Ricochet is the best place on the internet to discuss the issues of the day, either through commenting on posts or writing your own for our active and dynamic community in a fully moderated environment. In addition, the Ricochet Audio Network offers over 50 original podcasts with new episodes released every day.
Tired: NPR; Wired: Ricochet Audio Network
Have you heard?
Courtesy of my work news feed, Wired highlights conservatives’ own podcast network, and some folks you may know from around here are behind it all:
But there’s not much ideological diversity [among successful political podcasts]. As of this writing, the only conservative shows in iTunes’ News & Politics top 50 are rebroadcasts of syndicated talk shows: Glenn Beck’s, and Mark Levin’s. Podcasts have proven a viable platform to reach a liberal audience, just as radio talk shows have for conservative listeners. But what does that mean for the Americans in the middle? If you see November’s vote as choosing the lesser of two evils, where can you listen?
“How could libertarians and social conservatives get along? How can we talk about it, while following certain rules of propriety?” says Rob Long, a contributing editor at the National Review. “There’s surely a place where that can happen, without everyone being a jerk.” With 1.3 million downloads per month—and growing fast since the start of the primaries—Long and his friend Peter Robinson, research fellow at the Hoover Institution, believe they’re creating that space: the Ricochet [Audio] Network.
(The title is derived from early Wired magazine features that used “Tired/Wired” to indicate old and busted technologies in comparison with new and shiny ones. The article also includes a quote from “Scott Immergut, CEO of Ricochet.” And to think that some of us thought we knew him when he was just a little blue guy …
Published in General
Earned media can be the best media. And this feels well earned.
I remember when there seemed to be a resistance to becoming a podcast hub. That was a long time ago of course. It’s the indispensable provider in my feed, and always has been.
Cat’s out of the bag. Conservative hipsters gonna hafta find a new website. Ricochet’s going mainstream now.
I kid! I kid!
I kid, because I love.
;-)
Are there really 27 podcasts?
I guess actually yes if you count all the one listed on the podcast page, but a sizable number of those are long gone (though, oddly enough, I noticed that “Levy and Counsell” podcast is no longer listed on the Ricochet page) so the total is probably 28.
When it first started out, Wired was quite libertarian in its worldview, thanks to Kevin Kelly being at the wheel. That ended when they were bought out by Condé Nast, though. Nice to see them remember that 1/2 of ‘Murica is Red.
What a great profile- congrats guys!
That’s a lot of downloads per month. Who knew?
Great profile. 1.3M per month? Damn. Do they know that 200,000 of it is me listening to Mad Dogs on repeat?
Have I mentioned today that I find Scott Immergut to be the sort of man whose charisma is both inspiring and awe-inducing? The sort of person you would be honored to take a bullet for, if only he would let you?
For the record, those numbers wouldn’t happen with the rest of the site. If Peter, Rob, James and the rest of the official team were just to hit record while yakking away, we’d be doing… moderately okay. That we have the growing audience we do (that needs more growing yet) is due overwhelmingly to the community here and it drives our content and makes this site like nothing else out there.
I also hear his blood tastes like chocolate and cures death:
Per my FB comment, the buried lede here is the Blue Yeti coup to install himself as CEO.
Incidentally, I like the characterization of Ricochet as “NPR for conservatives”. That’s a great summation of how I feel about Ricochet.
Conservatives get a bad rap for being “anti-intellectual”, but it’s really been more that there are few outlets available for intellectuals who happen to be conservatives.
I always liked the NPR/PBS “style”. Nice, calm, sometimes languid. Prairie Home Companion/McNeil-Lehrer/Bob Ross, etc.
The problem is the use of public money to support it and the political bias that results from said public funding.
Ricochet is the best attempt (that I’ve seen) to implement that style of media on a privately-funded, conservative-leaning basis. User-supported, much like a PBS/NPR funding drive, rather than taxpayer-supported.
NPR for conservatives. I like it.
Me, I fear the interns. I don’t trust ’em. Beady little eyes…
Little?
Agreed. Hugh Hewitt is good (when he’s not sacrificing chickens to the gods of sport so his Cleveland teams can finally win something and/or pushing Mitt Romney as the cure to all that ails us) and Bill Bennett is good, but other than that, it’s polemics all the way down.
I don’t watch Fox News. I don’t listen to Rush, Beck, Levin or Savage. I don’t want opinion and shouting, I want facts so I can sway others, not reinforce what I already believe.
Al Haig, eat your heart out.
and small hands
Am I mis-remembering that the flagship podcast started up — well before the site, with the tagline “Ricochet {zing} … coming soon” — as a promotional vehicle for the site that was supposed to wind down once R> 1.0 went live?
(Of course, after it gained a following and James Lileks, the flagship podcast became the unstoppable behemoth we’ve all grown to love… 8^)
When I let my Rush 24/7 subscription lapse, I did listen to Hugh Hewitt for awhile (on Stitcher). In many ways, Hewitt is the anti-Rush, not all in a good way.
Sure, he isn’t bombastic. That’s a plus.
On the other hand, he makes a big deal about being an academic from the Ivy League (Harvard alumnus). When he has a guest on his show who graduated from an elite college, he makes a big deal about it. Rush never graduated college, doesn’t talk about it much, but doesn’t shy away from it either. Neither ashamed or proud of it.
Hewitt likes to talk about his connections in Washington, D.C. He often visits there, tells his audience when he’s there, and will hint about his connections there. Rush makes it a point to say that he stays away from Washington, D.C., so as to not feel influenced by it. He feels closer to his audience in staying away.
Truth to tell, despite my mild alienation from Rush, I find his political views to be closer mine versus Hewitt’s, who has some establishment, Chamber of Commerce views that I don’t agree with. It was eyebrow raising to me when he advocated keeping the Export-Import Bank.
I listened to Rush for years before I just got tired of him and his bombastic tactics. I got tired of Hewitt after about 2 months.
From the Wired article:
Well, I for one CAN’T eat pizza without thinking of Uncle Miltie, or Friedrich Hayek or Frédéric Bastiat.