So this episode dropped at the same time Overcast was updated on my phone to the 2024.8.2 release (the one that restored streamingānot a feature Iāve used).
This version (again) broke the functionality of playing the next item in the playlist if you have the ānit pickyā option of Play Top Episode Next turned on. Of course I discovered this 15 minutes into my long drive 
. (I think Iāll leave that option off from now on!)
I feel you. I understand that sometimes you need to do these sorts of full rewrites, but Iāve bounched off of Overcast for now due to the issues and some features not yet being implemented. My podcast client is my single most used app, and it needs to be rock solid.
Iām excited to revisit Overcast in 6 months or a year when hopefully it is more stable and complete again. I miss boring 
Good episode! Although I have heard most of what Marco had to say as Iām an ATP listener, I always enjoy the different way Stephen and David approach their interviews.
Really good overall (and Iām super excited swipe functionality will be coming back to Overcast!).
The number of times my app just stops after an episode ends is maddening. I canāt figure out how to make the queue go, and āadd toā and āmove toā seem like the same command?
Iām going to keep using it because I like th audio engine and Iām a cheapskate who isnāt gonna pay $25/year for Castro, but it seems more frustrating than it was a few months ago.
All that said, shortening silences and smart speed are worth the little inconveniences.
I dug the episode, too. I canāt find it, but my favorite podcast with Marco was several years ago with a Stitcher VP where they strongly disagreed with each other about podcastingās future. Reviewing the last ten years and how open podcasting beat Stitcher and Spotify, and partially YouTube, and the role Overcast played in that, was a nice segment. Hoping for reformed UI on that Apple podcast listing API opt-out checkbox.
Pocket Casts and Castro do this also.
Move to actually moves the episode from whatever list it was in, while add to puts it in your queue but leaves it in the list you were working from.
There are other podcast apps with good audio engines, but Overcast is still the best to my ears.
Itās funny how MPU will sometimes feature an app episode right after there is controversy surrounding it. They did this with Fantastical right after people were upset when they went subscription. I use Overcast, but donāt understand the rush the developer was in to push it out half-baked. Would another month have hurt us to wait?
New releases tend to prompt discussion and/or controversy, and new releases are the sorts of things that podcast hosts like to discuss.
I think the developer probably wanted to get it out on the tenth anniversary of the app.
Iāve not listened to other podcasts with Marco. Heās very engaging and comes across as really dedicated. It
Every product has little blips and most of them end up being storms in teacups.
Every power user knows this, and every seasoned developer. Doesnāt stop the changes being frustrating though.
I love the uploads feature of overcast. And the sound related tweaks are especially useful when listening on my hearing aids.
Thanks for this episode D and S.
I havenāt tried pocket casts, but I looked at Castro, and I think those features are paywalled?
In Pocket Casts they are not paywalled. Iāve switched to Pocket Casts, not in the mood to be a beta tester for Overcast in perpetuity (as something new always gets broken), and I couldnāt be happier.
Iām not an audiophile, and I listen to podcasts mostly when on the move, so I donāt get what the mythical audio superiority of Overcast is all about.
It seems (to my ears) that Overcast produces slightly less ānoisyā audio when using silence skipping and speed acceleration. Not to the point where the other apps are a problem, but Overcast does sound a bit cleaner.
I popped back from Pocket Casts to see how Overcast was doing (annual subscription coming due!), and the audio difference was noticeable. Not extreme, and not an āI must have Overcast because Pocket Casts is unlistenableā thing, but noticeable.
And honestly, Overcast was doing much better than the original release - but with this latest update it stops. after. every. single. episode. Itās driving me absolutely crazy.
Heās publically said that this is the case.
And I get it. But the app just wasnāt ready for public release. It badly needed a wider beta test to iron out the (many) issues that became apparant on day one.
I used Overcast for years, but I bailed after this. I have never (ever) experienced a worse app āupdate.ā Features were removed and broken and it became visually confusing. There was not a single improvement. I admit to finding it a little fascinating that a developer could put out such garbageāhow is that even possible?ābut Iām definitely not going to renew my subscription. This interview did nothing to persuade me to stick with Overcast.
I enjoyed this episode. The take-aways were different to what I might have guessed:
- Marcoās experience in the Apple system really came across strongly. This is a guy whoās been living and breathing this stuff for well over a decade and he still loves it
- Heās genuinely smart
- As David said, this was a guest with interesting and thoughtful opinions that were not just echoing what everyone was saying. I thought his takes on what Apple are invested in and what they are not (e.g. Apple are not invested in making Homepods better, so why should anyone else be invested in them) and his description of Apple as āpoor negotiatorsā because their ridiculously over-powered market position makes them assume that everyone will have to do as they wish - were spot on. I found myself really wishing that someone very high-up at Apple was listening.
- His analysis of the podcasting world, and how it is a constant battle between people trying to establish a walled garden to milk money from it all and people who want it to be open was excellent. Depressing and realistic but also hopeful.
There were things in there about Overcast, but I was more interested in the wider picture stuff which explained why he had felt so strongly about the need to re-write and get it released. I listened to the whole episode in one go, in headphones while walking, using Overcast. There are still a few oddities in the latest release, but things that were problems for me have already been fixed. I agreed with Davidās feedback to Marco, that heās happy that he can continue to use Overcast into the future. It was interesting that it was āby farā the most popular app for listening to MPU!
Itās about intelligibility of speech, for me. Like a lot of people, I have high frequency hearing loss so I find it hard to distinguish between p and d and t or s, sh and th sounds. In real life, I am a very good, self-taught, lip-reader. That was how I went for years without realising how bad my hearing was becoming. When you listen to speech in audio only, you canāt lip-read. I have to concentrate very strongly to fill-in what I miss, predict what the word should have been and itās hard to make sense of anything where people are discussing ideas or conveying nuance etc. especially when people are really into the topic.
Overcastās speech boost clarifies so much, especially if I listen in the car or anywhere with background noise (e.g. when walking around). Itās the difference between enjoying a meaty discussion and responding to the ideas bouncing around and giving up in frustration after five minutes because I am exhausted mentally from all the extra listening I have to do. The removal of silences helps clean things up too: I am able to concentrate on the content and not trying to decipher low-level cruft in the audio. I love that I can set it per podcast too: I can hear music āstraightā, for example and donāt have to consciously think about when to apply it.
Itās not about āaudiophileā type sound quality, in fact the change in sound is subtle, but things are happening on a microsecond by microsecond timescale to accentuate the verbal cues within the audio. Itās not just a volume and eq boost but much more. Other apps have similar features, but I donāt think anything else comes close. And it matters if you donāt have high frequency hearing loss: being cued in better to audio-only speech makes it easier to become focused on what is being said and not have to work so hard to listen.
Not sure if youāre experiencing the same issue as me (see the first post). Iāve found that turning off the Play Top Episode Next feature has fixed the stopping. after. every. single. episode bug.