The Golden Globes will present one podcast with the inaugural Best Podcast award on January 11 in Los Angeles and the nominees are shows that appear to avoid any sort of politics or controversy. Mark Kennedy writes about the nominations for the AP saying, “The six nominees for the inaugural best podcast award are “Armchair Expert with Dax Shepard,” “Call Her Daddy,” “Good Hang with Amy Poehler,” “The 
Mel Robbins Podcast,” “SmartLess” and “Up First,” from NPR. Representing a mix of news, advice and celebrity interviews, they were drawn from a shortlist of 25 programs the Globes had previously deemed eligible. The nominations avoided politics or controversy by passing on popular podcasts from the shortlist, such as conservative-leaning programs ‘The Megyn Kelly Show,’ ‘The Tucker Carlson Show,’ ‘The Ben Shapiro Show,’ Candace Owen’s ‘Candace’ and, most notably, ‘The Joe Rogan Experience,’ which topped Spotify, Apple and YouTube’s list of weekly podcast charts this year. The left-leaning ‘Pod Save America’ also was snubbed, as were popular true crime podcasts like ‘Morbid’ and ‘Rotten Mango.’” Kennedy notes in his report that Ben Shapiro lobbied hard for his show. “Shapiro had launched an all-out Golden Globes publicity campaign for his decade-old podcast, on which he’s spoken with the likes of U.S. Vice President JD Vance and Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy in the past year. In addition to making the rounds with industry publications, Shapiro also secured massive billboard space in New York City’s Times Square.” Read the AP story here.
