Year in Review
My 5 Favorite Podcasts of 2020
I love the change
2020 — what a ride. Some of my friends said a year ago:
“Thank god 2019 is over; it was my worst year ever. 2020 can get only better.”
Well, most of them changed their opinion, meanwhile.
I was also amongst those looking for a great year of traveling, building businesses, and making new acquaintances and friends.
The pandemic has tied me to my house most of the time. Also, meeting friends and family outside of Austria became impossible for the majority of the year.
Austria is a tiny country. Not being allowed to travel outside means even trips 50 k eastwards are impossible.
So I started working on my other interests. One was writing on medium, another one running, and the next one education.
I love to train my mind, body, and soul. A small improvement every day — working every day on becoming the best version of myself.
Since the pandemic has arranged some extra spare time in my life, I could explore new things.
One was podcasting.
A brief history of podcasting
The early beginnings of podcasts date back to the time before the internet started—the 1980s. Sharing audio and Video files amongst radio and television station was a problem that needed solutions before the rise of the internet.
As the Internet went public in 1993, the first webradios came out. Back then, I could listen to radio stations from the other end of the world for the first time, for example, Australian Radio Stations that also broadcast via the Internet. A gamechanger.
The next game-changing event happened in 2001 when Steve Jobs introduced the iPod. Subsequently, Adam Curry invented with a friend the software tool iPodder. The software tool made listening to internet radio possible on the iPod. iPod — Broadcast — combined obviously Podcast.
Steve Jobs got on the train. In 2006 he showed on stage how to create a Podcast Episode with Apple’s Garageband.
Since then, the podcast train left the station and gained tremendous speed. The episodic listening anywhere to content increased until 2020. And I also believe the pandemic helped to develop the format further.
On the statistical side, studies say that in 2020
- more than 1 million podcasts exist
- with over 30 million episodes
- in 100 languages
- 55% of the US population has listened to podcasts
- Podcast ad revenue in 2020 is estimated to be around 800 million dollar
What I love in podcasts
Of course, I didn’t start listening in 2020 to my first podcast episode ever. I did it before 2020, but only occasionally. In the last years, I was very much into non-fictional Audiobooks.
It was a great way to learn new things. Over the years — reading books and lately listening to audiobooks — lost its edge. The novelty factor in my fields of expertise was going downwards.
25 years ago, every book was an entirely new world. In 2020 I very often got reconfirmed what I already knew. The internet facilitated my learning process tremendously on top of my reading addiction. I love to google with its possibility to retrieve scholarly articles, my kindle, and apps like readily, which deliver my favorite magazines on my mobile for one subscription.
Then I discovered podcasts. In 2020 I had enough time to evaluate many of them. I love podcast s— well, in the ones I enjoy listening to — are real-life stories.
Rather than describing the 5 key success factors of something artificially, in theory, Podcasts grow and thrive on storytelling. In podcasts, people like Jeff Bezos, Elon Musk, or Bill Gates talk about their entrepreneurial real-life journeys:
How they discovered problems in the first place. Afterward, they put together the right team to tackle and solve the problem; they spread tiny bits of wisdom that make a huge difference and usually are not written down yet.
As you can see, I focus on conversational podcast episodes rather than getting into those who teach general public domain knowledge.
After almost a year of listening to new podcasts every month, I have distilled the list down to my 5 favorites.
Here they are.
The Joe Rogan Experience
By far, this is my favorite. Joe Rogan is a US comedian, moderator, and MMA commentator. He started his podcast in 2009 with his friend Brian Redban which in my eyes was “both sitting in front of their laptops and talking about things, having fun.”
In 2010 he named the podcast “The Joe Rogan Experience” and soon entered the iTunes top 100 lists. In October 2015, the podcast was downloaded 15 million times every month and kept growing.
This year — 2020 — Joe Rogan got an exclusive deal for his podcast with Spotify worth 100 million dollars for a multi-year contract. Joe Rogan features various guests who discuss current events, politics, philosophy, comedy, hobbies, and numerous other topics.
I especially love his interview style, in which he genuinely connects with his guest and goes really deep into sometimes very personal conversations.
The GaryVee Audio Experience
On the second place of my favorite list is Gary Vaynerchuk. I came across his profiles a couple of years ago, when I started getting interested in Social Media Marketing.
I was looking for new ways to shine a light on my life science companies. The usual way to promote companies in early-stage development is by attending conferences. It gives about 30 minutes of speaking time with people who can be of value to the company.
The follow-ups were mostly by mail and phone. My core question was — how can I improve this process with modern technology.
Gary V. had the answer. He published several books on the topic of social media marketing. He started early in the 90s in his family's wine shop with eMail campaigning and did the wine industry what Jeff Bezos did for the readers with Amazon.
Gary V. made a fortune with early investments in companies like Facebook or Uber. He has built a huge social media marketing agency.
In his podcasts, he focuses on Social Media Marketing, Entrepreneurship, and, lately, Kindness. He hosts guests from all walks of life, engages with the audience, invites them to call in, and is just doing without thinking.
I enjoy his open and positive communication style very much — and it is ad-free.
The Tim Ferriss Show
The 4-hour workweek was the book that got me in touch with Tim Ferriss years ago. I read it way back in 2010 when I was working on understanding what creates success in life.
The bottom line of his book and my search was — do what makes you happy, spend time to find the one thing that creates bliss in your life, and build a business around it.
When I got into podcast-listening, I also found his podcast The Tim Ferriss Show and started listening. He hosts guests like Seth Godin, Yuval Noah Harari, or Spotify's CEO and gets into deep and long conversations with them.
What impressed me the most was the episode in which he spoke very openly about his experience with childhood abuse and how he healed his trauma.
Impact Theory
My number 4 is the show of Tom Bilyeu, although his sponsorship with butcher box gets a bit annoying at times; as a true fan, of course, I listen to the commercials at the beginning to support my podcast heroes.
Tom is researching the question “how to create a success mindset and get people out of the matrix.” In his show, he circles with guests from all life areas around this question.
How can everybody create a happy and fulfilling, financially sustainable life?
I really love his style by pealing out practical everyday advice even when the scientific basis behind it is extremely complicated. It is getting complex topics down to earth so that everybody has a chance to integrate learnings in their own lives.
Lex Fridmann Podcast
Lex is a professor for Artificial Intelligence at MIT; he enjoys playing guitar and piano, martial arts, and long-form conversations.
And this is what he is doing with his podcast. Since he is one of the most important minds in AI and autonomous driving globally, he gets people like Elon Musk and Jack Dorsey on his shows.
Well, at least it is my view on the topic.
The thing is, Lex Fridman gets into intense, intellectual, and philosophical conversations with his guests.
And I love it. Why I put it in fifth place? Because I came across his excellent episodic audio experience recently.
The ranking above is merely a timeline, and in no case it is judgemental.
Due to the pandemic lockdowns, the podcast industry got a huge push, making more and more people enjoy podcast episodes and most likely lets billions of dollars flow into that industry.
Long-form conversations are also something I love, so one project of 2020 was creating my own podcast in which I have conversations with my life science and tech network.
But this is something for another article.
Since 1999 I am an executive, advisor, and coach for companies in various industries. I am specialized in Corporate Development and Finance, from seed rounds to IPO level, and focused on life science since 2006.
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