Top 5 Orchardcast Episodes of 2024

I released 20 episodes of my new long-form interview podcast this past year.

Starting this year, I began to make more use of the podcast function of this newsletter, releasing regular in-depth interviews with authors, journalists, academics, activists and politicians.

My original plan was to make the Orchardcast an exclusive feature for paid subscribers only, save for a five to 10-minute preview, but I decided a few months ago to expand the preview to provide the first half of each episode for free to anyone.

Below are the top 5 performing episodes of the podcast’s first year, as calculated by Substack through a somewhat arcane combination of views, preview downloads, full-episode downloads, likes and subscriptions.

I’ve got some good interview ideas lined up for 2025, so if you want full, untrammelled access to future episodes, plus the 20 episodes I released this past year, sign up as a paid subscriber.

Views: 3,057

Preview downloads: 1,148

Downloads: 61

Likes: 12

Subscribers: 6 (2 paid, 4 free)

Views: 2,781

Preview downloads: 423

Downloads: 87

Likes: 12

Subscriptions: 5 (4 paid, 1 free)

Views: 2,333

Preview downloads: 197

Downloads: 239

Likes: 10

Subscriptions: 5 (2 paid, 3 free)

Views: 2,712

Preview downloads: 582

Downloads: 88

Likes: 8

Subscriptions: 6 (1 paid, 5 free)

Views: 3,861

Preview downloads: 1,226

Downloads: 169

Likes: 3

Subscriptions: 45 (17 paid, 28 free)