me was on his way to an oil rig in Louisiana, south you know, out in the gulf, working for a big, multinational. And I was talking with him, and he he goes out there and does 10 weeks in, on the oil rig, and then he goes back to Philippine for 6 weeks and, you know, back and forth. He's flying more frequent firemiles than I am. So that just shows you the level of, workers that are
basically almost going everywhere in the world. But at the same time, there's this burgeoning industry largely started by call centers. But now you look at like AFG has 57 highly educated top engineers in the country doing engineering work, outsourcing for companies here in United States. She's a facilitator of it. And I went to another business and it's I believe it's called a BPO. And there were 600 people that were doing everything from bank finance to, I mean, the full Monty of skills.
So what the advantage really is, at least in the Philippines, is everyone speaks English. So that gives less misunderstandings, that kind of stuff. So I can see why we had so many editors. And I actually visited a couple of businesses. We're podcast editing companies where all the gentlemen do or ladies and gentlemen do in that company all day long is edit edit podcast. And I was pretty blown away just that was
just external of the event from Podfest. So it just made me realize there was opportunities there to to hire some really good people. We also had the senator. Remember, Pierre Gaetano stopped by? Yeah. So I when I was best friends, he's, like, the top senator in the Philippines. Like, when we say top, they wanted her to run for president, and she declined. So she came by to hang out, and Aya just told me she I think she started a podcast because she was so inspired
by all the podcasters there. They also Todd, I don't know if you picked this up, but they they love audio dramas in the Philippines. And I did ask why when they were kids, they would have audio dramas. If you you think about what people could afford, if they couldn't afford a TV, they had a radio, and the radio would play audio dramas, and they would paint the pictures. So they have a deep love for, audio in that country, so I I had no idea. These these different things you discover.
We brought Wally Green who's a a former pro ping pong player, and we knew that would be a hit because we did our research. Asians love any kind of, like, ping pong or table sports. And I think Pia, the senator, actually has a private indoor tennis paddle tennis. It's a new thing now. And she stole them for a couple hours and had them play at her place. So it's these things don't happen unless you're in house for it to happen. So it
was just a lot of fun. It was hot just like Florida, I would say, but, you know, nothing out of the norm for me out here. We just got whack with the tropical storm last week, so half my yard is still underwater. The tropical storm last week, so half my yard is still underwater. One thing it surprised me too, and I haven't told this story yet, I visited a newspaper, Sunstar. I went out seeing Sunstar's operations in Cebu, and they basically have seen the handwriting on
the wall. Now here in the United States, we know that physical newspapers, people are not buying USA Today or the New York Times in paper format. That's just a declining just a completely declining market. While at the same time, the digital piece is obviously ramping up and everyone's using going to these traditional websites online. But, you know, they're basically saying, how do I survive
this changing market? And they've essentially used all their editors, all their writers, all their people that do visual media and they basically become a media company. And so they still doing the the business of newspapers while that still continues, but at the same time they have this new pivot on a digital marketing. I thought it was brilliant. You've got all these qualified writers, you got all these people,
this is what they do. They've done media for their lifetime, and now we're just gonna switch to do digital and you're gonna be like a regular agency. And I I thought it was an incredible pivot for them. So I think, wow. How come some companies or some of these media companies in the United States haven't made that pivot? I think they recognize it, and really saw the handwriting on the wall and decided, okay. Things are changing. We need to change. If we don't change, we're gonna be extinct.
And so for me, I thought it was a brilliant pivot. And, of course, they're serving local businesses and companies there, in the Philippines overall. But I come back myself and said, why isn't the why isn't newspapers that are dying here not doing that? And there's some writers and all the creators. So what are all those creators doing now? They're doing podcasts and YouTube channels and stuff like that.
Outside of the US and Asia and other places, that it could bring more of a potential base of attendees for your Florida conference? That will probably still be your primary event. But doing this outreach all around the world, is that gonna help grow your Orlando event every year? Almost certainly. For sure. It's gonna grow Orlando, and it's we're really growing, a very solid foundation. Mhmm. We had the one thing that surprised me because I I don't that was my
first time in Southeast Asia. Todd's probably more expert because he's traveled a lot. We had people from Vietnam. We had people from Singapore. People came in, and I would talk to them, and they're like, hey. I'll see you at Podfest. And what was interesting, they were putting flight trackers to when they got a good price on a flight to come out that far out. So, yeah, we're gonna see a lot of cross cultural exchange, but I would love to also
vice versa. Right? Instead of half a dozen of us from the US next time, let's get 20, 30 people that wanna come out there and hang out with 4, 500, people in Southeast Asia. So I think you're gonna see it. That's the whole point is to see it all across. Obviously, the our US is, right now, our HQ, but the other branches should grow quite rapidly.
Yes. So we got a question from the audience from David Menendez de Sylvia who asked the question, what can an indie podcaster expect to bring home as like a benefit or a windfall from actually getting involved in a big podcasting event. So, Chris, I don't know if you wanna address it. I'm sure you think about that a lot. Yeah. So, like, one, you meet a lot of technical individuals. So there's a lot of really experienced
editors that you meet. A lot of times people are looking for different people to work with. The tips the the education is incredible that people are sharing on how to grow on what you wanna do. And then the collaborations. At Podfest, we do have an influencer meet and greet. There's also the hall of fame, which we love. But the collaborations to learn from how the whole ecosystem was built is there. I always tell people, like, if Todd and Rob are in the room, go say hello.
And they always they chuckle a little bit. I'm like, no. They're the reason why the rest of us are here. Todd's got a story given Steve Jobs feedback directly, but that's not a common thing. So, like, those are the people you at least wanna talk to. I know when Todd teaches, it's always action packed. He's always updating his stats. So people always say to me, hey. That's the 4th time I've seen him speak, but, man, that's good to know what's going on because
Todd updates his stuff. He's not telling you what happened 3 years ago. He's telling you what he sees today. So I think that's really important. For me, it's the community really because let's say you're successful, you're doing well, you wanna see your friends and see how they're doing, and the collaborations are ginormous to see your friends and compare
notes and see how they're doing. But Podfest does I I I'm obviously very biased, but I do believe we have some the best, if not the best education for independent podcasters because the education is given by them. Majority of the educators are applying. We go through literally 500 submissions, and we make sure we don't ask the question. The question we ask is how will this serve the community and is something that they're looking for, and that creates superior education on the stage.
Yeah. I think that's the thing that a lot of newer podcasters need to have as a takeaway is that all of us, Todd and I included, we started off earlier in our podcasting career going to conferences and being involved in. Sure, I was working for companies at the time that gave me that capability. But it's also building your connections inside of the industry and learning from others. And I think that the industry really has been built historically off of sharing and helping each other.
And I'm hoping that that will continue. I think I have seen a little bit of a decline in that as people have gotten competitive in this medium and not sharing and helping others as much as they probably could. And that's a big thing that happens at these conferences is people are sharing and giving, hopefully good information to others. It's not always good information, but it's also something that you have to, as a content creator, as a human, decipher for yourself what's
good information for you. It's not always a perfect fit. But these things are all about building community and building independent creators and not so much entirely focused on kind of the business side of podcasting per se. But I there's a component that's coming to your event as well, I'm sure. Yeah. There's networks that show up. There's connecting.
There's networking. It's all there. But Yeah. At the end of the day, we wanna make sure that your time is well spent with great people having a good time and comparing notes through the camaraderie. Like, Todd mentioned Aya. I met Aya through Jim Cirillo and David Allen Moss in at the Cleveland pot tour stop last year. I have to mention that we love to get out to the Philippines.
I've always had a great ex when when I was a kid, I had a really great experience with the Filipino family that I was on a class project, and it was me and another Greek kid, a Filipino kid, and, Michael Chang. To all of us, our parents were from other countries, and we all grouped up and we had to go do a class project. Anyways, one of the kids, we went to the house after school, and the parents didn't feed us because culture, I guess, they don't feed the kids
till later. Well, me and the other Greek kid, we like to eat, so we were starving. The next day we went over to my buddy, Asinjo's house, and his family's from the Philippines. But this time, we told our mom, so they gave us, like, an extra thing to eat in case there was no food after. But they roasted a whole pig, and I said, what's what's this pig in paella? Who's this for? And they go, for you guys. I'm like, we're like 14 year old kids.
Like, who are you talking about? And I just I the hospitality, both parents were nurses, great people, because they still had the the scrubs. They had just come off of work, and they literally made like, when I tell you they put out a spread, I never forgot that. And that's one of the reasons I was like, I wanna get back out to the Philippines because it I just still remember the warmth of that family. And I, Ron, all these amazing people, they let out the red carpet for us out
there. So it was an incredible journey. And, you know, I think the thing people have to remember too, because if if you haven't traveled much overseas, I've I've really seen a lot of the world. I've been fortunate too. And there's some places that are rife with poverty, and it's very sad. But what I think we ex what I was exposed to was incredible working spaces, more modern than even maybe what you would have oftentimes here in the United States on nurse on staff, childcare on staff.
All these things that you hear about big companies like Google and other folks being able to provide their employees, they're doing this within these BPOs for these folks that are working for American companies, and it comes as part of the package. So I was just astonished, to to be honest with you, about this about the work
well, basically, where they were working. Number 2, the policies around working where no one's being abused and people are being paid at probably higher wages than they would be able to earn in a local company. So I I was pretty astonished just from that aspect as well. And, again, had that wasn't even related to the conference. We're just we're at this beautiful facility. And again, like Chris said, happy to have us there and glad we're here and thank you and, yeah, the whole 9 yards. So
there's something to be said. I think if you are working in a big city like New York City or something like that, you're used to these types of big working facilities, but not everyone lives in a big city and has this type of exposure. I I was pretty blown away. But, again, oftentimes,
you've had this perception. Part of my challenge of hiring offshore was I was worried about I didn't wanna be that company that ended up in the news for not providing the right type of facility, the right salary, the right benefits, all those types of things that often you hear about companies people hiring people that they have got that locked down. Hey. You don't have to worry about a situation where
someone's gonna be taken advantage of. And I think that was a that was separate from the event, but it just goes to show you where at least the Philippines is in in regards to that type of if you're hiring VAs, I recommend that you hire a VPA through a BPO. That person will be absolutely unequivocally taken care of. They won't have to work from home. They can come and work with other people.
You're gonna pay a little bit more for that, but I think that's ethically the way to go, especially for folks that are thinking about hiring VAs. And, again, there's companies in like Ron's company that is doing this ethically, and the people you're hiring is getting paid a fair wage. And to me, that's more important than that's important to take care of people. So that's why I've had hesitated in going offshore. I just didn't wanna have an I guess the better word is an
ucky feeling. Is that the right word to say? And, Todd, you said some of those buildings are are world class. I mean, they're world class. Right? For fields on the like, energy efficient at the highest level. Yeah. And the owners of the building's a weird part of it is they're, like, 33 years old. Like, you'll meet people in the US. Usually, it's like you you have to work your way up. They're growing so fast. It It could be a 33 year old that owns a skyscraper. It's the
craziest thing when you see it. And they're just so grateful that you're there. They're welcoming you, and they got they always got ping pong tables on top for what what's not saying for break rooms. That's awesome. Yeah. Thing, you'll take breaks because I said when we brought Wally over there, and, obviously, Wally plays ping pong, they're all excited to challenge him. And they grouped up around him, and anytime someone got a point on Wally, they all started yelling.
They were so excited. And I said to Haya, thank you for bringing in the ping pong table. She goes, what are you talking about? So this ping pong table is here all the time. That's what we do during breakout. Just a really cool thing to see the employees taken care of better than some US circumstances, honestly. Absolutely. Personally. And in the audit the one company I was talking to in Cebu, ongoing education is just default.
You you have no choice. If you're gonna even if you let's say there's 20 companies that have people within this BPO. Everyone is getting continuing education. Everyone. Doesn't matter which company you're working with. It's just part of the package. So I don't know. I'm like Chris, I was pretty much blown away and it changed my perspective quite a bit. And we will, at Blueberry, be hiring some people out of the Philippines for sure. And BPO stands for business process outsourcing.
Yeah. It's a 3rd party company that helps support basically guarantees your results. If something doesn't work, they got someone else that could do the work. And the main thing about it too is you're guaranteed that you are not gonna end up on some list because you've taken advantage of someone because you paid them less than you should be paying them. So that that is not gonna happen. And a lot of the employees that are in those
have been with companies for many years. They because you're very fair in compensation. So Yeah. It goes over time. I think the when people would get people and brag about them paying someone a dollar an hour or whatever. The now you got these middle companies that have Rob, one thing that I noticed I don't know if you noticed this, Todd, and I did ask Aya about it. I said, hey. A lot of the girls have braces. And she goes, what do you mean?
And I go, I just noticed, like, a lot of the girls in their late twenties, early thirties have braces. I go, is it cheaper here or something? She goes, no. It's pretty expensive. And I go, why they have braces? She goes, because they're making good money now, and they invest in themselves. So, like, here, when you're a kid in the US, usually your parents get your braces. They're they're now over the last decade, like
what Todd's saying, they're making good money. So now they will put it aside to get braces and things like that, because you notice it when you see all the young girls at a certain age have braces on, and it's because they're doing well and they're investing back in themselves. So I I I thought that was pretty cool to see. Now wages for local companies I hired, like, in grocery stores and other businesses, I'll be frank. The the pay rate's pretty atrocious.
It is not what I would it's not equitable. So but it's what the market demands and where folks are coming in, they've spent money on education. You have people with bachelor's degrees that are working at McDonald's. That gives you an idea how it changes. You're not gonna be a teenager going into McDonald's in the Philippines and getting a job. And I don't know what McDonald's pays in the Philippines, but I know the BPOs are
paying a hell of a lot more. And and the quality people you're getting educated, you're you're high you're getting bachelor's degrees, master's degrees, PhDs, depending on what you want in your job spec that those folks are available. Just like here in the United States. Don't get me wrong. We've been big proponents of hiring in United States. But I guess I guess for the podcasters listening, if you're hiring a BA, please be cognizant of what you're paying them.
So what does that mean, Todd, to be cognizant? Is it to pay them more? Is that what you're trying to say? Or I'm just curious. If you're paying a VA and a lot of the VAs are working for more than one people. If you've got someone for 40 hours a a month, you should be paying them a month's living wage that is not as Chris said, at this minuscule rate. And I don't really wanna quote the pricing, but you should not be let's put it this
way. If you've got a VA for 300 dollars a month and you're using them at a partial basis, let's say you're only using them for 10 hours a week and they can have 3 other clients, well maybe that's fair for 300 a month. But if you're using that person for 20 hours and you're paying $300 a month, you are underpaying significantly. And people say, Oh my God, Todd. That sounds low. Well, the average wage, like I said, people that are on the working in a local community,
it's very low. And they don't make nowhere near that. So again, be cognizant of what you're paying your VAs outside of the United States. Yeah. If someone's making 500 a month I don't know about podcasting, like, stick to what Tata, but 500 a month is a good salary there. So if you can make 6,000 a year, that's good. If you're making anything like 7.50 or 1,000 a month, you're doing really well.
And then I I did ask Aya to take me to the where the poorest of the poor there, so because I wanted to see it. So to give you a frame of reference for what Todd is saying, so we just told you what I would say the upper middle class are doing. When you go to the poorest people, they're buying drinks for 2 I I forgot what their denomination is, but, like, like a penny.
Yeah. Peso. So you could buy, like, a drink for a penny in the markets, like you see on TV when they go to poorest places, dogs roaming around. And then they don't they can't afford to buy cigarettes by the pack, so they buy them by the stick. So I I was asking. I said, why did he just pick up 3? He didn't get the whole pack. They can't afford it. So the it's like a peso for a stick, a cigarette stick.
So that's what you're talking about. So think about that if they're buying a drink for a penny and 3 sticks for 3¢ or whatever. And that's a lot of money because it they're at the bodega, so to speak, the corner bodega there. And so when you're doing 500 a month or more, you're doing really well because those people, what Todd is saying, they're taking care of their family too. They're not just using that money for themselves. The older generation might not have the education or speak English as
well. So there that money is, like, fueling the entire ecosystem. Yeah. I think from, like, the cigarette by the stick is, like, 12 pesos. So that would be, like, 20¢ that they would pay by the stick if they're buying it like that. 8 pesos to the dollar is the is exchange rate. Currently, 57.5 right now, I think. But I also, at the same point, if you get someone that has a bachelor's degree and has experience, 600 is actually too low per month to pay. What do you think about a 1,000?
I think if you have someone that has experience with a bachelor's degree, it's probably gonna be around $1,000. Now if you get someone that has an MBA, you're probably talking 12 or $1300 a month with an MBA with experience. That is paying way beyond way beyond national average. Whereas a doctor in the Philippines, believe it or not, may not make 2 to $3,000 a month. So it gives you some perspective. If they are a city doctor, if they're a country doctor, they might be making 1200 a month.
So it just gives you the deltas, but this is why you have such enthusiasm for folks that are working for foreign companies and doing a fantastic job. It's life changing. Yeah. So let's change topics a little bit and wrap up with Chris here a little bit and talk about what's coming up and how maybe our viewers here or listeners can get involved with, Podfest right away. I know he I you've got the pod tour coming up here, Chris.
So Yeah. If you're Atlanta I know Dave Jackson's flying in from, Ohio to be a part of Atlanta next week, so feel free to come out August 14th. I'll be at CreatorFest after. That's a private event. But in case anyone wants, let us know. We could get we got some codes there. The tower right around the corner, early September. And then we'll be posting Eventbrite links within about a week. Most of these events are
free. You could just register on podfest .com, hit pod tour, and join us in the different cities that we'll be at. And then if you would like get our newsletter, which we release once a week, we just release 1, this issue, podfestmessenger.com. Larry Roberts is a editor. He does a great job putting everything together. Feel free to subscribe to that. But hopefully, we'll see many of your viewers and listeners over at Podfest. It'll be our 11th year in person.
We the way the luck worked out, we never miss an in person year. So it'll be 11th consecutive year of Podfest. Yeah. So you've got a lot of events come coming up. The people around the country can can We're gonna post a lot more. So that's just the open. Oh, you are? Oh, yeah. Yeah. This is just the open. By the end of August, you're gonna see because we work with local leaders, so we're also working with their schedules.
And then I might be at a bunch of them, but other team members will be at other ones. So we're excited. We had a huge audience in Toronto last year. So we're excited to we think Canada has so many people hungry that wanna get together, and they just haven't had the opportunity. So what usually goes on at a PodTuber event? What's the program look like? So this year, the theme is video podcasting. We just think video is a big thing. We saw that out in Asia.
So the theme will be just a couple of tips on how to look good on video, how to produce really good video. So that's this year's theme. So we just go through 10 different steps. But that's about 20 minutes of the presentation. The rest is if we have some veterans of Podfest, we might bring them up to do some q and a, like, very informal, and then we all hang out and chill. Give everybody a code on-site to join us at Podfest.
You see there Cutting Edge Events, which is the company that runs Podfest. Scroll down a little bit. You'll see it right underneath. We have over 31,000 people that have attended our events. So, like, on Eventbrite, that's, like, almost unheard of. So we've hosted I can't I don't even I lose track, so I don't even wanna say the number because it doesn't sound real. We've hosted a lot of events supporting podcasters all over the world now.
So I'm really grateful to that because when we post an event on Eventbrite, I think we're over 60 RSVPs, and it's a week out. We'll have well over a 120 RSVPs for Atlanta. How many show in a free event? About 50 percent. So 60 people show up. We'll have a great time, and then we give an opportunity to join us at Podfest. So Atlanta is a great city for us. We'll probably go there again before the year's up, but we just love it up there. So it goes from 7 to 9 PM EST on
Wednesday, August. Yeah. So format 7 to 7:30, late networking. Everybody's saying, hey. How you doing? Where you've been? Welcome new people. 20, 30 minutes of presentation. We keep it very simple. If I have a PowerPoint, I have images that correlate with the handout literally because that way, if we don't have PowerPoint, we don't wanna stress out. Here's the material. And then and then after that, we just connect. We just hang out and then off to the next step.
Okay. Yeah. And then back to Orlando and then Clearwater. So there's and then Yeah. We get to I'm here in Florida, Colombia, Bogota. I've never been, so I'm excited. It'll be my first time in Colombia. Yeah. It's awesome. One thing about Colombia is as you know, brush up on your Spanish because they're not as much there's not as many English speaking people in Colombia as there is in other Latin American countries. So that's a real heavy Spanish. So brush up on your. And
will do. Will do. And I got Neil Gilarte who'll help on that one. But the fact that you say that in the Philippines, it's very easy to get around. When I was in Japan, not everybody speaks English like they do in the Philippines. And the people of Japan are so respectful. They give you exact directions. So little things like they don't tell you, like, hey. That's the last bus. If you miss that, you're not getting another bus. They just tell you, here's where the bus stop is.
So you learn a lot about cultural differences in communicating, but I had a good time in Japan too. We spent since I was over in Asia, Todd, I think what I learned out of this is don't be so for me, it's always been like, oh my god. The plane ride's so far. But then you get there. You're like, why haven't I done this? You're like, what over that dumb little logic. So I'm excited to expose my family to those countries in Asia. I was just so impressed, with the people and and everything.
It's people say, oh, it's, like, fly out of Chicago to get to Narita is 13, 13 and a half hours, but you're gonna sleep part of it. And, you're gonna arrive, like, at 5 o'clock in the afternoon, and you'd be able to get your easily get around and get your, hotel and sleep the night and then be ready to rock and roll the next morning. So Japan is a great destination. All of Asia is not that hard, but it is a typically, depending on how many connections you have, will be a 24 hour
day. But once you're there, then if you've got 7 or 10 days to spend there, then you're good. But, you know, one thing I tip for you for Japan, Chris, is Google Maps will get you around the subway in a big it's fantastic. It's unlike any other place in the I'll be using it next time for sure. Yeah. Because you have to get tells you even what level to go on for the train. Wow. Sometimes yeah. And it'll it'll it'll say, okay. Go in this exit and turn left.
And but yeah. So the trains are the way to go in Tokyo and anyway, it's most countries have better train station train situations than United States. You know? I'm riding Amtrak, and it's like my chair is dirty. So I'm like, you you're not gonna find that in a Japan was the trucks, you could see your reflection in the trucks. I've never seen that before. Like, they like, trucks that work trucks,
like oil tankers. You could see you're it was it would be in front of us, and I could see my reflection. And they use it every day, and yet they clean it meticulously. So it was incredible. It it just I don't know, I went to one of the Moss brothers, which is like a fast food in Japan. And the lady looked at me and repeated my order back, looked at my eyes, asked if I agreed to the order, then she pointed
to the pictures. I mean, the level of detail even at, like, a fast food place was incredible. Well, you may have got that in Japan. You may not get that in the Philippines. No. It wasn't that was in Japan. I I'll be very clear. Philippines is more you can have a good time, but you're not gonna get that. Sometimes you get a get your order read back to you, then you get your order and you're like, this isn't what I ordered. But, you know, it's just
culturally different every place. When I was able to go over to Thailand for the first time in 30 years for 7 days, and nothing has changed there. But the food, I thought, my god. I could become a vegetarian in Thailand because the food was just, I mean, off the chart and inexpensive. So it's just those types of things that you know, those little things that are cool to do when you're in specific countries,
not less doing the the tourist thing. And I know you got to do a little bit of tourist stuff while you're over there, which was good because awful long way to come just to do business. Yeah. And I've never been to Asia, so this whole conversation is new to me. So it's great to hear. Definitely. And, Chris, thank you so much for joining us today. Thank you both, and thank you for all that you guys have done for the podcasting ecosystem.
I don't think people I know your audience probably realizes, but I try and tell the podcast audience like, hey. There's people I helped build the steps that we're all stepping on, and thank you for laying the foundation many years ago and still being on top of it today, which is that's hard to do. Chris, we gotta give credit, though. There's a lot of new people doing a lot of great things too. So Oh, yeah. We're learning from them as well. I go to events. I like I try to it's hard for
me. I try to listen more than I talk, and it's amazing the ideas and what people are doing in the space right now. So we may pave the way, but I tell you what, there's a lot of folks now that are doing some incredible work out there. And and I think we've started to see some of that. Those folks, you see them at your event. We see them at other events
putting out great information. So it's one of those situations where you can treat dog tricks, and then I think that's what both Rob and I try to do is try to stay up on stuff. And we're not perfect. We're still a little bit of ultra mudrid in certain ways. So much for so many years. It's hard for us not to be a little skeptical of some things and
yeah. So And when you do your video focus, remind folks that there is video podcast in Apple Podcasts even though they've made it a second class citizen. Well, hopefully, that'll change in the new year maybe. So who who knows? Right? So yeah. So if you have an interest in going to Podfest at a new hotel, I guess that that new hotel, I get a sense, is literally a newer hotel. So it'll be a Yeah. It's world class. Better experience. Yeah. Yeah. Very nice. Thank you guys for
having me on. I really appreciate it. Yeah. Well, thank you, Chris. Bye, Rob. Bye. Bye. Alright. Well yeah. That was good. Kind of a little bit a different topic than normal. We do here a little bit of more inside baseball, I guess. I don't know. I switched to a different Internet connection, so it seems to be doing better. It's more stable. It's like Are you not on Starlink? Yeah. I'm not on Starlink right now. I'm on my point to point right now, so
it seems to be working better. So lesson learned there, I think I'll be using that here on out until it fails. Hey. By the way, there was a article in Podnews today talking about how Spotify is now trying to poach podcasters. Basically, they're advertising their services against us directly to podcasters on Spotify. So on the I'm we're doing fine. And because Spotify has haven't killed us yet, free isn't always everything, I I just want to remind people.
And I I think it's really critical that those of you that are listening that are podcasters, I think it's I think we need to remember what you give up. What you're giving up when your podcast is on Spotify and when you're hosting at Spotify. And I think it's really I think it's really critical to remember that audience privacy is nonexistent. You basically had sell out your audience is being marketed to, and you, the podcaster, are earning 0. They're being remarketed to outside of Spotify.
Remember that Spotify is paying almost nothing to music artist. They the only reason they're paying them is they have to, and Spotify is not a friend of RSS. On top of that, they own Chartable and they own the form former pod sites, which I now is I think rolled into Megaphone or maybe it's actually part of Spotify. They can take all your IP data from those two services and target your listeners again and again, and you get nothing.
Now if that doesn't matter to you, if any of those points don't matter, you don't care about your audience privacy, you don't care about your audience being resold to, then just remember, this is what is happening. For years, people got tired of hearing it. They'd say, Todd, what are you doing with stats data? We don't do nothing with it. We don't resell it. I've had people try to buy it. I've had people try to buy insights.
So we've had people offer very big checks for us to give up information. Probably into the tune of several $1,000,000 over the life of the company that we have said no. You know? So I think just remember that. And when you have this urge to save some money, which isn't your choice, just remember that you are the product and your audience is the product.
And also I think, Todd, think thinking about the broader industry too, if everybody shifts over and does what Spotify would like everybody to do, it's also potentially could be a cause of the other little piece of news that came out today, which is, I guess, there's rumors of a fairly significant podcast hosting company has lost its CEO and has sold part of its business. So sometimes what triggers those kinds of things are when too many customers leave leave a platform
and they're not viable anymore. And I think we've seen this happen many times over the years. So this isn't a new thing. But I think in this climate right now, it's we may see it happen more where there's some of the smaller hosting companies struggle because of efforts like what Spotify is doing to siphon off paying customers off of other platforms into a free platform that may not be good for the overall industry of podcasting. If I was a betting man and knowing the structure,
I have stock in blueberry. We have stock. It's privately held stock. I have to give well, I have a we have some rules around stock sales. So it's not like I can just go and say, here's my stock. It's me. You wanna buy it. It's not as simple as that. But some people are holding a different kind of stock that they very well could sell. If I was I have a feeling I know who this is and it's not gonna bode well for them long term based upon everything that's been going
on. I will just I'm I'm gonna hold judgment till if it's announced, if it's if we see something come out. Yeah. I don't know I don't know who it is either, but this type of scenario typically happens inside of a larger company. And you said major. He used the word major. So who's a major Right. Podcast host? If you're a podcast host, I don't know if we would be considered a major. We're not in the top 3 or 4.
Right. So major I could envision this happening inside of I'm just speculating right now, inside of, like, Amazon or inside of, like, an Iheart or somebody, like, that wants to pass on some okay. The CEO doesn't have stock. The heads of those at Amazon and stuff, that no way it's from them. It's gotta be one of the top regular 5 traditional companies from a structure standpoint. I know which CEOs have gotten stock. Okay. It doesn't say anything about stock. It
doesn't say anything about stock. Yeah. I think it said something about stock. It said It said sold part of its business to someone else. Well, that that mean that mean well, if you sell part of your business, that is stock usually. Well, it could be a technology or a platform that you're selling to someone else. In pod news, he said let me go find it. Well, I have it right in front of me. Yeah. They said Has lost its CEO and has sold part of its business to someone else?
Okay. So if you hold stock and you sell your stock, you have sold part of your business. Well, sure. Sure. But it doesn't say stock specifically. So stock is usually associated with a whole company, not a part of a company. Well, it depends on how much I hold a percentage of blueberry through my stock. And k. If you took it to mean that, Todd, that means that they're selling a part of a bigger company. Right? So Jimmy I don't know. We'll find out if there's any truth to it. Yeah. We'll see.
Again, it's like the speculation journal at this point. Right. Right. Yeah. I mean I mean, it could be completely incorrect too. So Yeah. What's actually happening? Because it could be just a rumor of nothing. Yeah. Because, actually, this has happened in the past too. I think James had something that came out a couple months ago that was about some company selling or something like that that there was gonna be some big announcement that happened with that, and it never happened.
So Well, I I know some insider baseball on that, and I can't say anything without So Without it was a sale of something that didn't I no. Okay. So so how is that different? Well, let's just put it this way. There's always people there's always people that are sending me emails saying, hey. We'd love to talk about buying your company.
And let's say you go into a due diligence round and then you get close to a term sheet, and then you get the term sheet and it's not so so great terms and you say it packs in. So I've shredded a few term sheets in the past. 1 in particular that can't get sued anymore by him. So what you're saying is it may have been pitched, but it didn't happen. So Yeah. I got pitched and, yeah, when the cell phone was next to the shredder and it was that was the end of the conversation.
But so there can be deals are getting close, and then the deal doesn't go through. And Well, I think that's probably more common than the deals that go through. Yeah. I'm sure. So so then someone is and if you're a public company, technically, none you can't really you have to I'm a private company. I
can probably say whatever I want now. I might get fired for saying it, but if you're a public company there's definitely rules on what you can say because it could drive make the stock do this and you get in trouble with the SEC. So I'll see what see if there's any again, I I have my Ouija board out, and we'll see how it goes. Yeah. I also saw that the brand safety is back in the news big time. The the last Good. I'm glad I'm glad Elon's suing him. Yeah. Was it Elon as well as Rumble?
Well, x actually x is some essentially, Elon is suing Yeah. Garm. So I I personally think it's well deserved. I was a little bit surprised by the video that was put out by the CEO of of X. Linda Meuker. She made some of the comments that she made in there. I thought it was really interesting that they had discovered significant evidence of kind of collusion amongst advertisers to specifically target those 2 platforms. And now or individuals. Yeah. We've yeah. Yeah. Right. And it's interesting.
We've talked about brand safety and suitability and those platforms in Garm and things like that. And Garm is definitely in the crosshairs right now of a rating system that is proving to be giving people a tool to moderate content. It's not so much as innocent as I think many would like to project it as being. But, you know, I think if you're on the advertising side of this space, increasingly, those GARM criterias
through brand safety are getting integrated. And I know that there was some news that came out the last week or so about the benefits of having brand safety tools built into podcast hosting companies. And, increasingly, I think we're starting to see that start to develop now. So that would cause a a situation where those brand safety tools were made available to content before it was published, which has been, like, the opening that has held those platforms back is that it was only applicable to
past content. It wasn't being used to prevent the publishing of current content. And so if that can be if that technology can be integrated in with podcast hosting platforms, that means that when you publish and when you upload an episode, it automatically goes into the brand safety tools and gets rated before it even is actually made available on a public. Well, I think those companies have integrated that should be called out.
I don't know who else integrated. I have a pretty good idea of at least 2. Yeah. No. I know of a couple too, and they're out there proactively about it and promoting it as it's the next great thing to slice bread. And I just wonder if they're they may regret that here in the next few months that they've been out there so much
getting in front of it. Right. I think every company that's hosting company that's doing that, it should have to disclose and their podcasters should know that their content might be being subjected to, some downward pressure. And that's all I'm gonna say at this point. Hey. I wanna share today. Sure. Today, I'm using well, I have 2 of these. This is called the AudioSigma Pod Mobile. This is gen 1. The unit that I'm using today is much more advanced unit.
But what I'm doing with this today is powering my SMB 7. I have the ability to send a monitor out. So we're live and lit. I believe we are, unless I've touched something. Well, I don't see it working right now, but I know that we've been live and lit most of the day. How come I don't see nothing on the monitor anyway? But, anyway, the only thing this thing doesn't do is record. It's got the ability to have a no an equalizer, denoise. It's got some functions, basically phantom power and the like.
So why isn't that working? Oh, I got a cable that is goofy. My apology here. Anyway, so we've been live and lit, but you might not have heard anything. So anyway anyway, this is from Audio Sigma, and I've been using this here as the studio is being built. When I did my tech show on Monday, I used this with, on screen recording. I went old school. I recorded with Adobe edition, not using any third party tools. So this is a great tool for anyone that is looking to, have a rig that will go
on the go. And the amplifiers in this thing is they're off the chart. Beautiful sound come out of this. Audio Sigma Pod Mobile. And you hear podcast movement. Oh, it's Audio Sigma. It's called Audio Sigma, s I g m a. And it's currently being sold purely through, a partnership with with the BSW. But they will have we're gonna give 2 of these away at Podcast Movement. So if you're going to Podcast Movement, we'll have 2 of these Pod Mobiles to to utilize. Again, very small,
comes in a nice carrying case. Matter of fact, I didn't have a carrying case for my original. And I saw the carrying case that he delivered the new one on and I went on Amazon and tracked it down and ordered another a second case so that I have both these now and a hard case when I need to travel and so forth. But it's a great you'll be doing a solo show and this integrates with we're using StreamYard right now. So it it's seen by your computer as a DSP.
Mhmm. Yeah. I see it's got a it's got an Ethernet, port jack on the back of it here. Yeah. That's for daisy chaining them. So this doesn't connect to the Internet. It just daisy chains. So if you wanna it comes with a USB c as you see in the bottom Yeah. Right here that connects to your computer. And then the mini jack on the bottom left, one is an aux in, one is a audio out, then headphones at the top. Mhmm. On the backside of this are selectors too for denoising.
I don't know if they show it, the back side of it or not. Yeah. I don't know. I can't see it if it does. Yeah. But on the back, there is selections again for equalizer, and it's a preset levels. You can set 4 different level or 3 different levels, denoiser as well. You have a mix feature here where you can basically left right people. Yeah. So it's a great unit. I'm I I love the work that the originator I I when I first saw this couple of years ago, I bought one on
the spot right out of his bag. And he I got the second one here just a a week or so ago. And but, anyway, if you're looking for a real nice portable kit, this is it. Do these have a good kind of gain boost in it for an SM7B? The amplifier in this is off the chart. Nothing. There's no, that I know of at this price range, this is what there's no lift booster on my SMB 7. This is pure purely and I only got the gain cramped maybe a quarter. So, yeah. It'll it'll handle an SMB 7.
No problem whatsoever. Okay. So here is the This is domain name, if you wanna go Yeah. Read more about it. I'll send it to stop by the Blueberry booth, and we're gonna be giving a couple of these away. There are some criteria to win, but maybe we'll have it hooked up to a computer you can try. He's gonna be at Podcast Movement at the, I believe, the BSW booth. He'll be there with these units. If you're going to podcast movie, you definitely wanna go. And once you hear this thing, there's no
in my ear, Rob. None. 0. There is no So it's a very quiet preamp is what it sounds like. It's fan it's fantastic. I don't hear any background noise whatsoever. It's as clean as anything I've ever used. It's this is the sound out of this is cleaner than the broadcaster. Yeah. So what's the okay. So the price is typically $359? 359. Yep. And they have a single unit. Yeah. For 2 basically, it can handle 2 people. Or again, like we're doing here, we're tied into StreamYard.
So this a okay. So this will tell you something. This is an Adam Curry approved device. Adam tried building one of these on his own and spent a lot of money and couldn't do it. This is the same I turn It's a pretty high end unit. It's a pretty high end unit. It's it's a high end unit. But it's Yeah. I'm gonna tell you 289 for just a single track input. Right? Worth every penny. And then a 199, it looks like for another single, it's called the Mike Hero. Yeah. So you have to look up the
difference on these. And some of those are older models, I believe. 199, I think. But, Yeah. That's what this one is here. It's 199. But the new one's got all this DSP processing on it. Makes it, completely it's the the difference between the unit I've had for a couple of years and the unit that I've just got, it's even though the unit before was fantastic, this takes it to a whole whole new level.
It's a 100% better than the first unit that came out, and I thought the first unit was pretty doggone good. So when it says it can accommodate up to 10 participants, does that mean if you get, like, 5 of these things, you can daisy chain them? Yep. Yep. Sure can. Through the ethernet port? Is that what Yep. Is that Yep. How you would do it? Okay. Yep. So you could have as many as 10.10 people all on 1. Right. One chant or one show. Yeah. If you have that many guests at a
table. Yeah. You know, and and if you're gonna if you think about a Rodecaster, you can have 4 people. Alright? So you think about the price of a Rodecaster, but 4 is it. So if you're gonna be doing some sort of round table thing where you have 6 or 7, there's not a lot of devices out there unless you hump a mixer to be able to It's true. But that mixer is gonna be pretty big. And it's gonna be big. These are just throw these in a suitcase.
Yeah. Yeah. I mean So just 2 of them would get you 4 people, which is Right. Right. It's really is most that you're ever really gonna need, I think. But, like, we're going to CES, I could see having a third one. But, you know, the only disadvantage of this is it doesn't have onboard recording. So you have to record 3rd party. So either you record because I was running StreamYard and Adobe edition here on my Imac, and it handled it just fine. Adobe edition
was recording. The Imac StreamYard was doing its thing too. So I really had to double back up because StreamYard recorded locally and the the device I use edition. So maybe your MacBook would only be able to handle just doing StreamYard, but, yeah, I'm pretty stoked about this product. Fully endorse it, Dan. I don't get paid to say that. Yeah. Well, it's not an there's no endorsement deal going on this one. Right? No. It's just my recommendation. I will say he did send me a
free one. So he sent me this. Yeah. Maybe there should be though. But So but, you know, I and what's interesting was is when I introduced him to Adam, Adam gave him a whole bunch of feedback. I wish I had this and this. And when he built the next gen, he basically him and Evan, my understanding is they collaborated together And that's why this now has a denoiser. It's why it has an equalizer.
It's got a ability to do split on I don't fully understand that there's a record mode, so maybe it sends back a single channel or or a split. It it says split stage and normal. So I'll have to look at what that means. Maybe it means it sends 2 2 individual tracks back for those of you that like to edit. It's got a loop back function I'm not using. It's got phantom power, and you can even plug it into external power supply, but I'm running it right off USB. It's working just fine.
So Yeah. Anyway, that's what we have. That's the audio sigma.comforward/ podmobile. So if you're listening to this in the audio version and you wanna go check it out, it's audio sigma.comforward/podmobile. And so, Todd, let's quickly talk about in the last couple of minutes about your People's Choice Awards. Yeah. Slate was announced. Right. Yeah. Slate was announced on Monday, and we've we've got about 20,000 listeners cashing the final ballot.
So you can go through the list of folks that were nominated. So we've we've made it to this next stage. So what we look at next is the way we came up with the list of people that are voting is we know, because they have a login, who voted for what. So when we extract our we had a this year, a little over 3,000,000 people participated. 900 shows, around 3,000,000 people were down from last year.
3,000,000 people participated in voting, and then we have an option in the when they signed up to vote for the nomination, they can opt in to be part of the final slate voting. And then what we do is we know who voted for what, so we do a waiting on the list. So that as an example, and I'm not gonna say a show name. Let's say show 1. Let's say show 1 had a 1,000 people nominated, and show 2 had 700
nominated. So in the end, if we woulda just took 20,000 and we probably would've ended up with more people for show number 1 in the final voting pool. So what we do is we adjust it. It's weighted so that no show, has an advantage over another show when it comes to final voting. And it's pretty tricky. It takes my team over at 1 Technology. It takes them about 24 hours to get that list together. So that's where we're at. We're in final voting now. Some of the core categories were a little short.
This year, we didn't have as many Spanish entries There's not as many Asian shows either. That's interesting. Yeah. Yeah. It's awesome that it's coming up here. The awards are gonna be given out at, with the end of September. Right? September 30th. Yep. As part of, international podcast day. Yep. So that's awesome. So trying to think, is there anything else that we might want to talk about, Todd? Anything top of mind with you? I know. I guess, say, there's always stuff going on in the news.
Yeah. I don't have anything pressing right now. Trying to think here if there's anything that jumps out. But there's always new things that are coming out on the technology side of podcasting. I guess, Auphonic has launched a transcription tool, I guess, which I guess is new. Looking at anything else, I guess the ambies are now open for entry too. I think that's we could probably call it a day, Todd, if you want to. Alright. And apologize earlier for my weirdness in the streaming connection.
That's okay. That's gonna be the challenge here. That's the thing I've got I'm worried about the most is and it's raining. If it's raining hard, I'm done. I won't be able to do anything. Spot as a Starlink goes down, my point cover. It's a cloud cover. The cloud cover the Starlink is more affected by rain, but the point to point still is too. It's affected by heavy rain. So I'm pointed in an antenna 13 miles away. So that's what this stream is right now.
So anything gets in between that, heavy rain, that signal doesn't do as well. Can slow it down. Right? Yeah. And Starlink just does not survive heavy rainstorms at all. It's bad. Really bad. Yeah. And just to let everybody know, 2 podcast movements coming up in a couple weeks too down in Washington DC on August 19th through 22nd. So if you haven't booked yourself for that, that would be a good event to attend if you're inclined.
Absolutely. So well, anyway, Todd, we should probably sign off once you tell people how to find you. [email protected] on the email. Of course, you can reach me at [email protected] if you're on a mastodon account. So those are the 3 primary ways. Yeah. And I can be found at x as well at Rob Greenlee and on LinkedIn and YouTube and all of the platforms like that as well. And definitely come back and check out the show next Wednesday. I'm assuming that we're doing a
show next Wednesday. There's no conflicts that you have? Okay. I don't have any conflicts. So I think next week, we'll we'll just come back and just do our regular show with you and I, Todd. And Okay. And because I know we've been on a a guesting spree lately, so I think it's time for us to get back to our core. And that's talk about the issues in the medium. So so Absolutely. Yeah. Sounds good to me. So well, thank you, everybody, for being here for
the show today. And this is our website, new media show dot com. That's where we post all of the podcast episodes, you could keep up with and check out. And then, obviously, on all of the the main podcast listening platforms, we have an audio and video feed so you can consume the show in its video form if you would like on Apple podcasts, like we keep saying. And then and then also on a couple of different YouTube channels to off of my YouTube channel as well as Todd's.
And so so we're trying to embrace all the new stuff, aren't we, Todd, that we've been doing for 12 years? Yeah. Well, we're not embracing nothing new. It's just optional here. Right. Exactly. So, all right. Take care everybody. Thank you so much. Yep.