Marco.org

People keep asking us this, since my Build and Analyze and John Siracusa’s Hypercritical were both 5by5 tech podcasts, and now we’ve started a new tech podcast.

There really isn’t an interesting story behind it.

I want to own everything I do professionally unless there’s a very compelling reason not to. Some people feel uneasy having that level of control, but I feel uneasy not having it (to a fault).

When I started Build and Analyze, there were many compelling reasons to yield control and ownership to Dan: I needed a host, I didn’t know how to edit podcasts well or make them sound good, I didn’t have as much of an audience on my own, I couldn’t sell sponsorships myself, and I couldn’t devote much time to it. As far as I know, John was in a similar situation, although I can’t speak for him. That was more than two years ago, and we both ended our 5by5 shows last year for unrelated reasons.

Now, I know how to host, edit, promote, and sell a podcast without putting an insane amount of time into it. Since I’m willing to do that, John and Casey don’t need to, so it’s easy on them.

I’m not specifically avoiding 5by5 — I just don’t think we need what other people’s podcast networks provide. Maybe that will change over time, but I don’t expect it to.