Roman Mars.

Roman Mars. | 99% Invisible

The 60-second interview: Roman Mars, host and producer of the radio show '99% Invisible,' co-creator of the podcast collective Radiotopia

CAPITAL: In the nine months since Radiotopia launched, podcast downloads have increased by 165 percent, so there are tangible successes to be celebrated. What's been the hardest part of getting this collective started?

MARS: I think the hardest part of the collective, of any collective, is the collective. There's a lot of different people, and we were all independent producers and we have different timelines and production schedules... It's a challenge. If would be different if we owned them all and could tell them what to do, but we're really like a consortium, so we just have to come together on these things. That's the toughest part, but it's also the thing that makes us strong and makes us different...

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I think these collectives that are forming, I think they have real value, because a lot of the problem with podcasts is there's a ton of them, and you want to try to have a curated experience, and you can't download them all. What I love about Radiotopia the group is that I helped form these people around me with PRX because I just adored them. I felt like I could honestly say, “If you like my show, you should listen to these shows.”

CAPITAL: In your kickstarter campaign for Radiotopia, a collective of storytelling radio shows including "99% Invisible," you write that podcasts need about 50,000 downloads per episode for some measure of financial sustainability. How did you determine that number? Is that the number of downloads underwriters want to see before they buy sponsorships? What other metrics are they looking for?

MARS: This is Jake Shapiro from PRX's number. [Shapiro is CEO of Public Radio Exchange, a nonprofit that produces and distributes public radio content, and coordinate Radiotopia.] We just kind of estimated that based off my first Kickstarter—that's what I was working with the first Kickstarter I did two years ago. You can sort of extrapolate the 10 percent of your audience that acts to do something, like give money. So that's 5000 people, and they give a little bit and that's enough to attract sponsorships...It's kind of a hypothetical—with some good data—number. But we feel if we can boost everyone up to there...you have enough of a critical mass.

We're still testing it. That's one of the reasons why part of our money was a prototype grant from the Knight Foundation, because we were really interesting in testing these numbers to see if they were good. And so far, so good. It seems to be zeroing in that type of level of support, or level of exposure.

CAPITAL: What's your advice for a independent public radio producer who wants to start his/her own podcast and build an audience for it?

MARS: The most fundamental thing is own your work. Make sure it's yours. Make sure you have formed it into the thing you want it to be before you go talk to someone about it...Because this is a good time to own your work, make a living. You know it's not easy, but there's a good path here that we're establishing...A lot of people go to stations, go to other groups for validation. And that's more psychological, because they often don't provide very much. A radio station rarely pays you very much for doing these kinds of projects. So if you can forgo the little bit of pay in the beginning to just have full control, I would make the choice almost every single time...

You have to demonstrate a consistent release of your art and have a schedule and have proven you've invested yourself in it before anyone will invest in you. That's the real danger I see: people want to launch a podcast and they're like, “I have this great idea; give me $100,000.” That doesn't work...People want to know that you've invested everything before they want to pitch in.

CAPITAL: You've said the mechanisms for getting podcasts to listeners remain too complicated. How could they be improved?

MARS: I think in the world of sort of ubiquitous streaming, a podcast doesn't seem like anything special. Like you don't have to download and sync it to anything. You get it in your car. I think things like that would just make it like feel on-demand radio and not have to sync it to iTunes and get a special app...To ask people to do all that is pretty tough, so if we overcome that...I'm just not sure what the user interface of that will be, but I look forward to that day...I don't know if you'll press a podcast button on your car.

CAPITAL: What's your secret to making a radio show about design, a traditionally visual discipline?

MARS: The real secret is just to keep it about the story, the intent, the meaning behind design, which is a huge part of design. Designers, they're often celebrated for the beauty and pleasure principle of the things that they make, but they're really smart thinkers about solving problems. And that sort of problem solving and the genius that goes into these everyday things is much more of the interesting part of design and the story of it. So if I focus on the right things, it's actually pretty easy. I've been trying to do some videos, and I'm actually having a really hard time with it, which seems insane. Because...I like the idea of you being free of your biases when you are encountering this designed object. So you might really hate modern buildings or brutalist capital buildings. You might really have this visceral reaction to them. But if you put it in the context of everything with it and then you tell the story of it and then you see it—I think it really changes people's perception...There's a lot of good coverage of design and architecture that's about pretty, shiny things, and I like that I don't have the temptation to cover that territory again. I like the ugly things, the manhole covers.
http://www.politico.com/media/story/2014/10/the-60-second-interview-roman-mars-host-and-producer-of-the-radio-show-99-invisible-co-creator-of-the-podcast-collective-radiotopia-003005
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