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Comment by jimmySixDOF | Hacker News Reader

After being a user for many many years, I just recently tested out to Snipd [1] and have not looked back since. Pocket Cast were great but I don't see them innovating. With Snipd there is almost always a full text transcript available including a surprisingly accurate AI generated Table of Contents to cue through. Then I can easily save a transcribed clip of some section I am listening to for export to a TfT program like obsidian. Not sure how I ever lived without these features now I am used to them lol.

[1] https://www.snipd.com/

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> I don't see them innovating

For a podcast app that's a feature, not a bug.

Exactly! What features do we really need? Many “feature” suggestions I come across are people trying to make podcasts something they’re not so that they suit the person writing.

Snipd’s features are great. What kind of feature is making podcasts what they aren’t?

Taking notes makes sense to me for podcasts. Syncing with https://Readwise.io makes sense to me too.

As someone who's never taken notes while listening to podcasts, I'm curious what your use cases are. Do you listen as part of your research for a project?

Mostly I listen to podcasts but there's a few I listen to for learning, specifically a podcast discussing recent developments in law. I might try listening to these podcasts in Snipd (or with Airr) to try out how easy it is to clip relevant chunks, while using Pocket Casts for the vast stuff I listen to for fun/entertainment.

I think most people listen to podcasts for fun and entertainment so it's unlikely they'll want to clip, get transcripts etc. But the small number of podcasts doing deep dives on scholarly, technical or professional matters? It's potentially quite useful to be able to get transcripts/excerpts with highlights and audio clips to add to personal notes for future reference.

Politely disagree. The Pocket Casts app UI can definitely use some improvement. There's no such thing as perfection, and this app is far from perfect.

Reading about how they were sold in 2018 to NPR explains A LOT of why it hasn't changed much in the last 4 years.

I think it's pretty close to perfect at this point and is a million times better that the interface they had when I started using it nearly 10 years ago.

People say this all the time in all kinds of product categories. They are nearly always wrong. There's always some feature you didn't think of.

Plenty of good and useful features have been added to podcast apps since the first one shipped.

Seems like snipd is only a mobile app, the big feature that keeps me on PocketCast is the fact that I can seamlessly transition from listening on the Browser in my office, to the Mobile app in my car without loosing my place on any podcast.

This is exactly why I started using Pocketcasts to begin with. I was looking for something with a desktop app. I use Pocketcasts on my phone, my computer and my Alexa and it’s all kept in sync.

wow, to each their own... I just installed spind based on this but it wanted me to pick categories so it could spam me with suggestions. There's no skipping it so I uninstalled. I have zero desire for a podcast app to suggest podcasts to me period. I get plenty of recommendations from the podcasters I listen to. I don't need more even more ads in my life.

Thanks for this.

Pocket Cast user 2013-2018

Castro user 2018-2022. I switched to them after an awful PC rewrite.

Snipd looks interesting. May be my 2022-2026 daily driver.

When, oh when, will Castro make an iPad app? I'm convinced that no one is working on it full time.

At this point Castro is either abandonware, or they are over-polishing a huge (at this point vaporware) update…

There’s “move fast and break things” and then at the entire other part of the spectrum is the Castro team.

No desktop app, no thanks.

Snipd is running in a lowered refresh rate when I start it on my Android.

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