Over the years, we’ve toyed with the idea of starting a podcast here at Zwift Insider. But it was simply too time-intensive of a project, so we opted to leave it to the experts.
Recently, though, I’ve been messing around with AI-based podcast generation tools. We all know AI is the biggest thing happening in tech right now – and it’s only getting bigger. What you may not know is that AI is revolutionizing the way podcasts are created, since AI can greatly reduce the time required to edit a podcast’s raw audio to remove unnecessary content and tweak audio settings for an optimal listening experience. (Simon used Adobe’s AI tools to edit the latest episodes of the Zwiftcast, in fact.)
I was interested in going one step further, though. Having already spent the time to write up detailed articles on so many Zwifty topics, I was looking for a way to auto-generate a full podcast. Just point the robot at key source articles, let it consume the content, and spit out a podcast with real (simulated) human voices.
Enter Google’s just-released NotebookLM, which does exactly that. And does it very well.
List to our first (let’s call it beta) episode, a 12-minute romp on the topic of Trainer Difficulty:
This podcast was created by pointing NotebookLM to the following posts:
- Using the “Trainer Difficulty” Setting in Zwift
- Using Zwift Trainer Difficulty to Simulate IRL Climb “Feel”
- What’s the Best Zwift Trainer Difficulty Setting for Zwifters?
- Zwift Trainer Difficulty on Descents: Did You Know?
- Trainer Difficulty on Zwift: How Much of a Bigger Granny Gear Does 75%, 50%, and 25% Provide?
- Wahoo Kickr Climb Zwift “Trainer Difficulty” Wheelbase Hack
As you’ll hear, NotebookLM has two voices (a male and female) who riff off of each other on the topic at hand. Having listened to this particular episode multiple times, I’m impressed by how they organize the content thoughtfully, summarize it, and even add little comments that I don’t remember writing in my original posts. Maybe that info comes from user comments on the articles? Or maybe the bots are more Zwift-smart than anyone realizes?
Your Feedback
I’m sharing this with the Zwift Insider audience because I want your honest feedback: do you believe a podcast with short episodes on specific Zwift features be useful to you, and/or the Zwift community at large?
Yes, no, maybe so… let me know in the comments below. You won’t hurt my feelings – after all, the episodes aren’t hard to create, and it’s not my voice you’re hearing!
I heard there is a group ride that does a podcast of all of their chats from during the ride so riders who miss the ride don’t miss out on the discussions during the ride.
I’ve heard that podcast. I don’t think it would make anyone’s top ten list.
Wow, really cool. The spelling out of KICKR really threw me though! 😉 I think it’s a great tool to summarize the info, although not 1:1 replacement for a real podcast obviously!
While it is well done, I would never listen to these. I have zero interest in hearing bots discuss an article for me. I would rather just have a web extension read the article for me as written, but more likely I would just read it myself.
100%
Agree, we’ll have audiobooks ready by the satnav next. The whole enjoyment of a podcast is the human discussion and interaction, not just two voices reading a script.
I like the idea of leveraging a technology in a creative way. But I also don’t see the benefit in this instance. People looking for information on trainer difficulty would be search for the information via text and then to read. AFAIK, audio isn’t really searchable and wouldn’t be skim-able by a human looking for an answer. I guess I don’t yet realize the market/use-case for AI generated podcasts/audio of text-ingested information.
You can get an AI to listen to it and create a transcript and find the answer to your question and provide a written answer.
Full circle 🤓
That’s a seriously impressive beta run right there! I was half expecting a monotonous and clearly computer generated read-through of the articles, but with the exception of some minor hickups such as “kickr” this could go unnoticed as AI generated content.
Do we need/want it? I personally think it is just another way of getting the content out. People are different; some prefer reading, others listening. I would expect there to be an audience for this. Interesting times =)
This would be my feelings on it exactly very impressive I doubt without a heads up most people would never know the difference. I would be interested to hear more to see if the quality is consistent.
…and as a follow up to the actual content: perhaps an article on virtual shifting and trainer difficulty. Does one neutralize the other at the extreme end of climbing, if you run 100% and then create a virtual cassette that gets that back down to say 50-ish % again?
I thought this podcast was fantastic. Saved so much time otherwise spent on researching various articles and opinions, not always with acceptable results. This content was insightful and explained in very simple fashion. I could see myself listening to more of these podcasts
Ouch! On this particular topic of Trainer Difficulty, the bots are especially heinous. Even when humans discuss this topic, 90% of conversations fail because they start with “makes the hills seem less resistant” (true, good start), continue with “watts are the same” (ok, I see that), but then fail to bring it home with “in exchange for easier feel, the game awards you less horizontal credit.”
The sound of the convo is spooky good. But since it’s just gracefully rehashing, if the hash from which it’s drawing is missing some meat, the bot convo won’t contain the missing meat either.
Definitely agree that the content it draws from needs to be good. Although in testing these tools, it’s wild how much the AI knows that isn’t included on the reference posts I feed it. So it’s definitely got some “intelligence” pulled from other places on the web.
I don’t understand your comment, “in exchange for easier feel, the game awards you less horizontal credit.” Can you explain?
I imagine two similar riders X and Y spinning side by side. If their watt output is the same and remains unchanged, rider X with lower trainer difficulty feels less resistance on a hill. But here is the part that’s usually left out – to maintain the same watts and pace as Y, X must increase their cadence.
In my reply above, I was critical of convos that fail to explain in full, and then I failed to explain in full {jumping right to the case if X maintains cadence and watts fall).
I worry about AI replacing people. People are flawed and imperfect and interesting. I like that. 🕊
Increase cadence… or shift to a harder gear and keep your cadence the same.
I wouldn’t say the game awards you with less horizontal credit. If you put out the same power as the other guy, you’ll go the same distance. Simple as that.
AI concerns me in lots of ways, as it probably does you and most thinking people. But I also think it’s folly to just ignore it, so… here I am, testing out one potential application.
Fantastic job with alot of information that would have taken me a long time to search, and I’ve searched alot about this topic and never really got a good answer until now.
Well done Eric and way to leverage your time to support all of us!
Best
chris
I prefer humans. And frankly I prefer written content
I mean… so do I. It’s why I write.
But I know LOTS of people who prefer to listen to content rather than read it.
This was more of a test to see how good the quality would be, and how easy it would be to produce. Obviously, asking the opinion of my readers probably biases the results of my very informal survey… 😄
I am generally curious on AI and I think they did a great job. Spending time in the car commuting every day I like audio content as well. Amazing job, and I would probably prefer this over a computer “reading an article”. However, the “artificial” personality still shines through and it becomes a bit stereotypical, but that is probably just a matter of calibration and making different personalities over time.
Eric – very cool work. Always impressed by how quickly AI is improving. That being said i think the magic of a good podcast are the things that cannot be done with AI – offhand jokes, people laughing, a real story they tell. So a ZI pod i would listen to would feature you and someone else (or two) actually talking about zwift experieneces.
Of course if there is a market for people who want to consume their zwift info by pod this would be a good way to do it.
I like it. Keep them coming
Yes technically very clever, but ethically I think it’s wrong, and is on the slippery slope of removing human creativity and replacing it with software.
Personally I would not listen to this, I prefer a human for their personality, mistakes, quirks etc, this is another casual step towards eradicating people’s jobs.
A good way to summarize multiple articles on a subject, especially for newcomers. A bit long winded though. Definitely a new useful tool to use but with moderation I think…
I tried that site for a few things and love it!
Here is an example from a podcast about the 2nd race next round, the first point race, aka Surf and Turf. Even that podcast did some shoutouts towards Zwiftinsider.
https://notebooklm.google.com/notebook/b617447d-008c-4668-8a50-55b05c2861b8/audio
AI is scary…
Apart from the weird pronunciation of Kickr, I wouldn’t have known this was AI. This was actually one of the best explanations of trainer difficulty that I have heard so this is a really good bit of information especially for the newbies…
No thanks.
Enjoyed that. Very informative 13 minutes while taking a break from raking leaves. Keen on more of these.