Last week I had the privilege of being invited to share some of our current data on podcasting as a part of the ADM’s “Get The Download” event at ad:tech SF. This week, we are making our most recent Podcasting data publicly available at our site, and I will be expanding on the current state of the audience for podcasting at Podcamp NYC later this week (where I have the last slot of the day on Friday–nothing readies you to get your drink on like a big bucket o’ numbers, but I promise to be concise!) My job at Edison Media Research is to analyze data and tell the story behind the numbers-whether those stories are good, or bad. In the case of the current state of podcasting, the story is good, so I am pleased to be able to share it with you here.

This year, our third annual Podcast Consumer Revealed report (derived from the 2008 Arbitron/Edison Media Research Internet and Multimedia study) details significant gains in both audio and video podcast consumption. The audience for downloadable media is not only growing, but also represents a very attractive target for advertising. Our national data shows that more than one in five Americans have ever downloaded and watched/listened to a podcast, which breaks down further to 18% of Americans having ever listened to an audio podcast, and 16% having ever watched a video podcast. Those numbers are up sharply from last year’s figures, which were 13% and 11%, respectively. Nine percent of Americans 12+ have listened to an audio podcast in the past month, and those 23 million Americans are affluent, spend lots of time (and money!) online, and are increasingly more difficult to target with interruption advertising.

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