Slopcasting! Inception Point AI's Efficiency Kills Intimacy (and podcasts)
AI makes it easy to ship more… of nothing. Here’s why “slop-casting” is flattening audio and how to outplay it with Voice, Value, and Vulnerability.
Bonus: suggestion for a simple A/B experiment you can do today to audit your soul in the feed.
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Transcript
So in this episode, I'm gonna talk to you about why I think
Speaker:Inception point are complete idiots.
Speaker:Listeners, let's dive right into the latest and most effective moneymaking
Speaker:strategies that have emerged this week.
Speaker:So that's a real podcast.
Speaker:Created by Inception Point, AI under their Quiet please label.
Speaker:This is a company whose big idea is to replace real human
Speaker:creators with synthetic ones.
Speaker:Somehow they think that's progress, and they're calling any critics ignorant.
Speaker:Luddites.
Speaker:You're listening to Podcasting Insights with the Pod Master.
Speaker:I'm Neil Lio, the pod master, the Human one, and today we're talking about the
Speaker:creative apocalypse that nobody asked for, namely AI generated podcasts.
Speaker:I know what you're thinking.
Speaker:Neil, you use AI tools too?
Speaker:Yeah, I do.
Speaker:I use tools.
Speaker:I don't use sentient piles of algorithmic slop masquerading as podcast hosts
Speaker:Now with regards to how to make money, a podcast that has an AI generated thumbnail
Speaker:made in chat, GPT, it's obvious because chat GPT just loves those little gold
Speaker:logos with the dollar signs in them.
Speaker:It's using a AI generated voice, an AI generated script, and it's
Speaker:published using AI generated.
Speaker:Episode description notes.
Speaker:This show promises a guide on the art of how to make money.
Speaker:If I play you a clip, you are gonna get an idea of what that sounds like.
Speaker:Right now, starting your own business online is as
Speaker:accessible and lucrative as ever.
Speaker:Platforms like WAP and Map Academy have enabled university students
Speaker:to earn six figures by creating and selling online courses.
Speaker:Including unique offerings like Fortnite Map design.
Speaker:If you have specialized knowledge in any field, packaging it
Speaker:into educational modules can generate steady passive income.
Speaker:Now what Inception point have done, and they're quite proud of this, is create
Speaker:hundreds of these synthetic hosts.
Speaker:it's no different from what you would get if you use Notebook LLM.
Speaker:Or you had a conversation with chat GPT that you then recorded and
Speaker:published, who the hell wants to listen to a conversation with Chat, GPT?
Speaker:There's a reason that we can tell that this stuff is completely artificial.
Speaker:Even when we're having conversations with it, our brain won't allow us to
Speaker:converse with it like we would a human.
Speaker:Now each of these shows has a personality trained to sound relatable, but
Speaker:they don't actually feel anything.
Speaker:And that's kind of the point where all of this collapses.
Speaker:And I'm sorry, Janine, CEO of inception point.
Speaker:You can go on as many podcasts about podcasting, defending your product
Speaker:as you like, but here's a fundamental truth that you are not gonna like.
Speaker:It's coming.
Speaker:Before we get to that, let's talk about Inception point ai.
Speaker:They got podcasts about wellness, leadership, dating, spirituality,
Speaker:even some controversial people like Donald Trump and Charlie Kirk.
Speaker:and it's all voiced by ai.
Speaker:All of it entirely disconnected from the thing that makes any of
Speaker:these topics worth listening to.
Speaker:See, the thing is you can't fake scars.
Speaker:You can't fake failure.
Speaker:You can't fake knowing what heartbreak actually feels like, no matter how
Speaker:many language models you throw at it.
Speaker:Therefore, you can't relate to your target listener and all the
Speaker:emotions that they'll be experiencing while they're listening to you.
Speaker:Now, let's get into the nitty gritty of this here.
Speaker:I am not anti ai.
Speaker:I use D Script.
Speaker:I love Nic.
Speaker:Hell, I've probably had more conversations with chat GPT about stuff than I've
Speaker:had with most of my extended family.
Speaker:But there's a difference between using AI as a tool and using it
Speaker:as a substitute for your soul.
Speaker:This AI personality trend, kindness is the entire point of podcasting.
Speaker:Podcasting works because it's human to human.
Speaker:It's your voice in somebody else's head.
Speaker:They hear your hesitation, your laughter, your awkward pauses, and that's
Speaker:building trust ass building connection.
Speaker:So when you scribble that away, what you are left with.
Speaker:Is what I'm gonna start calling slop, casting low effort, zero empathy
Speaker:content designed to fill a feed rather than say anything meaningful.
Speaker:It's kind of the equivalent of when people used to sell those websites
Speaker:that would offer a link to you.
Speaker:As part of your link building campaign that were literally blank pages with
Speaker:the links written in the same color font as the background of the page.
Speaker:In other words, just a bunch of keyword stuffing that was meant to
Speaker:full Google into thinking your website had a decent link building strategy.
Speaker:And so this is the moment now, right now we're in it that pivotal point
Speaker:where creators need to decide what kind of side of the line they're on.
Speaker:Yes, automation can help you edit faster, it can clean up your sound, but if you
Speaker:think it can replace you, you're kind of missing the point of what podcasting is.
Speaker:Because the very thing listeners come for you is the one thing
Speaker:that AI can never be you.
Speaker:It can mimic your tone.
Speaker:It can't mimic your intention.
Speaker:It can sound confident, but it can't care.
Speaker:and this is exactly the part that Inception point AI doesn't get.
Speaker:And the reason why Janine's gonna hate me.
Speaker:Because they're selling you the illusion of authenticity, not the real thing.
Speaker:And they're telling you that this sort of stuff, it's just out there,
Speaker:so it's gonna get audience, therefore you are gonna make money from it.
Speaker:It's not how it works.
Speaker:And Janine.
Speaker:If you'd spend more than five minutes actually figuring out what
Speaker:podcasting is, rather than destroying the company you are once the CEO
Speaker:of you might have realized this,
Speaker:but here's the real danger that I want to address in this episode.
Speaker:When audiences get used to this kind of empty, frictionless content, then
Speaker:everything else starts to get devalued.
Speaker:It starts to flatten.
Speaker:You can already hear it happening on TikTok.
Speaker:Every motivational video sounds exactly the same.
Speaker:Every voiceover uses the same fake American AI voice reading
Speaker:from the same recycled script.
Speaker:Pretty much every video on TikTok actually sounds a little bit like
Speaker:Mel Gibson now, at least in my ears.
Speaker:And the moment we stopped noticing that and caring about that.
Speaker:That's when creativity dies, and this is why Janine and her team at Inception
Speaker:point are frankly fu&^ing dangerous because the people who win at podcasting
Speaker:aren't the ones with the most gear or the best SEO or the flashiest editing even.
Speaker:They're the ones who feel something when they're talking to you.
Speaker:The ones who aren't afraid to say, yeah, you know what?
Speaker:This didn't work.
Speaker:It's a bit crap, but here's what I learned from doing it.
Speaker:That's the kind of moment that no algorithm can fake.
Speaker:So if you are a creator thinking about ai, optimizing your podcast.
Speaker:Here's my general rule of thumb for you to follow.
Speaker:That will hopefully keep you on the right side of the tracks on this.
Speaker:Use AI to enhance your process, not replace it, so sure, let AI handle
Speaker:your transcripts, your show notes, your episode descriptions, et cetera.
Speaker:Your repurposing.
Speaker:Yeah, great.
Speaker:But when it comes to the producing of the actual content.
Speaker:Through this mic thing.
Speaker:Remember these three points.
Speaker:Rule one, your voice is the most important aspect, so don't sanitize your quirks.
Speaker:If you've got a weird laugh, strange accent, or you're incredibly blunt,
Speaker:hello, then that's your brand.
Speaker:It's what makes you real.
Speaker:Don't replace that with copy paste voices.
Speaker:Rule two, the value.
Speaker:Don't fill feeds with stuff.
Speaker:Say something that actually offers benefit to somebody.
Speaker:in an ideal world, your ideal listener.
Speaker:Even if that means one shorter, sharper episode instead of a weekly barrage of
Speaker:waffle, that's always the best route.
Speaker:Rule three is vulnerability.
Speaker:Be human.
Speaker:Share what you think, even if it's a bit messy, in fact, especially if it's messy.
Speaker:That's what separates you from how to make money from Quiet, please.
Speaker:Podcasts produced by Inception Point ai.
Speaker:I can help you make money.
Speaker:Sure you can love.
Speaker:If you've been wondering whether your own podcast sounds a little too
Speaker:robotic, or you're not sure what's working and what's just filler, that's
Speaker:literally what I help people fix.
Speaker:You can book in now for one of my podcast audits.
Speaker:I listen, I diagnose, and I tell you exactly what's holding your show back
Speaker:with no sugarcoating and no AI fluff.
Speaker:You'll find it at pod mastery.co/light.
Speaker:That's pod mastery.co/light.
Speaker:And if you are using AI to clone your own voice, then I suggest
Speaker:you book this immediately.
Speaker:Here's your related experiment for this week.
Speaker:So we've just wanged on about how to.
Speaker:What Inception point AI is doing with their platform.
Speaker:Quiet, please.
Speaker:What I want you to do is pick one of your old episodes,
Speaker:something you're really proud of.
Speaker:Then upload the transcript of that into an AI tool like chat, GPT, Claude,
Speaker:or whatever it is that you like.
Speaker:And ask it to rewrite this episode to sound more professional and polished
Speaker:then, and this is the key bit.
Speaker:Record.
Speaker:That version so that you can play it back to back with your original and do that.
Speaker:Listen to them one after the other, and I want you to make
Speaker:a note of these two things.
Speaker:Which one makes you feel something?
Speaker:Which one sounds like a person who's actually lived what they're saying?
Speaker:That's the difference that you are looking to achieve with your podcast.
Speaker:If after listening to both versions, you think that chat GT's actually
Speaker:nailed it better, there's a hint that maybe what you are putting out there
Speaker:into the world isn't quite as good as you might think it is, and therefore
Speaker:you might wanna look at some coaching.
Speaker:Here's the deal.
Speaker:AI will probably nail the structure.
Speaker:It will never nail the soul.
Speaker:It will never nail the belief.
Speaker:It'll give you cleaner phrasing, but it won't help you with the micro hesitations
Speaker:and the rhythm of real thought.
Speaker:You know, there's off the cuff.
Speaker:Hmm, that tell you listener, your human.
Speaker:Once you hear the difference, you'll never unhear it.
Speaker:That's the sound of trust and you can't prompt that into existence.
Speaker:Every episode I like to address some listener feedback, whether that's coming
Speaker:through email at po mastery.co/contact, or via voicemail pod mastery.co/voicemail.
Speaker:This one is from James in Manchester and again.
Speaker:When we don't have a voicemail, we do use ai.
Speaker:For the voices of listeners,
Speaker:here's James's email.
Speaker:Well, James, you've nailed exactly the problem that most podcasters
Speaker:face, so thanks very much for writing and bringing this to my attention.
Speaker:Sounds like you're in that precarious middle, as I call it, so you're too
Speaker:far along to call it an experiment at this stage, but you are too
Speaker:early to call it a polished product.
Speaker:So here's how I see it, and the advice I'd give you if you are one of my clients.
Speaker:First of all, map your core message.
Speaker:Before you push your podcast out into the world, are you able to sum it
Speaker:up in one crisp sentence that your listener will actually care about?
Speaker:What problem do you solve and who exactly is it for?
Speaker:Then set guardrails for your promotion.
Speaker:Decide in advance.
Speaker:I'm only gonna promote when I have at least three episodes with
Speaker:coherent messaging, clear cover art, and a rough social media plan,
Speaker:and use that as your checkpoint.
Speaker:Use what I call momentum windows as well.
Speaker:Be smart about it.
Speaker:If you feel ready ish, use some short bursts of promotion, maybe
Speaker:a week of guess swaps, a couple of focused, you know, clips.
Speaker:For Meta and Google, not a full launch campaign, just get some feedback
Speaker:in to guide your next refinements,
Speaker:so don't pause it entirely.
Speaker:I'd say just don't spray the promotion randomly either.
Speaker:Use the data that you have to validate your direction.
Speaker:Sharpen your messaging and then promote with a bit more confidence.
Speaker:I would say,
Speaker:and I would say this, if you want me to look more in depth at your positioning,
Speaker:what you are doing to promote your show and the actual content itself, that's
Speaker:exactly what I do in a podcast audit.
Speaker:So consider grabbing one of those if things don't improve for you.
Speaker:Thanks again, James.
Speaker:Well, thanks very much for listening.
Speaker:And here's what I want you to take away from this week's episode.
Speaker:AI isn't evil, it is efficient, but efficiency is the opposite of intimacy.
Speaker:And podcasting thrives on intimacy.
Speaker:So next time you are tempted to automate your voice, Remember this rule of
Speaker:three, which I mentioned to you earlier.
Speaker:Number one, your voice be unmistakably you.
Speaker:Even if that means taking a bit longer to get that out into the world.
Speaker:Number two, value, offer it.
Speaker:Say something that matters more than it sells.
Speaker:Number three, vulnerability.
Speaker:Show bits of yourself that robots would delete.
Speaker:That's how you stay human in a machine world.
Speaker:If this episode resonated with you and you think somebody you know might
Speaker:benefit from listening or watching, please do send them to pod mastery.co.
Speaker:If you haven't yet, give us a follow in whatever your podcast app of choice is,
Speaker:and although they make absolutely no difference to the show's success, but
Speaker:they feel good, if you fancy leaving me a review in Apple Podcasts, Spotify, cast
Speaker:Box, or any of the other platforms that allow you to leave comments, please do.
Speaker:I really appreciate it.
Speaker:Until the next episode, good luck continuing your journey.
Speaker:To attaining POD mastery.
