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Andy Warhol didn’t listen
by John Zipperer
Editor in Chief, The Voice of San Francisco
Over lunch with a podcaster yesterday, I learned about a competition in Britain where podcast producers pitch their program to funders. It’s kind of like Shark Tank except everyone sounds like Judi Dench. The prize money isn’t enough to fully fund a podcast, but it is a great platform for making connections with the wider community of people and organizations that fund podcasts. Because podcasters have a problem: there are too many of them, and the bottom has fallen out of the business model.
Like the late Andy Warhol is said to have declared (but didn’t), “In the future, everyone will be world-famous for 15 minutes.” If he were alive today, he might well say that everyone will have a podcast. It even seems that some popular podcasters spend all their time either creating their own podcasts or guesting on a friend’s podcast.
And yet, here we are at the Voice with John Rothmann’s daily podcasts and a separate, weekly podcast co-hosted by Melissa Caen and yours truly.
Are we crazy?
We’ll avoid that question for now. But it’s easier to explain why we came out of the gate with these podcasts as soon as we launched the Voice in April. John Rothmann is one of the best-known radio hosts in the Bay Area. Every weekday, he releases a short podcast discussing hot local issues and talking with San Franciscans. He covers everything from pickle ball politics to mayoral politicos, and he does it all with his inimitable Rothmann focus and style.
Meanwhile, each week Melissa and I interview someone who plays a role in making San Francisco work, diagnosing why it doesn’t, or predicting what its future will be like.
So do us and yourself a favor by subscribing to our podcasts on Apple, Spotify, Amazon Music, or anywhere else you get your favorite podcasts. And drop me a note if you have feedback about our podcasts or ideas for future topics and guests.
And if you’re Warhol’d out and don’t have time for more podcasts in your life, check out some of the other new content from the Voice below, including the inspiration for this week’s newsletter subject line, and the launch of Susan Dyer Reynolds’ “Three-Bat Thursday” with an ode to legends Herb Caen and Bruce Bellingham.
Top News
How Mark Farrell connects with San Francisco voters
REYNOLDS RAP
by Susan Dyer Reynolds
A new poll released yesterday by the Mark Farrell for Mayor campaign shows Farrell having the most first-choice votes among major candidates, and that after allocating votes to simulate the ranked-choice voting process, Farrell comes out on top against incumbent London Breed 57 percent to 43 percent. The poll […]
by Erica Sandberg
Like what you see?
Nomi Kane ‘toon
Three-Bat Thursday
Inaugural Three-BAT Thursday: In honor of the great Herb Caen, we’re going back to school — old school, that is …
By Susan Dyer Reynolds
“One-liners, scoops, gossip, anecdotes, and information” — with some fact-based opinion thrown in for good measure
“Short items, a few scooplets, a good one-liner or two, that’s what my kind of column is made of, and as my tribute to Mr. Winchell, I hope to keep three-dot journalism alive in a business that considers it hopelessly out of date. Hell, so am I, dot-dot-dot. You won’t find many young journalists writing three-dot columns these days. For one thing, it’s too much work.
— Herb Caen explaining three-dot journalism in a 1985 column
Herb Caen is the greatest columnist in San Francisco history — and arguably of all time, anywhere. “Mr. San Francisco,” as fans crowned him, was the absolute master of what came to be his trademark “three dot jurnalism.” Caen combined “one-liners, gossip, anecdotes and information” into a format that became a journalistic staple in the 1930s and 1940s, always ending with “…” His style was so distinctive that the promenade named after him on the Embarcadero was titled “Herb Caen Way …” ellipses at the end and all. Here’s a scooplet: Diehard fans of Caen’s will remember that in addition to his three dots, he also used three stars.
ICYMI
Out and About
What to do this week
By Lynette Majer
Managing Editor, The Voice of San Francisco
Friday, June 14
Mark your calendar for every second Friday for the Chinatown Night Market on Grant Avenue. Stroll the street under the festive red lanterns while you eat, drink, shop, and support the merchants. Free admission.
See more upcoming events online.
Listen up! Our podcasts
- John Rothmann interviews Ditka Reiner about redistricting in San Francisco
- John Rothmann: Hate has no place in San Francisco
- The Voice Weekly: Dr. Deepak Srivastava talks with Melissa Caen and John Zipperer
- Voice Weekly: Steven Greenhut Talks “Free Cities” with Melissa Caen and John Zipperer
- Plus more
Support our newsroom
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