Don’t disagree that Spotify is going to experiment with some exclusives, but I do disagree with the strategy. See full thread here: https://twitter.com/anthpb/status/1092096366799654914

Regarding differentiation via unique/exclusive content, see “The difference in exclusive rights between music and movies is partially due to the nature of each medium”: https://medium.com/adventures-in-consumer-technology/spotify-eks-parlay-d423a0097177

The difference between radio and podcasts is the ubiquitous nature of digital content — both unhindered by physical/analog infrastructure and effectively zero marginal costs to scale…

In addition, advertisers want access to either really targeted niches (direct response/targeted ads) or really broad populations (brand/mass market). So, from both Spotify and advertisers’ perspectives, internalizing Gimlet podcasts as Spotify exclusives would not only hurt brand ads’ reach, but also fail profit maximization for targeted ads. (e.g. From Spotify’s perspective, analysis must consider net subscriber adds plus retention — both ad-free — plus ad revenue from remaining free tier listeners.)

A better strategy for Spotify is to use internal analytics to identify differentiated podcasts (like Gimlet’s), then take equity stake, then use internal Spotify analytics to help pods’ producers optimize/expand/grow offerings and titles. But for everyone’s profit maximization, they must keep content open and available — not exclusive.

A lot of people have likened these Spotify acquisitions to Ben Thompson’s Aggregation Theory, but this is not Aggregation: Acquiring Gimlet requires a real capital outlay for Spotify, which is disqualifying for an Aggregator; Apple Podcasts app, in contrast, is an Aggregator here — likely *the* Aggregator by virtue of its scale, control of demand, and therefore control of supply.

Spotify’s actual plan (release some new original exclusives and keep the rest free/open/ubiquitous) is the worst of both worlds, because they’re going to be stuck in the middle, per “The Four Winds of Modern Media”, which dictates:

“…you cannot start in the middle of either spectrum and grow out‬, because your competitive disadvantages let your rivals squash you from the outside-in.”
(https://medium.com/adventures-in-consumer-technology/you-still-dont-understand-today-s-media-industry-edbdc08e9332)

This strategic misstep is akin to Spotify’s last mistake — its “half-pregnant” implementation of “Ek’s Parlay”: https://medium.com/adventures-in-consumer-technology/followup-spotify-and-eks-parlay-cfa3d8e82e82