In February of 2018 I wrote a review for Anchor. Anchor is a website and mobile app that will let you create and publish your very own podcast! I had a lot of very nice things to say about and you can read my review here. I did warn that this free service would not last and it could very easily disappear though I hoped this would not be the case.

Today, I was reading The Verge and saw this article title Podcast Wars: $100 Million Startup Luminary Launches Tuesday Without Reply All or The Daily by Ashley Carman. The article discusses how big companies are moving quickly to try to create and monetize their very own podcasting network and you guessed it – Anchor was purchased by one of these big tech companies – Spotify to be precise.
You can read Anchor’s announcement here.

So what’s the big deal?

My worry is that these companies are going to try to monetize podcasts, find out that people will just not subscribe or pay for many of these podcasts and then the whole thing will start to collapse. Then these companies will do what companies do when they want to cut their loses. They will start closing down development, departments, lay people off or transfer them to another department and then bye-bye Anchor

I don’t think that Anchor being a casualty of the podcast war and going away is too crazy. In fact it seems very likely.

Unfortunately, this seems to be the path that Anchor is heading. If you use Anchor – keep using Anchor. Don’t stop but I would start looking for alternatives. I would also keep an eye on any Anchor news. Subscribe to their blog and read any news concerning this podcast war is also a good idea. I doubt that they will shutter or close anytime soon, but having to find a new service for your educational units is always a pain.

The bottom line is that Anchor is not going away … yet.

Source: IT Babble Blog and Podcast