First of all, what is a podcast? “We can give a technical answer: it is a file posted on an RSS feed on the Web to be distributed there often freely and freely,” replies Julien Morissette, artistic director of Transistor Média, in Gatineau. “In France, we talk about podcast native to describe spoken audio content that is not intended for broadcast. This characteristic generates freedom in the format, in the duration, in the tone. It is a freer and less formatted creation than radio. »
Étienne Roy, director of digital platforms and content at QUB radio, also wishes to import the clear French distinction between the podcast (or podcast) native, which does not come from the radio, and the podcast (or podcast) catch-up, which comes from it. “But hey, between us, at QUB, we already divide between podcasting and simply catching up,” he says.
Mr. Morissette also underlines that the difficulty of defining the object has concrete consequences both for the structuring of the sector and for the framing of possible public aid. “Backers are asking questions: What is a podcast? What is the part of artistic creation in this digital audio form? »
Whatever the word, the thing exists and is doing better and better from a popular point of view. Canadian radio podcasts generate 1.5 million monthly connections, an increase of 112% since 2020. This is more than catch-up rebroadcasts (+34%). Audiences are asking for more. Their weekly size has increased by a third (31%) and viewing time per person has increased by 56 minutes per week since 2020.
Above all, we look for good stories and good storytellers
“We launched the Ohdio application six months before COVID and we quickly became a platform available to people who had time to discover our content. We have never had so many listeners for audio,” summarizes the general director of audio and radio at Radio-Canada, Caroline Jamet.
“Above all, we look for good stories and good storytellers,” adds Natacha Mercure, first director of digital audio at Radio-Canada. She gives the example of the series The worst moments in history (an Urbania production), champion of connections on Ohdio. Other popular productions include: My version of the facts, This is explained, The story does not end there And Investigation story.
The director of QUB radio notes that “the conversational genre” retains the ultimate rating. He quotes the series Sex oraL. A recent episode questioned the sexuality of small people, another on the deep throat technique. Investigations and crime series also do very well in QUB. Étienne Roy also cites In 5 minutesseries of general knowledge, among its best of.
Listening, the podcast by comedian Mike Ward, sits in a class all its own. It’s, let’s say, the equivalent of Celine Dion in song. Its immense popularity made it possible to record a recording in front of 21,131 people at the Bell Center in July 2022. The humorous self-production launched a decade earlier had six billion connections, making it the most popular production in the Francophonie .