Well, hello. It's Monday, 28th of April 2025, and this is your inaugural episode of Creators. I'm Clare Wade-Brown, independent podcaster.
Sam Sethi:And I'm Sam Sethi, the CEO of True Fans, on this week's show. Clare, we're going to talk about something called Creators Wallets. That's our feature of the week. We're going to reveal how you can feature your podcast on this very show, and also, clare and I are going to choose our music of the week. We're going to reveal how you can feature your podcast on this very show, and also, claire and I are going to choose our music of the week. And finally, we're going to talk a little bit of news from the podosphere what is going on in the big old, wide world. And finally, claire and I are going to be at the London Podcast Show, so we're going to talk a little bit about that as well.
Claire Waite Brown:Right, Shall we get started then, Sam? What has happened this week in True Fans?
Sam Sethi:So, as you know, claire, we build very fast here on True Fans, and one of the biggest requests has been for creators to be able to accrue money from their fans using micropayments from the wallets that we created. But they've started to get the money in, but they haven't been able to withdraw it out. So the good news is we now allow creators on TrueFans to withdraw the money to their Stripe account.
Claire Waite Brown:Brilliant. So what you're telling me now is that creators can actually, once supporters start supporting them with micropayments, they can then turn that money into real money that they can take to a shop.
Sam Sethi:Yes, absolutely, and people will be going. When will that happen? So the good news that's happened. So the way it works is when you join True Fans, you get given a True Fans wallet. We put some money in it, as you know, for completing certain onboarding tasks, and you can then start to either top up your wallet from Stripe or get paid by your fans who support your show. Now that money is now in a wallet that you own and it's starting to accumulate. Well, we've now made that wallet appear in your creator's dashboard. So after you claim your podcast on TrueFans, you'll get access to creatorstruefansfm and you'll see that in your wallet there is amount of sats. So now there's a big blue button that says withdrawal. What do you think happens next?
Sam Sethi:we get some money yes, we've actually got two options, possibly three. Why would I ever give you one claire? So the first option is you can withdraw the money to another micro payment wallet. So if you happen to have a Fountain or Podverse or a Podcast Guru account, which are other 2.0 apps, you can type in the Lightning address the wallet address. So mine would maybe be sam at fountainfm, yours might be claire at podversefm, for example. You just type that address in, tell it how much you want to take out of your TrueFans wallet and that will appear in your other Lightning wallet. So that's one option. But, more importantly, people have wanted to take their money back out into what we call a fiat currency dollars, pounds, euros. So now you choose the fiat option and you choose the amount you want to withdraw from your TrueFans wallet and, having set up your Stripe account, hopefully when you onboarded it'll just be one click straight into your wallet or your credit card or your bank account in the currency that you've chosen, and that's as simple as we can make it.
Claire Waite Brown:What I like about it is that if you're doing this for the first time as a listener and or creator, when you actually sign up with TrueFans's true fans, that give you the wallet and then any sats you've got in there you can give to other creators and then, as you say, if supporters are giving you that, it's that same wallet that you can then go to and turn that support into actual money. As you said, that can go back to your stripe account. It's also very easy to use your stripe account to put some money in so you can help other podcasts and, as you said, to take it out again Super.
Sam Sethi:Of course, the third option that we haven't talked about is you don't take the money out at all, but you use it as part of your marketing. So in your podcast you can put a marketing budget and, like we do with Fan Zone Claire, we pay people to listen to that podcast. You can use money in your True Fans wallet to pay your fans, maybe, to listen to that podcast. You can use money in your True Fans wallet to pay your fans, maybe, to listen to a trailer.
Claire Waite Brown:Brilliant. It's time for the podosphere. What is the podosphere? Sam?
Sam Sethi:Yes, it's the collective term for the podcast ecosystem, and I thought each week, claire, we could talk about one news story that might relate to True Fans and why I think it's important. So this week, the story is that X or Twitter as most people still know it as have announced that they are going to be bringing out micropayments and wallets in partnership with Visa, which I thought was very exciting because it means that a mainstream social media platform with roughly 200 million users are going to give every user a wallet and they're going to educate people on how to use micropayments.
Sam Sethi:So, from a wider standpoint, then you think this is going to help people to understand how to do this for their podcasts that they like well, I think if people get to understand what a wallet is and what micropayments are and then using visa in the case of x, to transfer fiat money into micropayments, that's a great learning curve. Step one and then, I think, step two, when you put a tweet out, or if that's still called a tweet, and you've got a heart and now you say I want to give you 10 sats with that heart. Again, it's educating a wider audience that you can pay creators micro payments for sentiment that you want to give them. There's no play sentiment like we do with a podcast, but maybe with a comment in X you can leave a comment with a payment, like we have super comments. So I think it's one way that we can see more people in the mainstream the mass market, as we often call it getting an education on what wallets are, what micropayments are and how they can reward, as a fan, their favourite creators.
Claire Waite Brown:Okay, so you've hit the nail on the head there in one point by saying what micropayments are. Presumably, micropayments are very small amounts of money, whether it's SATs or fiat. So your micropayments, what you're talking about there, is the ability to make very small payments and the idea being that lots of little payments build up.
Sam Sethi:And didn't we do a fan zone show about wallets and micropayments? Do you remember what episode that was?
Claire Waite Brown:Yeah, we did. We've done an episode called why a Wallet, so that explains a bit more about what we've been talking about in both sections of the show so far. We've also done an episode called the Heart Icon, which is similar to what you've just explained, and that's kind of how you've come up with these ideas as well. They're quite social media in style, because that's what people know, and you within True Fans have given people the ability to add a little bit of payment to that if they want to. So, yeah, there's a few of the early Fan Zone episodes. There's the comments icon episode, which will explain all about that.
Sam Sethi:And again, remember, if you listen to those episodes, you get paid by true fans to listen to them as a way of saying thank you for your time and attention. Now, Claire, let's move on. This is going to be where we feature independent podcast creators and independent music artists. How's it going to work?
Claire Waite Brown:Well, from the podcast point of view, I am beaming because, as an independent podcaster myself and with very, very many indie podcast friends, I know how difficult it can be. I know the challenges with discovery and I know that there are so many good shows out there that are maybe not noticed because possibly they're not fronted by celebrities or they don't have some kind of backing. So, true, fans is all about monetizing fandom. So this is where the independent creators come in, and this show is called Creators, so we want to showcase those creators and how they could be monetized by their fans. So what I thought we could do was well, a couple of things. Actually, there's a number of shows that I can recommend that I've listened to myself, that I know are top quality. So I'm very happy to do that in the future, and I'm sure you have some shows like that as well that you can recommend, sam.
Claire Waite Brown:I think another lovely option would be for creators to pitch themselves to us. That sounds a bit serious and corporate, but to introduce themselves to us. That's what we'd love to do. So if you have a show and you think more people would love to hear this show, what I would love for you to do is, in true fans, to leave a comment on this episode, any of the episodes in the future. You can add some money to that as a super comment, but you do not have to Just remember. It is just a comment telling us a bit about your show, and then Sam and I will have a listen and we'll decide, maybe, whether it's a good fit, maybe whether it's a good fit in the future when we're talking about a particular subject and I'm going to ask Sam if we can also add your show to our pod role, which in True Fans is called Recommendations, maybe even in the homepage carousel. I don't know if he'll let us do that, but these are all good things for Discovery, sam. What do you reckon?
Sam Sethi:The answer is always clear is I have to say yes to you. You know that I can't never say no, so there you go. And then the other thing I think is we want it not just to be UK. So what's nice about it is in shows we love, in the carousel on the homepage we have multiple countries. So if you're in another country France, germany, brazil, mexico, australia don't worry, please do send in and we can also feature you in your country as well.
Claire Waite Brown:That sounds brilliant. So tell me, Sam, about the song aspect of this section of this show.
Sam Sethi:Now, one of the things we also want to highlight is independent music artists. Yes, you know, spotify has thousands of big artists, but they all tend to be the same globally your Ed Sheeran or your Dua Lipa or your Bruno Mars. But there are brilliant, brilliant artists that are trying to get discovered. They are struggling to get airtime and we wanted to feature those as well. So we are going to take a song of the week, and this week it's Two Weeks in Nashville. It's a three-piece UK indie rock band twin. I like the name. Two Weeks in Nashville conceived their name as a tribute to the musical capital of the world, and so here we go. This is a song from their latest album. It's called Get Away.
TWIN:I'm gonna get away, far from everything. Please don't ask me why. I just need some time. I'm going now for a while Things to get off my mind. Don't call me, don't follow me, don't ask me why. Don't hate me, I'm not the enemy, just gotta get things off my mind, not my brain. I gotta get away. I need a holiday because I'm not okay. I'm going out for a while Got stuff to get off my mind. Don't call me, don't follow me, don't ask me why. Don't hate me, I'm not the enemy, just gotta get things off my mind. My mind's been stressing me out and I can't decide what's bringing me down this time. I'll figure it out just in the space and time Told you. I'd go and you should know that I will return to fix what we left. Letting you go is hard at first, but I will return and we can reset. So now I'm gonna get away, far from everything, no matter why you say, I just need some space.
Claire Waite Brown:Well, that was brilliant, sam. Thanks for introducing me to them. If you want to find music on the True Fans app on your mobile, you will go to the avatar or the little picture of you, and just a little way down you've got search podcasts. You've got podcasts and then you've got music. Click on there and you can go to music. You can see what's featured and you can do some searching. And while we're at it, sam, I'll just mention that in that sidebar from the avatar, we've also got trailers, and I know that we can earn money from listening to trailers sometimes, can't we?
Sam Sethi:Well, we trailers, and I know that we can earn money from listening to trailers sometimes, can't we? Well, we can't you and I, but other people can. Yes, your band, claire. You can't just sit there listening to trailers all day, but everyone else could if they wanted to.
Sam Sethi:Yes, yeah, super, thank you now let's move on Claire awards and events. What we want to do in this section on this show is highlight things that are coming up that independent podcast creators might want to come along to or they might want to enter if it's an award. The London Podcast Show is at the end of May, May 21st 22nd at the Business Design Centre in Islington, Will you be there, claire?
Claire Waite Brown:I most certainly will. Yes, I will be there both days. I will be there at pubs afterwards. If anybody wants to invite me to any get togethers, I'm always up for those.
Sam Sethi:Now you went last year. What was your experience like?
Claire Waite Brown:I had a very fabulous time, I have to say. I went up on the Tuesday night and I'm doing that again. I don't live that far from London but I don't have the energy to go home each night. So I managed to get myself a reasonable hotel in Kings Cross but I went to the pub where a lot of the parties were on the Tuesday night and that kind of thing was just so valuable to be meeting other people who are making podcasts. So that side of things I really enjoyed the event itself a number of good talks. It's quite heavy going if you're doing it for the whole full days, but that's a lot of lovely networking to be done and again, there's always events going on afterwards as well. So on the Wednesday night, on the Thursday night, there's lots of things to be doing. So, yeah, thoroughly enjoyed it.
Sam Sethi:Good, I will be there as well for the whole period. My voice will probably be lost by the end of it. I do highly recommend, if you are into podcasting, come along to the show. It is an amazing gathering of, probably, this year, around 10,000 people. Claire, that's how big they're going to make it this year.
Claire Waite Brown:It certainly felt a lot bigger last year than the year before.
Sam Sethi:I will also be there with James Cridland doing a live Pod News Weekly. We do one each year and I will also be presenting the future of podcasting, a podcasting 3.0 presentation and demo. So there, if you fancy coming along absolutely.
Claire Waite Brown:It's time for the inbox. How does this work, sam?
Sam Sethi:well each week. Claire what we like users and listeners of this show to do is to leave us a super comment. So find the episode, go to the comments tab and leave us a comment, without a payment or a super comment, if you feel like giving a little micro payment tip. But what we will do is read out those comments each week on this show. So it's a great way to give us feedback or ask us for features or other questions that you might have. But also we will have if you happen to have X or you happen to have Blue Sky, which is a new social web platform.
Sam Sethi:So you can go to at truefanssocial on Blue Sky and find a post related to this show in that thread and you can leave a comment there and we can pick it up from there. Or you can go to X, and it's at truefansfm on X and you can leave a comment there and we can pick it up from there. Or you can go tox, and it's at true fans fm on x and you can leave us a comment there. So in both cases, if you don't want to come into the app and create an account, you can still leave us a comment on social media and again we can pick that up and each week our goal is to read back some of those comments and, yeah, it's a nice way to interact with the show.
Claire Waite Brown:Yeah, I really look forward to hearing from people. That's brilliant. What about if people want to support the show, Sam? How can they do that?
Sam Sethi:Well, that's nice and easy. So you go to truefansfm slash creators, which is the URL for this show. You'll see a heart in a hand icon. You click on that and you state how much you would like to pay this show per month. So if you want to give us three pounds or three dollars, or if you want to do that in sats, it can be three thousand sats. So it's a nice way for you to be able to say each month, I'd like to give you this amount of money.
Sam Sethi:However, the good news is, if me and you, claire, do not produce another show, then no more money is taken from your wallet. But if you and I produce a show and you are choosing to support this show, then we will take a micropayment, which is the amount of value for this show times the time, and we'll take that from your £3 budget. Now, once that three pound budget is used up, don't worry, we won't be taking any more. So you can control the amount you wish to give this show, but we won't take any more than the amount you choose. So supporting this show is very simple you choose the amount you want and we will then take that every time we produce a new episode of Creators. And yes, thank you very much if you are a supporter and of course we will name check you here on the show yes, brilliant.
Claire Waite Brown:I look forward to reading out some names. That hand with the heart symbol is um is one we talk about in a future episode of fan zone. One coming up it's known as the funding tag in 2.0 terms and, of course, I talk about in a future episode of Fan Zone. One coming up it's known as the funding tag in 2.0 terms and, of course, I talk about it in Podcasting 2.0 in practice. But just so, as you know, there's going to be more info on that going forward.
Sam Sethi:So that's pretty much the show, Claire. I just want to, of course, mention two shows that you produce Fan Zone and Podcasting 2.0. In Practice, what's the difference between those two shows?
Claire Waite Brown:Okay. Well, podcasting 2.0 in Practice is a course and as of today, it isa complete course because the final episode has gone out Now. The difference between Fan Zone and Podcasting 2.0 in Practice is that Podcasting 2.0 in Practice talks about a number of Podcasting 2.0 features. It talks about why they're good, but it also gives you some homework on how to use those features. So this means I show you where you can find them on some of the 2.0 apps. So of course, I cover TrueFans, I also cover Fountain, sometimes Pocket Cast, sometimes Podcast Guru.
Claire Waite Brown:So that's looking at what the 2.0 features are and why they're good and how easy they are to use, whereas Fan Zone we are looking very specifically at what you can do in True Fans and I've been learning as I've gone along. I thought I knew, but I've learned even more. So in each episode again, they are just bite-sized episodes we're just going to look at one icon or one tab or one feature. You explain to me what it is, I ask you a question if I don't understand, and then there's chapter art that shows you how to use the thing as well. So it's a nice easy way to just pick up on some of the fun things you can do in TrueFans.
Sam Sethi:One of the things that we're going to do with this show and I'm going to also go back retrospectively with FanZone is to create a blog post to explain some of the things we've talked about. I'll put in the screencast so that if you want to see exactly how example example, in this show we talked about creator wallets, there's a screencast in the episode page for this show that you can go and read. And again, I might go back and do all the fun zone ones that way, because I think it might be a great way claire to visualize, if you haven't already got an account in true, how that feature might work.
Claire Waite Brown:Ah, I see yes. Well, good luck with that extra work you've given yourself.
Sam Sethi:And that's it for this week. Claire, Our audio is recorded and edited using Descript, and we're hosted by our friends at Buzzsprout.
Claire Waite Brown:You can support this show by streaming sats from your True Fans wallet or, better still, become a monthly supporter of this show. You can give us feedback using super comments in this episode.
Sam Sethi:And, equally, if you'd like to report a bug you've found in True Fans or suggest a new feature again, you can go into True Fans and you can find that in the sidebar at the bottom of the menu. And the good news, claire, is you own sats when you report a bug or suggest a new feature Fantastic. Finally, of course, if you want, you can just email support at truefansfm if there's anything else you need to talk to us about.
Claire Waite Brown:And if you would like to advertise on or sponsor this show, please email sam at truefansfm for further details.