Marta Perrotta: We had some chapters from scholars and other from practitioners, and so we all asked, answered the question, what kind of journalism is podcasting becoming?

How does it address the challenges, uh, facing the news industry, which is audience disengagement, sustainability, uh, trust.

The topic of trust in sound media is something very important.

Neil McPhedran: Welcome to Continuing studies, a podcast for higher education podcasters to learn and get inspired.

I'm Neil McPhedran, founder of Podium Podcast Company, and HigherEdPods.com.

Jennifer-Lee: And I'm JenniferLee, founder of JPod Creations.

Podcasting is broadcasting.

We want you to know you're not alone.

In fact, there are many of you higher ed podcasters out there, and we can all learn from each other.

Neil McPhedran: Absolutely Jen.

And on the note of learning from each other, I'm super excited to let you know that we have launched the Slack channel in Higher Ed Pods, so off the back of the Higher Ed PodCon and the excitement there and all of the face to face-to-face community building and meeting each other, we have launched the Slack channel.

We just did it yesterday morning and we already have over 20 people in there, so please join.

So if you go to HigherEdPods.com, and if you join, you become a member, no charge right now for any of that.

All free.

And if you do that as part of the signup, you will get an invite to the Slack channel.

So please go do that and join us.

Jennifer-Lee: Awesome.

I'm excited about this.

This is also very exciting.

We are heading to Italy in this episode.

I love this.

We get to travel all the time.

Neil McPhedran: Well, I like how you say that, Jen.

It is true.

I'm loving how We have chatted with a few folks from Europe.

We got a couple more coming up and today we are chatting with Marta Perrotta.

I know for sure I got that pronunciation totally, totally wrong, but I'm trying, Marta, if you're listening to this, I am trying.

Okay, so Marta is an associate professor at the University of Roma Tre, that's in Italy as we talked about.

She's also the director of Roma Tre Radio, which is the radio station for the university.

She is among the co-founders of the International Research Network, which is funded by the European Commission, and if that's not enough, she's also research coordinator, and kind of the force behind WePod, which is, we produce podcasts.

It's very cool.

It's this cross border collaboration for podcast producers and it's also funded and supported by the European Commission.

And we get into that.

We really get into that.

Actually we get into everything 'cause she's doing so much Jen.

Jennifer-Lee: And I'm pretty sure she invited us to Italy too.

So I'm so game.

So let's get into the conversation.

Neil McPhedran: We're going to Italy.

Jennifer-Lee: Going.

Neil McPhedran: Well, hello Marta.

It's so nice to have you here with us today.

Thanks for joining us.

Marta Perrotta: Thank you for, uh, inviting me.

Neil McPhedran: So, Marta, you're associate professor at Roma Tre University.

So maybe before we jump into all the amazing stuff you're doing in the world of podcasting, why don't you just sort of tell us a little bit about what you teach at Roma Tre University.

Marta Perrotta: I teach radio and television, and I teach digital media, and the one is for the BA and the second one is for the MA.

And also I have responsibility of the college radio station, Roma Tre Radio.

Also, I am, um, a deputy director for the communication.

Uh, so I'm also into institutional communication and promotion for the university.

And I have a background in podcast studies and in, uh, television and uh, radio studies.

So as a media scholar mostly I am interested into the, uh, digital disruption for broadcasting and also the sound part of the broadcasting media is very much interesting for me.

And also I have a line of research on women and radio, and I focus on podcast as a disruption for radio.

So it's all connected to, to the production studies, uh, approach I give to my research.

Jennifer-Lee: I love that.

Digital disruption of radio.

That's, that's my favorite.

This is like what Neil knows I love to nerd out, because I always say that podcasting is the rebirth of radio.

We're doing a lot of the same things.

But podcasting is the vessel, and the vessel is a little bit more global than opposed to radio, which it is more localized and community filled because you are tied to a terrestrial radio tower.

So I was like, oh, Marta, I'm excited to talk to you about this today because this is one of my favorite topics.

And the fact that you're teaching at a university, I always say, and we had someone on earlier too, to talk about this, it's like, broadcasting programs are changing.

Some schools are doing it better than others, and there's just so much potential.

This is what makes me excited.

Marta Perrotta: I love to talk about that because I love to connect my different fields of research and also to make some practice of that.

Because in production studies for broadcasting and podcasting is very important to be part of the production as well.

Jennifer-Lee: And podcasting is really unique in the fact when we get to the university space is, yes, anyone can start podcasting.

That's nice thing about it.

But it's, we're kind of getting into this area of podcasting is still very young and so a lot of people are not necessarily training in podcasting.

Like you can teach yourself.

There's a lot of YouTube videos out there and things like that.

A lot of people come from public relations or uh, marketing backgrounds, which is awesome.

But I think we're starting to see now that you do need some other skills, and it's not just mic skills.

It's not just storytelling skills, it's production skills.

It's a lot of different hats.

So I love the fact that these programs are starting to think about that because there is no traditional education for podcasting.

There is for broadcasting.

Marta Perrotta: Yeah, and you can borrow a lot from other medias like, uh, movie, like television.

It's all the fields of the production in creative industries can teach a little bit about podcasting.

And that's also why when we think about podcasts, we know that it has a potential for other adaptation and to, to be this starting brick for a very big construction in content production.

So it's really good to be focused on that, but also to know that the multimedia, intermedial production can grow around that.

Neil McPhedran: I think, and Jen, you were kind of alluding to it, but the journalism side, which is not my background.

I've come to, you know, as we've talked about before on the show, I've come to podcasting through the world of digital marketing and digital content production.

But the journalism side is where you've, you've come from, Jen.

And Marta, that's your expertise.

So specifically, you've actually put out or published a journal called Podcast in the Future of Journalism.

That's the English translation version of it.

And I connected with you through Carl Hartley, who was on a couple of episodes ago, and he, I believe, wrote a chapter in, in your book.

So this sounds super interesting.

I'd love to hear more about your new journal that you've published and maybe sort some of the findings about podcasting in the future of journalism.

Marta Perrotta: Yeah, it's a book, actually.

I edited the book after a call.

I launched at the end of 2023.

This book and this call is part of a big project we have been did with my university and uh, selected media in Europe.

Because we participated into a bid for the creative Europe fund that was going to fund projects in digital transformation of journalism.

And me, together with representatives of, uh, big and small media in Europe.

One of them is PRISA, the group.

PRISA is the group of the EL PAÍS, the, the newspaper in Spain, Chora Media, which is a podcast producer in Italy, Europod, the podcast producer in Belgium.

We together developed a project of co-production of podcasting for media outlets and, uh, specifically for the journalistic part of them.

My goal in this project as well, I was the only, uh, academic person inside, was to study the process of the co-production in a cross-cultural situation for podcasting.

And that's particularly, um, interesting for Europe, which is a multilingual, uh, continent.

And also the space for connected and related productions in podcasting is not so common.

I mean, it has been, it is for television, uh, for movies of course, but not for radio and podcasting.

Uh, all the experiments, uh, in radio have been very hard to be brought on.

So we tried to develop a project of journalistic co-production in order to see how journalistic content can be adapted in different countries, but also develop and conceived in different countries together in order that journalists work together and then, uh, produce podcasts in their own languages, which is something really is not so common, right?

At least the way, before the call, we counted like 10 or 15 examples all over the world.

So as part of this big project that we have been winning in, uh, late, uh, 2022, and that started in 2023, I launched the call for, um, academic reflection on the topic of the transformation of journalism practices through podcasting.

And this was, uh, not only focused on cross border co-productions, of course it was, um, focused on several, uh, experiences all over the world where, uh, we can see how podcasting a, a brought a significant transformation in journalistic practices.

Uh, because it has been changing how stories are told, how they're distributed and how they engage, uh, with audiences.

So we keep Serial as a benchmark, of course, for investigative series or The Daily.

So these well known examples, I mean, they, they have market turning points and, uh, so I wanted to build something and to raise academics around the topic of how has been, uh, podcast transforming journalism in this 20 years, at least in the last 10 within the big WePod project.

That's the, the name of the project, of the co-production.

We edited this collection of 11 chapters that is open access.

You can, um, download it for free and it's, uh, it's there.

Or the chapter of Carl, Carl is there, of course.

Neil McPhedran: We'll put a link in our show notes to it for sure.

Marta Perrotta: Yes, please.

Please do it.

And so it's also interesting because we had some chapters from scholars and other from practitioners.

And so we all, uh, asked, answer the question, what kind of journalism is podcasting becoming?

How does it address the challenges, uh, facing the news industry, which is, um, audience disengagement, sustainability, uh, trust.

The topic of trust in sound media is something very important.

We have in the EBU, in European Broadcasting Union research, every year we see that the most trusted journalist is the one of radio.

So it's a sound media that is more trusted than the visual one.

And that link was very important to have this same question about podcast journalism, which is sound and which is, has to be clear, has to be quick, has to be simple for the audience, uh, but also can be closer to young listeners, young audiences, which are more and more detached from consuming news.

So all these topic came together.\ Across the various chapters.

And we have also some analysis of co-productions and also some reflections about models of journalism around the globe.

So it's, I think it's, even if it's, it started in the European project is more, uh, global for, uh, as a perspective.

Jennifer-Lee: I think what you just hit on was like, so important because I think that's a lot of thing is everyone's like, oh, radio is dying, TV is dying.

The news is dying.

It's not, journalism is not dying.

We're still gonna need the news.

It's just transferring to where your audience is.

So that's the thing is I think what you guys are doing with WePod and everything is you're finding your audience.

And again, I think that's a huge discussion, and this is gonna be with it with anything.

Because podcasting is not regulated it is very hard when you come from an industry that is so regulated like the news industry.

So it's like you're finding that fine balance of all these broadcasters that are trusted are needing jobs because they're getting cut left, right, and center on the traditional stations.

And they have something to say and bringing them onto podcast is great, maybe with the accreditation 'cause sometimes BBC and, and other ones do like this, under those banners, but then it's like, how do you weed out, you know, Joe that starts his own podcast and he talks about politics and maybe he's swayed to one side.

Marta Perrotta: Yes.

Uh, yeah, I mean we, in the project we have, uh, produced six co-productions and it's really, um, interesting to see how different distinct national ecosystems, national context, and national ideas of what the headaches of some kind of journalism and also, the practices of journalism can mix and can find a balance, as you were saying.

I think that one of the best experiences of this project has been the last podcast that has been released, which is, uh, called The Right Kind of Family.

It's big production in seven languages.

Among them there is English and French of course, but also Hungarian, Polish, German, Italian, and Spanish.

And it's really a work, it's a co-production of four journalists that have been traveling and reporting together across Europe.

It, it took, uh, one year and a half to be ready from the first meeting for the developing the concept until the last episode release that was last Tuesday.

And it's really an example of how in the field of podcasting even if you have rules in each country, and also you have tradition, uh, practice tradition in, in every, in every context, and you need to look for different balances and different, uh, also way of cooperation.

And it's, uh, it has been the, also the topic of this, this, this production is really, is really, uh, delicate.

It's really, uh, sensible.

It's, it's about, uh, female bodies and the policies about, uh, reproduction in all the countries.

Even if there are no, um, explicit politics in every country about that, it's the, the lobbying around the body control, the main theme of the production.

So the journalists traveled from Spain to Hungary, from Italy, uh, to Poland, uh, and they really discovered connections that are not so evident, uh, in the public discourse.

So it's really something that only a podcast could do for the time that it took.

Also, there is a European grant, uh, behind that, uh, it has been funded and has been produced with the idea of really, uh, engaging the audience into the very relevant topic.

And, uh, I think it's gonna be huge.

I, I don't know any listening, uh, trends yet because it's a, it was just released.

But I, I hope that it will be listened a lot in all the, in the language is, uh, is produced.

Neil McPhedran: That's great.

I'm looking at it right now.

We'll, and we'll definitely put a, a link to this as well too.

So I think this is fascinating, and you're right, like it points out how podcasting is such a unique medium to be able to tackle something like this cross border.

It would take a while.

There's a lot of journalistic requirements, a lot of journalistic work, so the, the time continuum to put something like this together doesn't necessarily work as well with radio.

But then this, the fact that it's produced then in seven languages and you're identifying this political network, what's called the political network of values, just reading it there.

This sort of global network of conservative and far right organizations that is sort of subversively, you know that it's there but we don't see it in all different countries and all the different languages or whatever.

And so this is a really interesting medium.

So the WePod project is really fascinating and I guess there's so much there.

You've got all of the, you know, you've got the partnership of all the production organizations, the funding, 'cause that's required for, for things like big journalistic projects like this too.

So, there's a lot of podcasts in there.

It, it's super interesting.

Marta Perrotta: It also has an IP marketplace.

The website has developed a platform for a IP marketplace of podcasting, that is open to every producer.

So everyone can put content and, and just say it's open for adaptation, for the selling to the rights of the podcast to be a, to become a book, or to do a translation or adaptation to other languages.

Uh, it's also a place where European podcasters can meet and can grab some tools for production.

There is a tool, uh, box to, to be explored to help, uh, producers, uh, from conceptualization into the scene of the rights and the, all the tools and help podcasters in, uh, in producing all the pipeline, the podcast.

And also, um, we would like to launch the European Association of Podcast Creators.

So it's coming more and more complex, but as a place where to start doing pressure on the commission to, uh, offer more space in the, in the policies, in the European policies because it's no longer a niche.

Uh, it's a central part of how people engage with, uh, news or entertainment and public life as well.

So it, uh, is been raising question of ethics, question of, uh, sustainability.

And we really need Europe to be aware of that besides all the other creative industries.

So, it's, uh, it's, it's one of the main task of this project, and only the media can be so heavy in that because as a university I can give support with research, but the pressure on the politics is not so my job at the moment.

But with the association that has, um, academics and producers and media, maybe this is more easy in there.

It's more effective.

Jennifer-Lee: And the ethics part, again, just always fascinates me.

'Cause I always talk about journalistic integrity and is it something that you even teach your students?

Because it's something that everyone needs to know.

But it's so funny because in podcasting it actually doesn't really happen sometimes.

Marta Perrotta: Yeah.

You know, I have a team at Roma Tre and I don't teach journalism and I don't teach to future journalists, I mean, the ethics and all the production processes and in journalism, because I'm more focused on entertainment format.

So I have a colleague that does so, and we, we happen to have, uh, lessons together and we, we start from very famous examples of journalistic podcasting from Serial, of course, to Caliphate, to other cases that can be very, um, interesting in terms of the way the journalist is included in the narration.

But yeah, students are really interested in, uh, learning and also in listening, and it's something that I, I have been teaching radio since 2003.

And I've been, uh, witnessing a very, uh, incredible transformations in terms of listening skills of the, of the students and also in terms of the interest into sound, into the language of radio and podcasting through podcasting.

So now in the radio at the university, we have a lot of people that come because they listen to podcast and then they start to do radio.

So it's uh, really interesting this, um, I mean this catchy side of podcasting, uh, because it's cool now.

But also it's interesting how the students discover, for instance, very old programs of the radio, of the seventies, of the eighties, and they realize how much they have to get off with the history of radio.

Neil McPhedran: I wanna circle back to the WePod project.

I think I would encourage everyone listening to go have a look at this.

There's, you know, so you've got all the podcasts that are in there, then there's a toolbox, there's a knowledge section.

And then you mentioned the IP marketplace, but then there's also a talent section for sharing.

So people, I would imagine they could, uh, like audio engineers could put their, their services or whatever.

But the thing that's really interesting is this notion of, you know, we were The Right Kind of Family is the example here, but that is in, as you mentioned, is in 1, 2, 7 languages.

And what's interesting about that is you can click through to each version, each version has its own RSS feed in Apple and so on and so forth.

But then they're all interconnected and I, I think this is a really interesting project because I think we as podcasters kinda live in our language silo.

Marta Perrotta: Yeah.

Neil McPhedran: In our feed, in our one feed.

And what this is doing is creating this network.

So it's one big project and one big journalism focus as we've discussed.

So it all comes together on the website, but then each one lives separately at the end of the line on Apple and Spotify and so on and so forth.

I just think like there must be a lot that you sort of learned about doing that, and it just really opens it up, I think.

Marta Perrotta: Yeah.

Uh, yeah.

The, the idea was to give each partner its space as for, um, everyone has it's, uh, language silo as you, as you mentioned before.

But it's very important to show the connections to the audience.

Because if you listen to them, you understand from each language that there is collaborative work behind that.

Besides the funding, and besides all the names and all the creatives and all the projects.

You don't know as a audience because I'm into, so much deep into the introduction, but I would love to make interviews with audience to understand what they get from this global, at least cross-cultural conceptualization.

If there is some idea of international inquiry, international, because actually I prefer to listen to my native language version, is Italian of course.

And from that I feel, uh, that is told in a way that speaks to me directly, in the way a good podcast does.

Always though as, uh, uh, finding connections to our daily lives.

Uh, and I, I think that this is an effect that this in every version and it's really important.

Yeah, so from a listening point of view, it would be great at the end of the project in August, uh, 2025 to find out the sides of the audience of all the podcasts, putting together all the data of the different media.

Neil McPhedran: That's what I was thinking about too.

That part is super fascinating.

But it's also just for these big journalistic, like you're right, like you want, like I would wanna listen to the English version.

You're gonna wanna listen to the Italian version, like some in France is gonna wanna listen to the French version.

But it's an important journalistic project that is one, it's the output from this collaborative cross border, cross-cultural journalistic project, but at the same time, the end listener is consuming it in the language that's natural to them and there's, culturally would be sort of relevant to them as well.

It just from a journalistic perspective, it really opens up the aperture for opportunity for these cross border and cross-cultural endeavors that I think that instead of getting caught into your own little world and you're translating and you know, and so on and so forth.

So maybe before we go, you also are a podcaster and as we sort of set off the top, I know this is of interest to Jen, is women in podcasting and women in radio.

Just maybe tell us a little bit about own personal podcasting, uh, adventure.

Marta Perrotta: Yeah.

It has been a project for the sensory of radio in Italy last year, 2024, the public service commissioned an investigation on the female, uh, leading roles in the radio of the, the sensory.

It's really hard to, to find them on the books.

So besides the project of the podcast, I was writing a book about that actually.

I started work 13 years ago actually.

But yeah, I had the chance to dig into the archives.

Uh, that is so interesting and important.

And I picked out 10 women.

Some of them were totally unknown by the, uh, literature and, uh, they had done hours and hours of documentaries, of programs, inventing also new formats, going around with the recorder, the portable recorder in the sixties, cross, uh, countries.

I told the story of, uh, one of them, I just mentioned her because she's, uh, amazing.

She was born in 1930 and she has been traveling to Australia with Nigra for five weeks on a boat with migrants, Italian migrants to Australia.

And she has been doing a reportage that if you listen to that, uh, now you just have shivers.

It's, uh, it's, uh, it's so modern.

So yeah, it's really speaks of today, of all the problems that, uh, people face they leave the house for going somewhere else where they feel they have more luck.

It's a 10 episode podcast with women that were not so famous and so well known, but who did a lot of, uh, work and programs in radio, in public radio mostly.

Uh, the public service asked me to put some very well known women like singers or, uh, presenters in television, uh, that had a, had a background in radio that no one knows.

So the besides, they're known, they are very well known.

People like Mina, or which is very, very famous, uh, all over the world, uh, and their, the archives, uh, gave, gave me the chance to pick up very, uh, interesting excerpts of, of their work in, in the radio, which, I mean, it was a very interesting way to look at this 100 years.

And give justice and restore.

Big job they did.

And also to understand how the model of a female host has been built, because today, of course, that are different, but before there were more men than women in, uh, hosting the radio shows.

Neil McPhedran: Yeah, I think that's, that's great.

Well, thanks for sharing that with us as well too then.

That sounds like a, a really amazing project, especially using archives of audio and bringing that back to life.

Jennifer-Lee: And that's a whole, like that's a whole deeper conversation as women in radio because it's not even that long ago.

Like I graduated from radio school almost like 15 years ago, and I remember one of my male teachers came up to me.

And he said, it is still a male dominated industry.

He said, do not let it stop you.

He says, there are gonna be men that are in your path.

And he said, just keep going.

And I thought that was really cool that he was like super supportive.

But that wasn't that long ago.

And the fact that he's still telling female students to like push past the boundary.

And even like just, it wasn't even that long ago, they were telling us in radio school that women were only allowed certain day parts.

They had this thing too for music radio that like if a woman's song came, you couldn't necessarily have a woman off the back and they couldn't have women songs together.

Like it was just, it's so fascinating.

And it was interesting 'cause I read an article too.

And this is why I am glad in the university space and, and a lot of the people that we do interview, are amazing women.

Not that, I love the men, but it's the fact that they were saying still that podcasting is still a male dominated industry.

And what is it?

I don't know.

Maybe, maybe women don't necessarily wanna speak on the air.

Are we given the opportunities?

Obviously podcast is a little bit different because anyone can come out with a microphone, but it is still male dominated, like broadcasting.

Neil McPhedran: It is true.

Jen, I think you, you raised a really good point, and I think we still see it in podcasting if you think about the, the bro podcasts, right?

Like it's prevalent and persistent.

And so Marta, you're doing amazing work.

Just encourage you to keep going and not only your academic study with female in the industry, but the cross border, the cross-cultural, the cross language work that you're doing as well too.

It's commendable and thank you so much for joining us today and telling us a little bit more about it.

We'll definitely put links in our, uh, show notes.

Thank you so much for joining us today.

Marta Perrotta: Thank you.

Thank you so much.

Neil McPhedran: Well, Jen, I know I say this every single time, but that was a great interview.

I learned so much from Marta.

And it just continues to blow my mind how after two years, we just keep talking to new people just doing so many cool things.

And I love how lately we've just been like really reaching outside of North America and learning what is going on in Europe.

Although we do need to figure out, we need to talk to people out there in Asia.

Hello.

Talk to us if you want get interviewed, and Africa, you know, we definitely need that too.

Jennifer-Lee: And more Canadians because we actually don't talk to many at all.

Neil McPhedran: Well, we got a few Canadians coming.

Jennifer-Lee: I feel like We don't talk to, we don't talk to our people ever.

Neil McPhedran: True that, that is true.

But anyway, our conversation with Marta was amazing.

Oh, and wait, I gotta give a shout out to Carl Hartley, who again, has introduced us to someone amazing.

And you need to check out Marta's book, uh, or her journal that she has published, which Carl Hartley has a chapter there in.

And while that WePod, what a great organization and project.

Jennifer-Lee: Something that's very international and I love it.

So we're learning so many new ideas from everyone.

And like you said, Neil, every time we think we've got it figured out, somebody else comes out with a new part to podcasting.

So very exciting times.

Neil McPhedran: Yeah.

I can't wait to go to Italy.

Jennifer-Lee: Yeah, we're telling Marta we're coming.

Neil McPhedran: Now that we've done the live event at PodCon, I feel like we just now need to go do, do a live, live tour in Europe.

Jennifer-Lee: Oh, let's do it.

Booking the flights.

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