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    BREAKING: The ways people hear about big news these days; “into a million pieces,” says source
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    Sept. 7, 2021, 2:28 p.m.
    Hot Pod, the podcast industry newsletter, will become The Verge’s first paid product
    LINK: hotpodnews.com  ➚   |   Posted by: Sarah Scire   |   September 7, 2021

    Hot Pod, the newsletter about the podcasting industry, has been acquired by Vox Media. Founder Nick Quah will become a full-time podcast reviewer for Vulture and Hot Pod, now written by Ashley Carman, will live on at The Verge as the site’s first paid product.

    Hot Pod marks the third acquisition of the year for Vox Media, which owns Eater, SB Nation, and the gaming site Polygon in addition to Vox.com, The Verge, and New York magazine. (They previously purchased the drinks-focused publication Punch and Preet Bharara’s podcast studio Cafe in 2021.)

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    Vox Media and New York magazine isn’t a marriage, but it’s a deal that makes sense
    September 25, 2019
    Hot Pod will be The Verge’s first paid product, and will function as a test balloon for similar editorial projects in the future, the site’s editor, Nilay Patel, told Variety. The Verge has “amassed a huge audience” in its 10 years but has “never made anybody pay for anything” before, Patel said.

    Hot Pod, which will stay at $7/month for subscribers, looked like a good place for them to start.

    “We think this is the right product and the right audience and think Ashley can deliver a lot of value that is worth paying for to an audience that can trade on that information,” Patel said. “We are looking at it as a test. We have a lot to learn.”

    Quah is a long-time friend of Nieman Lab. He started Hot Pod back in November 2014 — when Serial had just started being a thing, he notes — and less than a year later, Nieman Lab started publishing his industry insights and sharp-eyed summaries that sifted news from bluster in a fast-moving field. (Here’s that first post and the last, where he bid adieu to Nieman Lab readers as Vulture took over syndication of Hot Pod.)

    Current Hot Pod subscribers will be given a three-month subscription to New York magazine and readers can find his podcast criticism by signing up for — what else? — his new newsletter, 1.5x Speed.

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