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Sharp curation for independent podcasters, audio producers, and marketing directors — before it hits mainstream feeds.

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Latest Issue
Feb 20, 2026

Issue #47 · The Quiet Monetization Playbook: What 50 Six-Figure Podcasters Actually Do

Most podcasters chase dynamic ad slots. The ones clearing $8k/month are doing something quieter — community access tiers, evergreen course funnels, and one live event per quarter. We mapped the patterns.

MonetizationStrategyGrowth
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Why Airwave Exists

The internet doesn't need another podcast aggregator.
It needs someone who actually listens.

Airwave started in 2022 because the newsletter landscape was full of link dumps dressed as curation. Forty-seven issues later, the editorial standard is the same: if it doesn't change how you make, market, or monetize your show, it doesn't run.

1

Curation is a craft, not a filter.

Every item in Airwave has been listened to, tested, or verified by a working audio professional. Nothing passes through on hype alone.

2

The best insight arrives before the think-pieces.

We monitor 340 RSS feeds, six Discord servers, and three private Slack groups. By the time something trends, it's already in our archive.

3

Gear talk without context is just advertising.

Every equipment mention includes real workflow context — who uses it, at what room size, with which interface, and whether the upgrade was worth it.

“The podcast industry produces 800,000 new episodes a week. Airwave covers the 12 that matter to your workflow.”

Jordan Merritt, Editor
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Monetization#47
Feb 20, 2026·9 min read

The Quiet Monetization Playbook: What 50 Six-Figure Podcasters Actually Do

Most podcasters chase dynamic ad slots. The ones clearing $8k/month are doing something quieter — community access tiers, evergreen course funnels, and one live event per quarter. We mapped the patterns across 50 shows that share P&L data with us.

Community tiers outperform ad revenue 3:1 after episode 100

The $500/month Patreon floor requires exactly 47 episodes

Live events convert at 12% from newsletter — vs 0.8% from social

Read full issue→
Growth#46
Feb 13, 2026·7 min read

Why Your First 10 Episodes Are the Wrong Ones to Promote

The discovery algorithm doesn't reward effort. It rewards episode quality at positions 11–25. Here's the data from 200 podcast RSS feeds.

Promotion spend on ep 1–10 has 0.3% retention rate

Episode 14 is the statistically optimal first promotion target

Read full issue→
Production#45
Feb 6, 2026·11 min read

DAW Wars 2026: Logic Pro vs Reaper vs Descript for the Independent Podcaster

We spent three weeks in each environment. The answer depends entirely on whether you edit by ear or by eye — and one of these is dramatically underpriced.

Reaper at $60 lifetime beats Logic for podcast-only workflows

Descript wins for remote interview cleanup — nothing else comes close

Read full issue→

44 more issues in the archive. Browse them all →

Who Reads Airwave

Built for people who take
audio seriously.

Not hobbyists. Not beginners hunting for basic tutorials. Airwave is for practitioners — people already in the room, already making shows, already thinking about the next move.

◎

Independent Podcasters

Editing in GarageBand at midnight, wondering if the RSS analytics are lying to you.

◇

Audio Producers

Shopping for a new DAW, evaluating interfaces, building client workflows from scratch.

◈

Marketing Directors

Weighing whether your brand should have a show — and what it actually costs to do it right.

11,400 practitioners read every Thursday. That number is real — we don't round up.

Next issue: Thursday, Feb 27

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