Below is my #SFF2020 interview with interview with Mur Lafferty of Escape Pod. For the complete #SFF2020: The State of Genre Magazines report, including other interviews, or to download the report in Kindle, Epub and PDF formats, go here.
Interview with Mur Lafferty, Co-Editor of Escape Pod
Jason Sanford: I suspect most people in the SF/F genre don’t understand the difficulties of publishing a podcast magazine. What’s one aspect of running a podcast like Escape Pod that you wish more listeners and writers knew about?
Mur Lafferty: I think a lot of people believe that our costs are just to pay for our stories, but we are working toward paying everyone involved with bringing the podcast together. This includes the author, of course, but also the editors, production, the narrators, and we are working toward paying our associate editors, or slush readers. Everyone puts a lot of time and effort into this magazine and deserves to be compensated.
Jason: Escape Pod is the longest-running podcast magazine and pioneered the genre. How have things changed since the founding of Escape Pod? Would you say it’s harder or easier to raise funds for and financially support a genre podcast these days?
Mur: It's definitely harder. When Serah Eley started it in 2005, she was the only one on editorial/production and the donations only had to pay for the stories. Now we're a much larger production, with bigger teams and branching out to three sister podcasts. That's a lot more people to manage, keep track of, and pay.
Jason: In addition to paying your writers, Escape Pod also pays the narrators of your stories. Are there any other expenses associated with a podcast magazine which a text-only genre magazine may not encounter?
Mur: Oops, I'm answering the questions too early. But audio production and narrators are definitely a cost that text-only magazines don't need to worry about. In addition, we have to pay for someone to host and stream the audio content.
Jason: Do you pay any of your staff? How many hours of volunteer time does it typically take to create each episode of Escape Pod?
Mur: Again, answering too early! :) We pay everyone but our associate editors, and that's one of our fundraising goals. Counting the labor from first read to final post, we'd estimate a total of 5-6 hours per published story. Of that, only 15 minutes is currently unpaid, and we're working to change that.
Jason: According to this year's Locus Magazine survey, Escape Pod has an audience size of 37,000 people, making it one of the largest English-language SF magazines in the world. What percentage of your audience supports the magazine with donations? Any thoughts on how to convinces more genre readers and listeners to support the magazines they love?
Mur: I believe we have the typical 1% rate of donation. We have no funding but our listeners, and the couple of times we've been in trouble, we've been honest with saying, hey, we can't keep delivering the show to you if you don't support us, and they've always stepped up. With Patreon it's much easier to allow people to donate on a sustaining level and get rewards as well!
Jason: It seems to me that many of the genre magazines which have succeeded in recent years have built up a strong community of readers and writers. How important is to for a podcast to build its own community and support that community?
Mur: I don't think it's possible to thrive today without a strong community, especially online. Love it or hate it, social media is the fastest way to spread the word about something you like, and when we can get people talking about our stories, we see a difference.