Data power the business world, and podcasting is no exception. Knowing what works and what doesn't across the whole of podcasting is a major competitive advantage. And guess who now owns it?Recently, https://newsroom.spotify.com/2022-02-16/spotify-acquires-podsights-and-chartable-to-advance-podcast-measurement-for-advertisers-and-insights-for-publishers/ (Spotify reached into their big bag of holding and pulled out enough cash to purchase both Podsights and Chartable). A good chunk of the overall podcast advertising spend is at least partially tracked by those two companies. From indie podcasters all the way up to large podcast networks. Beyond advertising, both let podcasters gain a more complete view of their shows' audience and download activity. And now, both of those services are owned by Spotify, giving Spotify access to data about more podcasts that aren't hosted on a Spotify-owned hosting company. And that may not be such a great thing. All of that collected data or additional insight can now be accessed by Spotify. All the smart promos, attribution modeling, and other nifty optimization features can now be accessed by Spotify. Because they own the companies that collect the data. Are you sure they won't peek?Spotify has placed massive, GDP-level bets on podcasting. If you listen to Daniel Ek, it seems like he's staking the future of his entire company on podcasting. Their investments—incredibly large investments—in podcasting have to pay off. Are you sure they won't mine through all of those juicy data in their quest for profit? Data collected on podcasts of every shape and size that extend well beyond those hosted on their platforms? Spotify is in the business of making money. How long can they keep their hands out of the cookie jar when the pressure from their investors to turn a profit really heats up? My bet is not very long at all. I'm not at Chicken Little level, but there are more implications I explore in the article and on the episode of @PodPont, which you can find at https://podcastpontifications.com/episode/all-your-podcasts-data-are-belong-to-spotify .You’ll find more thoughts on this topic and other questions every serious podcaster should be asking athttps://podcastpontifications.com ( PodcastPontifications.com).