Feature Request: Ability to turn off the appearance of automated transcripts
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I appreciate that transcripts are important and necessary for some listeners, but I really don’t like having them clog up the app, especially the way they appear above the episode description in the web version. I certainly don’t think automated transcripts, full of ums and misheard words, need to be there. Can we have a setting to turn off or hide transcripts?
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Hi @withaballoon – On the web app, only a small portion of the transcript is shown unless you click on it to display the full transcript. And on the mobile apps you have to tap on Transcript in order to see it. Are you seeing it somewhere else that is getting in the way? Would you be able to share a screenshot so we can see what you’re describing? Thanks!
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Sure, here you go. This is on web, which is how I mostly use Pocketcasts.
I know it’s just a preview, but I don’t want it there. It’s too big and almost pushes the episode description off my screen. In the case of this episode, the preview is just showing the text of an ad read. Most of the other episodes I’ve seen it on are the same, since that’s how a lot of shows start, or it’s showing the host saying “Hi this is X show, today we’re talking about Y”, which is redundant info.
As I said, I’m sure these transcript previews are helpful to some users and I’m find with them being on by default. I’d just like the ability to hide them since they interfere with the way I use PocketCasts.
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Thank you for sharing the screenshot and your feedback on this. I’ve forwarded this along to our development team to take into consideration as we refine the design going forward.
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Just wanted to second this request. Putting this above the episode description pushes wanted information away.
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Thanks, @mikerockwell. I would recommend thinking about what information a preview is likely to show – the first 20-30 seconds of most episodes are ads, music, introductory remarks or some combination of all three — and considering whether that information would take priority over an episode description for users.
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@arnvidr @withaballoon, that’s completely understandable! I’ve forwarded your feedback along to our team as well! Thank you!
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Thanks for taking this into consideration, I’d like to say I have the same issue with the transcript taking too much space above the description. Another issue is that it’s relatively slow to load so essentially I click into the episode, start reading the description and then after a bit the description text is pushed down when the transcript area loads and then it’s pushed down again when the transcript excerpt has loaded, which makes it hard to quickly scan through the description as I’d normally do.
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@ravensixty6 Thank you for bringing that to our attention as well! I’ll forward that along to the team!
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I came here to say the same exact thing as @ravensixty6 . As I remember the loading the description has been instant before, now it is slow, too slow, don’t want to look at a spinner..
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@larsabrasha Thanks for chiming in! I’ve made sure to share your feedback with the developers so we can look into improving this feature further.
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I’m gonna be blunt. I bought the app a long time ago. It is what I recommend to folks. I literally am such a power user that y’all subtweeted me in the patch notes one time because the amount of podcasts I listen to broke your app. I have personally been behind its sale to multiple people. If you don’t back off integrating generative ai I will turn on you so fast and stop at nothing to talk about your betrayal to the entire podcasting scene as loudly as possible. Generative AI is horrible for the environment, uses plagiarized content to feed itself, and erodes are sense of shared truth. Putting it into any consumer product makes you a villain, and I am so ANGRY that you WONT EVEN LET PEOPLE OPT OUT that I want to scream.
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to emphasize. I’m not being facetious. My entire body locked up the minute I saw that horrid “generative ai” diamond in my app when I opened it this morning. Like, it practically activates PTSD, and if it doesn’t for you that means you’ve been taken in by the marketing. Even if there’s a theoretical future where the stuff can be ethically used we are SO FAR away from it that any use outside of laboratory is actively contributing to the end of the world. You have no idea how serious I am. I switched to Linux the moment Microsoft ANNOUNCED the coming copilot integration. I’m saving up for a fair phone with a community OS so that I can go back to not having even the ABILITY for generative AI to be activated on my phone. I’m giving y’all a bit of grace because you’re a small team and it’s a fad, but I use podcasts medicinally. I literally keep them running essentially every hour of the day that I’m awake to keep myself from having panic attacks. It feels like someone cut open my medical device, filled it with cheese, and now is like “what? Everyone likes cheese.” Ignoring that A. Not everyone likes cheese, and B. Putting it in a medical device could kill folks. Fix it.
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@vranacat Thanks for sharing your feedback. Having generated transcripts has been one of the features users have requested the most over the years, primarily for accessibility. I get that it’s not for everyone, however, and I’ve made sure to share your comments with the rest of the team.
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I get that it’s a requested feature but you have the ability to tell your users you’re not going to invoke ecologically unsustainable generative AI to do it. You can stand up for some form of principles, to not feed podcasts created by other people (you know, the content of your platform) into a plagiarism turbine. I’m cancelling my subscription today. I’ll keep following you on socials, waiting for the announcement of when you abandon this fad.
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Thanks for chiming in too, @blankdave. I’ve also shared your feedback with the team now.
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Adding my voice to the request. I do not want even a preview of a transcript clogging up the screen on my iPhone. If you want to offer this as a Plus feature, fine, but it certainly won’t motivate me to use Plus… and even if I do decide one day to use Plus for other reasons, I would want the ability to turn this off.
It certainly should NOT be automatically appearing, on every episode, without being asked. Generate it when somebody asks for it. Not as a matter of course, and certainly not as a “ooh, here’s a teaser, we’re going to tell you about it every single time while also telling you you can’t see it because you haven’t paid”. It’s rude and offputting.
Plus there’s the energy use. If there’s one thing that’s truly irritating about the proliferation of AI (especially AI that the user has no control over), it’s that it’s constantly done without discussing the major increase of energy use involved in providing this “service”. Maybe this particular form of AI doesn’t take too much processing and hence energy, but it certainly takes some. And the cost/benefit analysis just isn’t there or offered to the user. It’s a classic case of tech bros pushing a shiny new toy onto people because they can, not because everybody was desperate for it.
Podcast transcripts are really only useful for podcasts I don’t particularly want to actually LISTEN to, which is rare, and if I was reading them it wouldn’t be on my small iPhone screen anyway. I use pocketcasts because it’s a nice, clean app on my phone. Please do not clog it up with something that is wasteful of space, wasteful of energy, not actually useful and only serving as a preview ad anyway. On every single episode? No. Go away. -
PS And while I understand it’s a requested accessibility feature… since when has any accessibility feature been turned on for EVERY user? That’s almost wrong by definition.
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@trevormobbsdae46d6a08 Thanks for chiming in and taking the time to share such detailed feedback. I’ve shared your thoughts with the team.
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@staff-frank I don’t want to hear “I’ve shared your thoughts.” I want to hear “we understand that many of our core users have ethical and functional issues with the inclusion of generative AI and will be looking into removing it or at least making into an OP IN technology. “Passed on to the team” tends to be corpo speak for “shut the fuck up. We want to enshittify the app and you can’t stop us.”
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