Meghan Markle podcast taught Spotify an expensive lesson: expert

Spotify's deal to produce podcasts with Prince Harry and Meghan Markle  ended in 2023.

A joint statement from Harry and Meghan's company and the streaming giant said they had "mutually agreed to part ways".

Spotify confirmed it was not renewing Meghan's podcast Archetypes, which ran for 12 episodes from August 2022, for a second series.

The contract was estimated to be worth $25m (£18m) in late 2020.

Days before Meghan Markle's new show arrives on Netflix, podcaster Shaun Newman weighed in on why Meghan's podcast was cancelled after one season.

In a long thread on X, he said the Spotify's bet on the Duchess of Sussex  taught them an expensive lesson about what people really want.

He said: "Markle did 12 episodes. That's it. Done and dusted. But this isn't just about how many episodes you pump out.. Her show was all polish, all production, all... well, manufactured.

Every episode felt like a press release with better audio. And in podcasting that couldn't be less appealing...

People don't want polished perfection. They want real conversations. The kind you have sitting around a kitchen table, just... talking.

Podcasting isn't like mainstream media. It's intimate. It's personal. Most folks are listening alone, maybe on their commute or while working out.

They don't want some overproduced show. They want connection. Markle's show had a week or more of silence between episodes. You can't build a relationship by showing up once in a while. Markle's show felt like a lecture hall. One-way conversation."