Podcasts are already one of the uses for smart speakers, but that activity could be boosted in the US by the latest announcements from Amazon. From last Friday (13 December) it became possible for American Alexa customers to ask for podcasts as well as music.
Interestingly, Amazon’s announcement only included Apple, with more than 800k podcasts from that company’s catalogue now available using the command ‘Play [podcast title] on Apple Podcasts’. Amazon’s post also explained how people can set Apple Podcasts as their default podcast provider using the Alexa app.
It was left to Spotify to announce the other part of the news: that its podcast catalogue is also now being supported by Alexa in the US, with the same command with ‘on Spotify’ swapped in.
Thus far, Amazon has taken a resolutely partnership-focused approach for podcasts, rather than building its own catalogue of spoken-word shows – beyond the originals that its Audible subsidiary produces.
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