# Hosting podcast(s) in Discourse
**URL:** https://meta.discourse.org/t/hosting-podcast-s-in-discourse/74859
**Category:** Feature
**Created:** [27.Ноябрь.2017 05:28:18 UTC](https://meta.discourse.org/t/hosting-podcast-s-in-discourse/74859 "2017-11-27T05:28:18Z")
**Posts on this page:** 13
**Page:** 1
### Author:  [@meglio](https://meta.discourse.org/u/meglio)
#### Post date: [27.Ноябрь.2017 05:28:18 UTC](https://meta.discourse.org/t/hosting-podcast-s-in-discourse/74859/1 "2017-11-27T05:28:18Z")
I can see two different ways on how a Discourse instance can be used for podcast hosting:
1. **One topic = podcast channel**
Have a topic setting that activates the “podcast” mode for the topic.
Every post authored by the topic author and containing an audio attachment = one episode
other posts in the topic are just the podcast / episode discussion
The Summarize button shows episode posts only
2. **One category = podcast channel**
Have a category setting that activates the “podcast” mode for the category.
First topic post with an audio attachment = one episode.
Following posts in the topic = episode discussion.
Have a “play” icon in front of each episode-topic.
Latests / Top view naturally shows the episodes list.
In both cases:
- Make the topic/category RSS with episode posts only, and make it compatible with most podcast platforms, like iTunes (Apple Podcast), Google Play etc.
### Benefits of using Discourse for podcast hosting:
- free = save money
- one less thing for site owners to setup and configure in order to run a podcast = save time
- people can host their own podcasts on your Discourse instance = help attracts more people to your community
- episode list with “play” button embedded into the main community website as a topic; this is not always possible with 3rd party solutions, e.g. if there is no oEmbed support [like in this case](https://meta.discourse.org/t/can-an-administrator-post-iframe-based-podcast-episodes-for-discussion/51551);
- natural way for the community to engage in discussion straight away and write comments as they listen.
- as with Discourse, you own your files
- naturally consumes Discourse’s backup = less things to worry about
- integrates well with the community by consuming Discourse features like Search, Advanced Search, topic pinning and interlinking, user mention (who’s featured in that episode?)
Might be a plugin territory?
Anyone likes the idea?
### Alternatives:
- if you have a website running in WordPress, use a plugin specializing in Podcast hosting, like [Seriously Simple Podcasting](https://wordpress.org/plugins/seriously-simple-podcasting/)
- use a complete solution like [Blubrry](https://www.blubrry.com/) or [Podcasting with SoundCloud](https://soundcloud.com/for/podcasting) (free plan limits you to 3 hours of uploads)
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### Author:  [@itsbhanusharma](https://meta.discourse.org/u/itsbhanusharma)
#### Post date: [27.Ноябрь.2017 05:34:24 UTC](https://meta.discourse.org/t/hosting-podcast-s-in-discourse/74859/2 "2017-11-27T05:34:24Z")
It can be into the plugin territory but not in the core but I don’t think most of communities do podcast so I highly doubt anyone writing a plugin for this.
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### Author:  [@SouperC](https://meta.discourse.org/u/SouperC)
#### Post date: [27.Ноябрь.2017 07:05:53 UTC](https://meta.discourse.org/t/hosting-podcast-s-in-discourse/74859/3 "2017-11-27T07:05:53Z")
I can’t imagine the use case of where a discourse community has a podcast being very common, let alone one that might host several.
We host our podcast on SoundCloud (including the rss) and have a podcast category on the forums. Then we just manually post each episode as a topic, using the soundcloud embed link.
The SC embed works quite well when posted in a topic on discourse.
It’s imperfect, mainly because the order of episodes gets jacked up when we get replies. Mainly we did it to have a place for our forum members and visitors to get access first, and join in a discussion of the episode if they wish.
We’d also set each new episode as a banner topic and share the link to the topic on our social channels.
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### Author:  [@barryvan](https://meta.discourse.org/u/barryvan)
#### Post date: [27.Ноябрь.2017 07:20:51 UTC](https://meta.discourse.org/t/hosting-podcast-s-in-discourse/74859/4 "2017-11-27T07:20:51Z")
> [@SouperC](#):
>
> We host our podcast on SoundCloud (including the rss) and have a podcast category on the forums. The SC embed works quite well when posted in a topic
This is what I’d recommend – perhaps using something like [https://meta.discourse.org/t/autobot-automatic-content-creator/71756](https://meta.discourse.org/t/autobot-automatic-content-creator/71756) to automatically create posts in your podcast category, too.
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### Author:  [@itsbhanusharma](https://meta.discourse.org/u/itsbhanusharma)
#### Post date: [27.Ноябрь.2017 08:23:47 UTC](https://meta.discourse.org/t/hosting-podcast-s-in-discourse/74859/5 "2017-11-27T08:23:47Z")
The Plugin sometimes Goes crazy with RSS and its really difficult to deal with.
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### Author:  [@SouperC](https://meta.discourse.org/u/SouperC)
#### Post date: [27.Ноябрь.2017 14:30:15 UTC](https://meta.discourse.org/t/hosting-podcast-s-in-discourse/74859/6 "2017-11-27T14:30:15Z")
Oh that’s interesting, thanks. We add shownotes and some other things as well, but it’s good to know that such a thing exists.
URL we’re using is [podcast.kartpulse.com](http://podcast.kartpulse.com) which is just redirected to the podcast category until we get the wordpress site up and running.
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### Author:  [@meglio](https://meta.discourse.org/u/meglio)
#### Post date: [28.Ноябрь.2017 02:27:30 UTC](https://meta.discourse.org/t/hosting-podcast-s-in-discourse/74859/7 "2017-11-28T02:27:30Z")
> [@SouperC](#):
>
> which is just redirected to the podcast category until we get the wordpress site up and running.
Was it an easy decision whether you wanted a category or a topic act as a podcast?
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### Author:  [@notriddle](https://meta.discourse.org/u/notriddle)
#### Post date: [28.Ноябрь.2017 03:09:43 UTC](https://meta.discourse.org/t/hosting-podcast-s-in-discourse/74859/8 "2017-11-28T03:09:43Z")
Discourse is supposed to have one conversation per topic. Putting an entire podcast in one topic (as opposed to having a separate topic for every episode) is not going to achieve that.
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### Author:  [@SouperC](https://meta.discourse.org/u/SouperC)
#### Post date: [28.Ноябрь.2017 16:49:26 UTC](https://meta.discourse.org/t/hosting-podcast-s-in-discourse/74859/9 "2017-11-28T16:49:26Z")
> [@meglio](#):
>
> Was it an easy decision whether you wanted a category or a topic act as a podcast?
The idea of just having a topic for each episode never crossed my mind for some reason, so that made it an easy decision 😄
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### Author:  [@riking](https://meta.discourse.org/u/riking)
#### Post date: [28.Ноябрь.2017 19:23:36 UTC](https://meta.discourse.org/t/hosting-podcast-s-in-discourse/74859/10 "2017-11-28T19:23:36Z")
> [@SouperC](#):
>
> It’s imperfect, mainly because the order of episodes gets jacked up when we get replies. Mainly we did it to have a place for our forum members and visitors to get access first, and join in a discussion of the episode if they wish.
You can fix that by making a link to the category listing sorted by creation date.
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### Author:  [@notriddle](https://meta.discourse.org/u/notriddle)
#### Post date: [28.Ноябрь.2017 19:37:31 UTC](https://meta.discourse.org/t/hosting-podcast-s-in-discourse/74859/11 "2017-11-28T19:37:31Z")
How? [https://meta.discourse.org/new](https://meta.discourse.org/new) shows a limited number of recently-created posts, not a list of everything, sorted by creation date.
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### Author:  [@jomaxro](https://meta.discourse.org/u/jomaxro)
#### Post date: [28.Ноябрь.2017 20:27:09 UTC](https://meta.discourse.org/t/hosting-podcast-s-in-discourse/74859/12 "2017-11-28T20:27:09Z")
In the settings for the category you wish to sort differently, change the `Topic List Sort By:` setting.
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### Author:  [@SouperC](https://meta.discourse.org/u/SouperC)
#### Post date: [28.Ноябрь.2017 23:26:32 UTC](https://meta.discourse.org/t/hosting-podcast-s-in-discourse/74859/13 "2017-11-28T23:26:32Z")
> [@jomaxro](#):
>
> In the settings for the category you wish to sort differently, change the Topic List Sort By: setting.
Thanks for pointing this out. ❤