“An expert, whether self-invented or fully credentialed, is nothing without an audience, and digital media actually makes that truer than ever.”

I don’t remember how I first found Nick Quah’s newsletter HotPod, but I knew I’d found a kindred spirit when I did.

Nick was someone who, like me, scoffed at everyone who assumed that the podcasting industry started with Serial in 2014. We’d both been listening to podcasts nearly since the industry’s true beginning a decade earlier. But unlike Quah, I worked in the podcasting industry and…