Podcast News Roundup | Lawsuit Filed Against SiriusXM & More!
Welcome back to the HeadStuff Podcast News Round-Up were we take a look at what’s happening in the world of podcasting and give you a recommendation or two along the way. This week we look at SiriusXM and why they are being sued, the shut down of ShoutEngine and a podcast that is entirely AI-generated!
Podcast of the week
The Bar Council of Ireland, which represents barristers in Ireland, has recently been marking the occasion of 100 years of women at the Bar. Women at the Bar, hosted by barrister Sarah Reid, offers a fascinating insight into the lives of three very high-profile judges as they chat about their legal careers in a profession that has traditionally been heavily male-dominated. Featuring retired Supreme Court judge Mary Laffoy, Court of Appeal judge Aileen Donnelly, and High Court judge Mary Rose Gearty, the podcast is a great listen for anyone interested in how the legal system has changed over the last fifty years or to simply hear about the lives and careers of three inspiring and influential women.
You can listen here:
SiriusXM are Being Sued for Lack of Transcriptions on Podcasts
The National Association for the Deaf (NAD) and the Disability Rights Advocates (DRA) in America are suing SiriusXM, a popular streaming platform, after claiming they are in violation of the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA).
It is the claim of NAD and DRA that since SiriusXM does not provide captioning or transcripts for many of their podcasts, they are therefore making it difficult for deaf and hard-of-hearing users to access these podcasts. The complaint states that as a direct result of this, deaf and hard-of-hearing users are restricted from “critical sources of news, entertainment, educational programs, and popular culture that Defendants make available to their hearing customers.”
Christina Brandt-Young from the DRA told The Verge “These are multimillion-dollar companies. It’s time for them to do the right thing and provide podcast transcripts on their websites and apps.”
Podcast Host ShoutEngine will Shut Down by the End of this Year
ShoutEngine was a podcast hosting platform aimed at podcasters to make it easier to publish and distribute shows. Founded in 2013 by Chris Hayes, ShoutEngine was home to thousands of podcasts. However, after eight years, ShoutEngine will be shutting down by the end of this year, as announced on their website.
As of 10th December 2021, all ShoutEngine subscription plans and billing have been cancelled, and the primary publishing platform will be shut down permanently on December 30th 2021 at 12:00am PST.
ShoutEngine are currently offering assistance to any podcasters publishing their shows through the platform to migrate their podcasts elsewhere and promise to maintain RSS redirects until March 30th 2022.
The Deep Dreams Podcast is Made Entirely through AI-Generation
Stavros Korokithakis has created an entire podcast using AI-generated software – meaning there are no humans behind the writing, recording or producing of this podcast (not counting the many, many hours of work Korokithakis put in to get the podcast up and running).
The podcast is called the Deep Dreams podcast, and it tells “nonsensical stories that you could listen to to help you fall asleep more easily.”
All the scripts are generated by an AI and read by a synthetic speech model. Even the background music and podcast logo are AI-generated. There are currently thirteen episodes of the podcast available to stream, and you can read about the process of creating The Deep Dreams Podcast here.
Find more podcast related content on the HeadStuff Podcast Section – News, Reviews, Interviews and How-To Guides for all you podcasters out there.
