Sounds like they purchased Anchor for the ad insertion feature. IMO, as a podcast producer, this is a great thing. That said, Anchor currently lets us publish our podcast almost everywhere we'd like to. I can totally see Anchor being turned into Spotify: the podcast host, then that being done away with. I guess that's when we leave Anchor. I don't know, though. I hate having to run ads and how we never get support, but have reached something like 150 plays a week in a year.

I hate to sound like a jerk, but if people paid producers instead of subscribing to companies, the world may be a better place.