James Van Der Beek shows us what a celebrity podcast deal is worth - The Verge

James Van Der Beek is suing SiriusXM over a podcast deal with Stitcher gone wrong. Plus, Dateline adds a podcast subscription, and Hideo Kojima goes to Spotify.

Hello! I am back in NYC after a whirlwind couple of days in Dallas last week. It was really great to meet so many people from the industry in person. My biggest takeaway from Podcast Movement week is how much the podcast format has evolved (for better or worse). Video podcasts were the hot topic, with lots of discussions on how to pivot to video and whether it’s necessary to do so. As one exec told me, video is not for everyone! It’s much easier to produce professional-quality audio than video, and a lot of podcast genres don’t actually lend themselves to video. I will be curious to see if it’s as big of a topic next year — maybe by then, creators will have tried and abandoned the practice.

After a big newsy week last week, with Twitter soft launching its podcast function and a whole lot of ~~discourse around Ben Shapiro’s surprise appearance at Podcast Movement, it’s somewhat calmer this week. Everyone is in late-summer lazy mode, and I am not mad at it — except for James Van Der Beek, who is feeling litigious. Let’s get into it.

James Van Der Beek is suing Stitcher after podcast talks break down

James Van Der Beek is not happy about the demise of his podcast deal with SiriusXM’s Stitcher; the Dawson’s Creek star is suing the network for breach of contract. The Blast first reported the lawsuit, which was filed on Friday. The suit alleges that his deal would have been worth $700,000 minimum for 40 episodes, plus 50 percent of the net ad revenue.

“[Van Der Beek] had other offers and potential partners to choose from in order to develop this project,” the filing said. “However, relying on the contractual agreement reached with Defendants, Plaintiff stopped negotiating with other buyers and affirmatively rejected those other offers (as well as other acting opportunities).”

https://www.theverge.com/2022/8/30/23328676/james-van-der-beek-siriusxm-podcast-lawsuit-stitcher

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