The legacy streaming model was built for the platform, not the creator. Between opaque payout formulas and the struggle for algorithmic visibility, artists are often sidelined from the value they create.

We launched Fountain for Artists to return sovereignty to the musician. Fountain is built on open protocols - RSS, Bitcoin, and Nostr - ensuring that your music, your fan relationships, and your earnings are never gated by a single company. Whether you’re a solo producer or a full touring band, Fountain provides the infrastructure to build a sustainable career on your own terms.

With Fountain for Artists, you can now:

• Publish and distribute your music to an open, global ecosystem

• Earn instantly with direct-to-artist payments from every listener

• Cultivate a community through exclusive subscriptions and tiers

• Own your data with transparent analytics and audience insights

• Manage your team with automated revenue splits for collaborators

Get started

Distribution without compromise

Professional hosting designed for creative autonomy.

• Unlimited catalog: Upload your entire discography without artificial limits or recurring per-track fees.

• Open standards: We use open protocols so your music remains portable. You aren’t locked into a walled garden, you’re part of the open internet.

Instant, transparent monetization

Stop waiting for royalty checks. Start earning in real-time.

• Instant payments: Listeners support directly from the player. Get paid for every minute listened, or receive one-time payments with a comment (known as “Boosts”).

• Automatic splits: Adding collaborators is easy. Set your percentages and your team gets paid automatically and instantly.

Premium fan experiences

Turn listeners into patrons by launching a paid subscription.

• Exclusive releases: Offer bonus tracks, early access, or high-res masters to your most dedicated supporters.

• Frictionless payments: Listeners can subscribe with their card through Stripe or use Lightning for instant, low-fee payments.

• Direct engagement: Communicate with your supporters without fighting an algorithm for their attention.

Advanced analytics

Elite-level insights to help you grow.

• Audience depth: See exactly who and where your fans are, and how they are interacting with your music across the open network.

• Revenue tracking: Monitor your earnings across subscriptions, one-time payments, and streaming revenue in one clean dashboard.

A new home for your music

Fountain is built to support your vision, not dictate it. Whether you are building a small, dedicated circle of supporters or reaching a global audience, we provide the tools for you to remain independent and in control.

Start today for just $1/month. Create your artist page, publish your music and convert listeners into supporters. Just head to fountain.fm/artists.

Get started

For more details on the what and why of Fountain for Artists, check out these articles:

Open Distribution: The Quiet Power of RSS
Open Payments: Rewriting the Payout Model for Artists
Open Social: How Streaming Forgot the Social Side of Music

Fountain has always been compatible with CarPlay and Android Auto, but the app has never really been optimised for use when driving. As the world takes to the roads to travel home to their families, we wanted to make some timely improvements to offer the best in-car experience possible.

You can now use your vehicles’s built-in controls to open Fountain and find something to listen to. That might not sound like headline news, but if you who often listen to Fountain in the car, this will be music to your ears.

The Home tab shows your recently played episodes, making it easy to pick up where you left off. You can also explore trending episodes and trending tracks, which are recommendations from other listeners you are following.

The new Library tab now includes Albums, Artists, Episodes, Shows and Tracks. There is also a dedicated page for Downloads, in case you’re driving through area with poor coverage. The Queue tab remains unchanged and works just as it always has.

We’ve also added collection playback to improve listening continuity. When you select an item from an Album, Artist, Trending Tracks, or Tracks page, we’ll now load and play the entire collection starting from your selected item.

Finally, here’s a quick look at Android Auto, which also features library search. The new in-car improvements are available now in version 1.4.4 on iOS and Android.

We would love to hear how you’re finding Fountain. Please submit your thoughts and feedback via the main menu in the app and we will take it on board as we continue to improve the app.

If you want to help test new features out before they get released, you can join Fountain Beta on Telegram. All iOS and Android users welcome.

Wallet Redesign

The first thing you’ll notice after updating is a cleaner, simpler look for the new Fountain wallet. But this wasn’t just about refreshing the design - we’ve added several highly requested features and made user-friendly improvements across every payment surface in the app.

Nostr Wallet Connect

Here we go… the most requested feature of 2025! You can now use an external wallet like Alby or Primal to send and receive payments on Fountain. To connect an external wallet by pasting your the Nostr Wallet Connect String. You can switch between your Fountain wallet and your external wallet at any time.

Choose Amount

The redesigned choose amount screens offer a much smoother and more transparent experience. As you enter an amount, you’ll see the minimum and maximum you can send, as well as the estimated fees that apply.

Pay Lightning Address

You can now pay anyone instantly from Fountain. Enter the recipients Lightning Address or search for their Nostr profile, then add an optional message with your payment. This feature is accessible from the Send options in the Fountain wallet.

Withdraw to Strike

Strike is doing great things, and we are proud to be partnered with them to make moving money between apps more seamless. By popular demand, we’re excited to announce that you can now withdraw to Strike through our Connect Strike feature.

For listeners, connecting Strike allows you to deposit funds to Fountain in your preferred currency without leaving the app. For podcasters and artists, connecting Strike makes it possible to convert your earnings into your preferred currency and send them your bank account.

Choose Payment Method

More podcasts and artists now support card payments, allowing you to pay in your preferred currency through Stripe. You can now choose your payment method when boosting and switch to card whenever it’s supported.

If you’re a podcaster or an artist and you want to make card payments available for your listeners, sign up for Fountain for Podcasters or Fountain for Artists and connect a Stripe Business account.

We would love to hear how you’re finding Fountain. Please submit your thoughts and feedback via the main menu in the app and we will take it on board as we continue to improve the app.

If you want to help test new features out before they get released, you can join Fountain Beta on Telegram. All iOS and Android users welcome.

The good news? Podcasters can now deliver both audio and video in any supporting app, letting listeners switch formats seamlessly wherever they listen.

See it in action here: https://fountain.fm/episode/bb3MURtHHVbPFkvvDpTc

And read on to learn how it works under the hood.

Why Video Can’t Be Ignored

Over the last 20 years, the internet has become more social and far more crowded with content. While this gives listeners more choice, it also means creators face tougher competition.

Video has become one of the most reliable ways to stand out. Although audio listeners tend to be more loyal, audio content is harder to discover. Short video clips can break through on social platforms and reach people who may never find the podcast otherwise. And when that video isn’t locked to a single platform like YouTube, the whole podcasting experience becomes better for both creators and listeners.

The Status Quo

Podcasts are usually distributed via RSS feeds - computer-readable documents that contain information about the podcast: its title, description, and more. ‘Enclosures’ are elements in the RSS feed that link to the audio file for each episode, which lets podcast apps download the audio to the listener’s device.

Podcasts in video form do exist, so how is that implemented today, and what are the drawbacks?

Alongside their RSS feeds, creators often upload video versions of their podcast to YouTube and other closed platforms. This makes video a great way to consume a podcast for users of those platforms, but it moves us away from open podcasting because the video files aren’t publicly accessible and can’t be viewed in your app of choice.

Another option is to include video directly in the RSS enclosure: apps like Apple Podcasts support certain video formats, such as MP4, through open podcasting protocols. That’s a much better approach than relying on closed platforms, but it still comes with a few issues. Conventional video formats aren’t ideal for many scenarios - file sizes are large, resolutions are fixed, and streaming is less flexible. And even if you solve those problems, most podcast apps were built for audio, so putting video where they expect audio can break things. Some podcasters work around this by publishing separate audio and video feeds, but that only complicates things unnecessarily, especially when modern standards provide a cleaner solution.

Alternate Enclosure: Podcasting 2.0 Solution for Video

Podcasting 2.0 is a set of community-driven standards that improve the experience for both podcasters and listeners. One such improvement is the alternate enclosure - a way to include multiple versions of your episode media in the RSS feed.

With this approach, a hosting company can include the regular audio in the main enclosure and add a video file as an alternate enclosure. This allows audio-only apps to keep working as they always have, while apps that support video can offer a full video experience. Video-supporting apps can choose to show both options or simply default to video.

Video is more demanding than audio, but modern formats make it far more practical. Formats like HLS support multiple resolutions and split videos into many smaller segments, making distribution and playback much more efficient. This leads to a smoother experience for listeners and lower costs for podcasters.

Video at Fountain

Fountain aims to make video podcasting open, giving podcasters and listeners real choice instead of locking them to a single platform.

Fountain for Podcasters, our hosting platform, lets creators upload video alongside audio. We optimize each video for both standard and high quality playback, so it works well even on limited connections. We then include both audio and video in the RSS feed, and any app that supports video can display it.

Fountain App, our podcast player, lets anyone watch videos included in a podcast’s RSS feed - even if the video isn’t hosted on Fountain. Listeners can switch between audio and video, download videos for offline playback, and support creators while they watch.

We’ve also made major improvements to the video experience on desktop. The web version of Fountain now offers an interface that rivals video-native platforms: closed captions, advanced controls, automatic quality selection, comments, and more. You can check it out here.

We hope this shows podcasters and listeners what’s possible with open standards that don’t lock video to individual platforms or proprietary protocols. As more hosting companies and apps adopt these standards, the whole ecosystem becomes more open, putting pressure on closed platforms to offer a better, more seamless experience.

How to Support Open Video Podcasting

Hosting companies: Support alternate enclosures and allow creators to upload both audio and video.

Podcast apps: Support alternate enclosures and let users watch video directly in the app.

Podcasters: Ask your hosting provider to support alternate enclosures or switch to one that already does, like Fountain for Podcasters

Listeners: Tell your podcast app you want open video support or switch to an app that already has video, like Fountain. Most importantly, let your favorite podcasters know why open video podcasting matters!

Subscribe now

The top 500 podcasts capture nearly half of all U.S. ad revenue, leaving the other 99.9% at a disadvantage when it comes to monetization.

Existing platforms don’t make it easy. They charge high fees, offer a poor user experience, and keep control of your audience relationships.

We launched Fountain for Podcasters to help you generate a reliable income stream and build a thriving community - regardless of your monthly downloads.

Fountain is built on open protocols - RSS, Lightning, and Nostr - ensuring your content, audience, and payments are always yours.

With Fountain you can now:

• Host and distribute your podcast seamlessly to every platform

• Upgrade your listener experience with video, chapters and transcripts

• Launch a paid subscription and offer exclusive benefits to members

• Receive card payments for subscriptions and donations

• Interact with listeners across multiple apps

• Access advanced analytics for your audience and revenue

Let’s get into some of the core features of Fountain for Podcasters…

Publish like a pro

A premium podcast hosting platform built for a superior listener experience.

• Distribute everywhere. Switch to Fountain from your current hosting provider in minutes without any interruption for listeners.

• Upload video versions. Your video is embedded directly in your RSS feed, allowing listeners to toggle between audio and video on supporting apps.

• AI automation. Save time and reduce dependency on third-party tools with auto-generated transcripts and chapters.

Receive donations instantly

Allow fans to pay you directly from the app they are listening on. Engage with your audience on modern podcast apps and Nostr clients - all in one place.

• Boosts: In the Fountain dashboard we make it easy to respond to Boosts and comments from your listeners.

• Streaming payments: Get paid every minute and watch payments come in from listeners in real time.

• Splits: Add co-hosts and team members to your splits and they will get paid too. All you need from them is a Lightning Address.

Paid subscriptions made seamless

Subscription platforms that generate private RSS feeds deliver a poor experience for you and for your listeners. Publishing episodes for paid subscribers behind a paywall in your public RSS feed allows for frictionless sign up, improved security, and less work for you.

• Choose subscriber benefits. Offer bonus episodes, early access and ad-free listening to your paid subscribers on Fountain.

• Flexible pricing. Set a minimum monthly subscription price and listeners can pay more if they wish.

• One-time purchases. Price each episode behind your paywall so listeners can unlock them without a subscription.

• Choose payment methods. Connect Stripe to take card payments, or get paid instantly and with lower fees via Lightning.

Know your audience

Get detailed insight into listeners and supporters across all apps.

• Track your downloads. Monitor your audience growth and spot trends across every app, platform and country.

• Track your revenue. Chart your supporter growth and see detailed analytics across all payment types.

Join our webinar on October 30 to learn more

Get a full walkthrough of the platform and find out how podcasters hosting on Fountain are already earning from direct listener support.

🗓️ Thursday, October 30, 2025
⏰ 11:00 AM ET | 3:00 PM UK

Don’t miss this chance to be among the very first podcasters to see how Fountain can transform your show.

Reserve your place

Likes

Boosts and comments are great, but sometimes you just want to say “I enjoyed this” without typing anything. Now you can like any episode or track from the player or the content page. When you like something it shows up:

• In the feed for people who follow you

• On your profile under Recent Likes

Likes also influence what gets featured in the Trending sections on the new Home tab (more on this in a moment). Likes on Fountain are powered by Nostr, so they can work in any supporting podcast apps.

Liking is the easiest way to recommend content to your network. Try it out and see what your friends are liking too.

New Home Tab

You will notice some big changes to the Home tab in the app and on our website to give you recommendations based on people you are following.

• Recently played: Jump back into podcasts you already started listening to

• Live now: See livestreams from people you are following

• Trending: See which episodes and tracks were recently boosted, liked or shared by people you are following

The Feed now has its own dedicated tab and we’ve also added a Trending view which allows you to see the top boosts.

Improved Search

Let’s be honest - our old search wasn’t great. In 1.3, we’ve completely rebuilt our content search index from scratch and rolled it out in the app and on our website.

• Faster and more relevant search results for podcasts, music, profiles and clips

• Find episodes by keywords in the title, subtitle, or description

• See your recent searches

We’ve also made some design and UX improvements to the charts as well as featured shows, artists and music shows.

Nostr Infrastructure Upgrades

In Fountain 1.3 we've completely rebuilt our Nostr database for speed and stability. Browsing the feeds, comments, profiles, and reactions should feel noticeably snappier.

Bug Fixes and Other Improvements

• Boost with bank card added for select shows hosted on Fountain

• Nostr Live stream bug fixes and UX improvements

• Early access improvements (locked items won’t automatically add to you queue)

• Music collections like My Tracks and Hot Tracks now play in sequence

• Track playback position is now saved in player when returning to the app

• Added light haptic feedback on reactions

• Follow/unfollow a show directly from the menu

• Improvements to import podcasts flow

We would love to hear how you’re finding Fountain. Please submit your thoughts and feedback via the main menu in the app and we will take it on board as we continue to improve the app.

If you want to help test new features out before they get released, you can join Fountain Beta on Telegram. All iOS and Android users welcome.

Player Design Refresh

The new player interface makes listening to podcasts — and music — feel smoother and more refined. Artwork takes center stage, complemented by larger text, a cleaner layout, and smoother transitions. Playback controls are now more intuitive and easier to use. We’ve also made subtle UX improvements to the clipping tool, which you can now access via the tab bar at the bottom of the player.

You will notice that earning rewards are no longer shown on the player. Instead, you’ll see a toast notification when you first play a podcast each day which lets you know if you’re earning today (and what your rate is).

Video Playback

Fountain now supports video podcasts and you can now toggle seamlessly between audio and video by tapping the artwork on the player.

If a show provides an MP4 or HLS video in their feed, you’ll see a video icon on the episode card and episode page. By default, video will auto-play when available. You can customize this in Settings > Playback to control video playback based on your data preferences (Never, Wi-Fi only, or Mobile Data).

You can find a demo created by Justin Jackson below and learn more about the implementation over on the Podcast Standards Project blog.

We’ll soon be sharing an update on the new podcast hosting product we’ve been building. It will allow podcasters to upload a video version when publishing new episodes, making video playback available in all supported apps. Please contact us if you'd like to learn more and get access to our beta.

AirPlay and Chromecast Support

You can now cast audio and video to your favourite devices with AirPlay and Chromecast support. Tap the artwork on the player to see your casting options and connect with ease.

Auto-Queue on Play

We’ve added a new library setting which automatically queues episodes when played. Choose whether you want the episodes added to the top or the bottom of your queue. You can enable this by going to Settings > Library.

Other Bug Fixes & Improvements

• Improved playback of downloaded content on Android

• Fixed issue where play position was lost after resuming

• Fix for playback state tracking, reducing issues with paused or unresponsive play buttons

• Faster seek forward/back responsiveness

• Improved support for custom RSS feeds with video enclosures and modern streaming formats (HLS, DASH, SmoothStreaming)

• Fixed an issue where queued items were not advancing properly when played from the queue or library

• Resolved crash when setting custom boost/zap amounts

• Fixed issue where downloaded items could fail to resume

• Solved occasional "grey screen" in the Library due to incorrect content mapping

• Seek errors on iOS when loading new assets are now resolved

• Transcript start/end times are now more reliable

• Improved error handling and transcript performance

• Reduces unnecessary UI rebuilds for player controls and queue

• Filters out live items from auto-delete downloads

We would love to hear how you’re finding Fountain. Please submit your thoughts and feedback via the main menu in the app and we will take it on board as we continue to improve the app.

If you want to help test new features out before they get released, you can join Fountain Beta on Telegram. All iOS and Android users welcome.

Library Design Update

• New content-type filters at the top of the page make it easier to navigate between podcasts and music in your library.

• Recently Played is now the default view in your library, so it’s easier to jump back into podcasts you’ve already started.

• The Music filter now makes it easier to find saved tracks and albums, and it also gives you a list of all the artists whose music you’ve saved.

• We’ve refreshed the design of the content cards to make it easier to see how much time is remaining on episodes you’ve already started.

Content Pages Design Update

• All of the different content pages have undergone an extensive redesign, including shows, episodes, artists, albums, tracks, clips and playlists

• We’ve replaced the tab layout we were using on the content pages with one scrollable page, making it easier to access features like chapters and tracklists

• We’ve sanitised the formatting of show notes too, and if there is no activity for a given episode, we now display the expanded show notes

Episode Summaries

Ever looked at a 4-hour Lex Fridman episode and wished you could just read a high-level summary? We certainly have, so we did something about it.

• Every episode page now has a Summary button above the show notes.

• Simply pay 500 sats to unlock a summary, or upgrade to Fountain Premium for $2.99/month to enjoy unlimited summaries.

• Summaries and transcripts now come as a bundle — two for the price of one!

• Thanks to major improvements, they’re now faster, cheaper, and more accurate than ever before.

Playback Improvements

We’ve completely rebuilt our audio engine from the ground up. Playback is now more robust and reliable — especially for music. Here are some of the key enhancements in Fountain 1.2:

• Tracks now load and play instantly when tapped.

• When playing a collection of tracks (e.g. from an artist, album, or playlist), you can now skip seamlessly between them.

• We’ve replaced the scrollable player page with full-screen modals to make it easier to access show notes, comments, transcripts, chapters, tracklists, and your queue.

• The new Smart Resume feature rewinds the episode by 5 seconds when you hit pause, so you don’t miss a beat.

• You can now skip forward or backward by 60 seconds for faster navigation through episodes.

Other Bug Fixes & Improvements

• Rebuilt payment stats for more complete and reliable transaction records.

• Refreshed the design of the Settings pages for better usability.

• Added new episode notification preferences in Settings.

• Fixed several playback issues that were causing crashes or freezes.

• Updated lock screen display and controls for livestreams.

• Fixed issue where the next item in the queue paused unexpectedly.

• Resolved playback stuttering on Android during livestreams.

• Fixed disappearing playback controls on the lock screen.

• Fixed playback speed not updating correctly.

• Resolved issue where played episodes couldn’t be replayed.

• Fixed playback not resuming correctly when listening in the car.

• Synced car playback position with the device.

• Fixed persistent car display refresh issue.

• Fixed volume control via car controls.

• Resolved issue with headphone controls after playing a transcript.

• Fixed disappearing metadata on the lock screen.

• Fixed bug where downloaded episodes stopped in airplane mode but showed as playing.

We would love to hear how you’re finding Fountain 1.2. Please submit your thoughts and feedback via the main menu in the app and we will take it on board as we continue to improve the app.

If you want to help test new features out before they get released, you can join Fountain Beta on Telegram. All iOS and Android users welcome.

Nostr Live Streams (Beta)

If you follow shows like Rabbit Hole Recap, THE Bitcoin Podcast or Simply Bitcoin on Nostr, you can now watch the video in Fountain and hang out in the live chat as it’s being recorded. You'll find livestreams from people who follow on Nostr at the top of the home screen.

As well and live podcasts, you will also find live music events from Phantom Power Music, radio stations like NoGood and Noderunners, as well as channels dedicated to gaming, art, coding and much more.

Bringing creators and fans together through live experiences enables audience participation and creates a special feeling of community, so we’re really excited to get this into your hands.

Nostr livestreams are a beta feature - i.e. we still have a lot more work to do! We will continue to make improvements to livestreams over the coming months - so we would love to hear your feedback.

Storage Manager

We’ve added a storage manager in the app’s settings so that you can view file storage size for audio downloads, video downloads, transcripts, image cache, feed cache, and temp files. You can delete all files in any of these folders to free up storage on your device so that Fountain continues to run optimally.

There are other performance and stability improvements that we are working on too. For example, in the next couple of weeks we will be rolling out an image proxy service, which should reduce mobile data usage and optimise storage. Stay tuned for further updates and, as always, thanks for your support.

If you want to help test new features out before they get released, or if you want to share feedback or send a feature request, you can join Fountain Beta on Telegram. All iOS and Android users welcome.

In 2024, listeners sent a total of $127,900 to creators on Fountain

The 2 BTC sent is equivalent to $127,900 based on a daily price conversion but it would be worth nearly 50% more today.

You sent over 40,000 boosts to your favourite shows and artists, with an average boost value of 3,380 sats (around $3.20 at today's price).

To add to that, over 63 million sats were streamed over the course of the year, representing 32% of total value sent.

Here are some of the shows and artists who picked up the top awards in 2024. To read the full article, head to our website.

Read Fountain Rewind 2024

Most Supported Show: Rabbit Hole Recap

Rabbit Hole Recap is a bitcoin news show hosted by Marty Bent and Matt Odell. Over the last three years, RHR has become one of the most-loved shows among Fountain listeners (affectionately known as ‘freaks’). In 2022 they were #3, in 2023 they were #2, and in 2024 they finally claimed the #1 spot. Congratulations, Marty and ODELL. Your dedication and humility is an inspiration to bitcoiners around the world.

Show with Most Supporters: Mr Obnoxious

Peter McCormack announced earlier this year that What Bitcoin Did, the preeminent podcast he has hosted for as long as we can remember, would come to an end to make way for a new show, Mr Obnoxious. In December, the Real Bedford FC owner announced that Danny Knowles would be the new custodian - much to the relief of the 800 listeners who supported the show this year. Thanks for everything, Pete!

Most Supported Episode: LINUX Unplugged | 545: 3,062 Days Later

LINUX Unplugged is just one of many popular shows about open-source, security and privacy from Jupiter Broadcasting. Editor-in-chief Chris Fisher finishes the year with three shows in Fountain's top 40. How? He and his co-hosts have made boosting a core part the listener experience, with his audience often sending "zip code boosts" (which can get pretty expensive if you live in Alaska).

Most Supported Artist: Ainsley Costello

At just 20 years old, Ainsley has been working toward a career in music for over half her life. Her music is the modern pop soundtrack of the next generation. Ainsley first made "waves" on the internet in August 2023 as the first artist to receive 1 million sats with her hit song “Cherry On Top.” Since then, she has inspired countless artists to follow her path, becoming the face of this exciting new movement.

Artist with Most Supporters: Man Like Kweks

Don Kweka is a producer and rapper from Tanzania. When he's not at his desk working his 9 to 5, he's making beats in his bedroom - and he has been prolific in 2024. Earlier this year he told Forbes he had earned a total of $25.68 from United Masters, the distribution company he uses for traditional DSPs (for which he pays a $60 annual fee). Since first publishing his music on Wavlake, he’s earned 2.3 million sats (over $2,000).

Most Supported Track: Abi Muir | Stockholm

Born in Scotland and now residing in Australia, Abi’s distinctive, goosebump-inducing vocals and heartfelt lyrics define her creative songwriting. Her unique style sees her delivering memorable, catchy pop songs of singer-songwriter prose with a contemporary pop sound. In Stockholm she explores a darker, harder edge to her music that crosses into alt-rock, topped with Muir's piercing, sultry vocals.

Read Fountain Rewind 2024 in full on our website

To see the full list of award winners, the top 40 shows and artists, plus the top stories from this year, hit the link below.

Read Fountain Rewind 2024

Share your Rewind for a chance to win Fountain AirPods, limited edition merch and 100,000 sats

Open the app to see your Fountain Rewind (make sure you're using the latest version). Post a screenshot of any screen in your Fountain Rewind on X or Nostr and tag @fountain_app in your post. We will be announcing three lucky winners on Dec 31 - good luck!

This weekend, Sats by SW is taking place in Austin, TX. The two-day event is a celebration of independent music and innovation presented by our friends at Tunestr.

• Sunday Dec 15 (from 12pm CST): A day of panel talks at Bitcoin Commons featuring artists and advocates for decentralised technology in the music industry.

  • Fountain live stream link here

• Monday Dec 16 (from 6pm CST): A night of music hosted by Adam Curry at the legendary Antone’s nightclub with some special live performances.

  • Fountain live stream link here

If you are in town, you can still pick up tickets here. On Monday night, the kind people at Azteco will be handing out QR codes at the venue that you can scan with your Fountain wallet to top up with some free sats.

We are very fortunate to have some of the artists performing at Sats by SW hosting takeovers on Fountain Radio before the event.

In case you missed it, Fountain Radio is a communal listening experience powered by Bitcoin and Nostr. Every week we will be inviting artists to take over the queue and share their music. To tune in, go to the Discover tab in the Fountain app, or go to our website.

Here is the schedule for the next few days…

Abel James

Friday 13 Dec (12:00 CST)

When he’s not writing New York Times bestsellers, recording new episodes for his award-winning podcast, or launching #1 food and health apps, Abel James likes to make music. He is a multi-talented madman. As a musician and songwriter, Abel has toured internationally, jammed with superstars, and won several awards for vocal performance. Earlier this year he made some of his album “Swamp Thing” available on Fountain. Ever since, he has become increasingly passionate about this new movement and attracted attention from new listeners with his fat, rocky blues sound.

Abel James on Fountain

FM Rodeo

Saturday 14 Dec (12:00 CST)

Based out of the Hill Country in Texas, FM Rodeo started in 2015 when Troy Dry and Johnny Elrod began recording the Machine Shop sessions. They describe themselves as an “alternative rock band playing punk grunge music for anybody with ears”. Their style is often compared to Green Day, Nirvana, Oasis, or more recently, Amyl and The Sniffers.

FM Rodeo on Fountain

Ainsley Costello

Sunday 15 Dec (10:30 CST)

Ainsley is a singer songwriter living in Nashville. At just 20 years old, she has been working toward a career in music for over half her life. Ainsley first made "waves" on the internet in August 2023 as the first artist to receive 1 million sats with her hit song “Cherry On Top.” Since then, she's built connections with a worldwide community of developers working on decentralised music projects powered by open protocols to try and change the music industry forever. She’s also inspired countless artists to follow her path, becoming the face of this exciting new movement.

Ainsley Costello on Fountain

Suzanne Santo

Monday 16 Dec (11:30 CST)

Suzanne Santo has built her sound in the grey area between Americana, southern-gothic soul, and forward-thinking rock & roll. She is a former member of the L.A. duo HoneyHoney, she has toured the world with Hosier, performed at Glastonbury in front of 60,000 fans and released two solo albums. Last month Suzanne made one of her tracks, “Worried”, available on Fountain and it was met a great reception after getting played on Boostagram Ball and M2H2.

Suzanne Santo on Fountain

Payment UX Improvements

We have updated the modals for all payment functionality across the app. Next time you boost, stream, zap, deposit or withdraw, you will notice that a few changes.

We now display both sats and USD values when making a payment. When choosing a custom amount, you can enter a value in either sats or USD. When making a payment, we have also added toast notifications to confirm that your payment was successful.

The best thing about $100k Bitcoin is it’s much easier to working out how much things cost because 1000 sats equals $1. The price won’t stay the same for long, but when it does you will be grateful for this update.

We will be adding support for more currencies in 2025 and we are currently working on reducing friction for listeners who want to deposit and withdraw using their preferred currency. Stay tuned!

Faster Boosts

Previously, you sometimes had to wait five seconds or longer for your boost to be sent. This was not a good experience. We’ve done some work to make boosts approximately 50% faster - so you should notice the difference.

There are a few other updates to boosts too. As well as being able to see the dollar value of the sats you are sending, you can now toggle between sending a boost or a comment. We have made a couple of design improvements to the boost modals too.

Finally, you can now boost any podcast or artist on Fountain from your web browser. Just log in and pay using your Fountain wallet.

If you want to help test new features out before they get released, or if you want to share feedback or send a feature request, you can join Fountain Beta on Telegram. All iOS and Android users welcome.

To tune in, go to the Discover tab in the Fountain app, or go to our website. Load up your wallet, make sure you have connected Nostr then sit back, enjoy, and boost!

Here’s everything you need to know about this week’s schedule:

Longy (Monday 2 Dec // 12pm EST)

Longy is a songsmith and producer from Southend-on-Sea in the UK. The seaside storyteller is heavy on endurance and calls his own music Gospel Trash. He picked up the guitar because of Buddy Holly, shouts like Little Richard and says he wanted to make music that sounded noisy, raw and that emulated street sounds.

From his days of busking to 500 shows in a year, from breaking his back to chaos in Barcelona, band brawls, tour shambles and fights with promoters, Longy is made of something different.

Listeners on Fountain will best know Longy for his track “The Underclass”, which has been played on countless music shows. Tune in to Fountain Radio today at 12pm EST to hear him share some of the wild stories behind his music.

Follow Longy

Kevin Embleton (Tuesday 3 Dec // 12pm EST)

Few singers, these days, resonate with that old kind of earnestness like Kevin Embleton. It’s a passion and a yearning buried deep in the dusty vinyl collections of your parent’s neglected basement.

His music reaches back to the melodies of classic American pop and weaves them into dynamic and arresting songs that breathe like a west coast wind. With three LPs under his belt, Embleton recently relocated from Akron, OH to Nashville, TN to work as an artist, songwriter, and producer.

Tune in to Fountain Radio on Tuesday at 12pm EST to hear Kevin’s selections.

Follow Kevin

Nate Johnivan (Friday 6 Dec // 12pm EST)

Nate Johnivan describes himself as a middle aged man living in middle America working at a middle class job. He makes music as a solo artist but also plays with other bands including Red Arrow Highway, Monkey Robot War, Death by Lions, Drawing Monsters, Prom and R.a.t.a.h.

Nate has prepared an hour-long takeover where he will share some upcoming albums and singles of his own with voiceover narration. Tune in to Fountain Radio this Friday at 12pm EST to check it out.

Follow Nate

If you missed it, here’s a quick primer on how it works:

• Add tracks to the queue: Pay 100 sats to add any track on Fountain

• Upvote tracks in the queue: The track with the most upvotes will play next

• Boost to support the artist: 95% of every payment goes to the artist playing

• Post in the live chat: See all recent activity from other listeners

• Save tracks to your library: Listen to your latest discoveries again

Artists can now host a takeover of Fountain radio and share their music (or songs from other artists) with listeners around the world. During a takeover, the artist controls the music and nobody else can add tracks or upvote tracks in the queue until it ends.

The first artist takeovers will take place this week. To tune in, go to the Discover tab in the Fountain app, or go to our website. Load up your wallet, make sure you have connected Nostr then sit back, enjoy, and boost!

Here’s everything you need to know about this week’s schedule:

Joe Martin (Wednesday 27 Nov // 12pm EST)

Joe Martin is an independent singer songwriter from the UK. His music captures the stories of people and encounters from his years on the road, with the Beatles, the Beach Boys, Bob Dylan, James Taylor, and Simon and Garfunkel among his influences.

Feeling increasingly disillusioned with the legacy streaming model, Joe became one of the very first artists to distribute his music to places like Fountain and Wavlake. His single ‘High Gravity’ became an instant classic when it was released in October 2022, followed by his debut studio album, ‘Empty Passenger Seat’.

His success has converted him into an advocate of the decentralised music movement, and has also led to collaborations with other like-minded artists around the world including Man Like Kweks and Richard. Tune in to Fountain Radio today at 12pm EST to hear some of Joe’s favourite tracks on Fountain.

Follow Joe

Ainsley Costello (Friday 29 Nov // 12pm EST)

Ainsley is a singer songwriter living in Nashville. At just 20 years old, she has been working toward a career in music for over half her life. Drawing inspiration from a wide array of artists from Paramore to Carly Rae Jepsen, Ainsley's music is the modern pop soundtrack of the next generation.

Ainsley first made "waves" on the internet in August 2023 as the first artist to receive 1 million sats with her hit song “Cherry On Top.” Since then, she's built connections with a worldwide community of developers working on decentralised music projects powered by open protocols to try and change the music industry forever.

She’s also inspired countless artists to follow her path, becoming the face of this exciting new movement. Tune in to Fountain Radio this Friday at 12pm EST to hear music from some of the artists that Ainsley is currently listening to.

Follow Ainsley

We are being programmed to listen to more of the same. New artists are finding it harder than ever before to break through and get their music in front of new listeners - not to mention achieve the impossible dream of making a living from their music. This has to change.

Earlier this year, we started beta testing a new communal listening experience on our website called Fountain Radio. The basic idea was to have a global queue where you pay to play a track - just like the old jukeboxes you can still find in some pubs and bars. You could pay upvote a track to change its position in the queue - and you could send a payment to support the artist currently playing.

This early iteration of Fountain Radio was far from perfect, but it got us excited about discovering new music again. Today we are excited to launch a new and improved Fountain Radio experience in the mobile app - and give artists the ability to host a takeover. After updating to version 1.1.8, you will be able to tune in to Fountain Radio from the Discover tab. Here’s how it works…

Add and upvote tracks in the queue

Search for tracks in your library or search all music on Fountain. Adding a track to the costs 100 sats (less than $0.10) and your selection will be added to the end of the queue. You can pay to upvote any track in the queue to change its position. 1 sat equals 1 upvote and the track with the most upvotes will play next. Just like zaps, you can pay as much as you like but the minimum is 100 sats.

Support the artist currently playing

Boost to send a payment with a message on enable streaming to send a small amount for every minute you spend listening. 95% of every boost and streaming payment goes directly to the artist currently playing and the remaining 5% is set aside for fees paid to PodcastIndex and Fountain.

Post in the live chat

Hang out with other listeners in the live chat by connecting Nostr. You can post chat messages for free. Every time a track is added or upvoted this appears in the activity feed too.

Save tracks to your library

Listen to your latest discoveries again later in the app. Tap on any content card to add a song to your library or a playlist, or see more music from that artist.

Listen to Fountain Radio on other apps

Fountain Radio now has its own RSS feed so you can tune in on any podcast app that supports live streams. Just bear in mind that you will only be able to listen. If you use Nostr livestream platforms such as zap.stream or tunestr.io, you can listen there and zaps will be paid to the artist currently playing.

Artist Takeovers

Artists can now take control of the music and host a listening party or an AMA. During a takeover, only the host can add tracks to the queue and upvotes are disabled.

Fountain Radio takeovers help artists reach new listeners and find new fans, followers and supporters. If you have just posted new music to Fountain after uploading to Wavlake or RSS Blue, takeovers are a great way to drive engagement - particularly if it’s the first time you’ve shared music in this way. We will also promote upcoming takeovers to help introduce your music to new audiences.

The first artist takeover will be the UK’s very own Joe Martin on Wednesday 27th November at 12:00pm EST. Make sure you’re following @fountain_app and @joe_martin and you won’t miss it.

If you are interested to take over Fountain Radio and get your music heard by new listeners, email hello@fountain.fm or open the menu on the player then choose Request Takeover.

Other bug fixes and improvements

• Fixed grey screen when viewing queue

• Fixed clips not being posted to Nostr

• Fixed custom deposit amount

• Fixed crash after sharing or creating a clip

• Fixed error on The Joe Rogan Experience

• Fixed issue when @ symbol appears in a link sent in a comment

• Fixed issue where latest episodes in library were not updating for some users

• Fixed issue where episode could not be replayed if already listened to

• Added error handling when Nostr keypair is already connected to another account

• Added warning when using Fountain as a guest

• Added prompt to share to Nostr after creating a clip

• Added OPML file explorer

With this update we wanted to strengthen the foundations and ensure that playback functionality is solid before rolling out some exciting new features and user experience improvements in the coming weeks.

New Audio APIs and Performance Upgrades

If you’ve been experiencing issues with playback on Fountain recently, there’s a good chance that they will be resolved in version 1.1.6. You can find an exhaustive list of issues that have been addressed below.

Queue

• Episodes in queue being skipped and marked as played

• Played episodes being added to queue

Playback

• Audio won't play when offline on Android

• App crashes during playback when device is locked

• Playback position not being saved

• Android Auto source error

Player

• Lag when scrubbing through podcasts or music on player

• Unable to go previous track when playing album or playlist

• Mini player not showing chapter artwork and chapter title

Social

• Unable to share clips as videos

• Issues saving playlists

• Grey screen when copying and pasting a link into a comment

• Improved offline support for episode pages

• Clip duration incorrect on show and episode pages

Payments

• Timeout error when boosting

• Unable to boost pending live streams

• Value time splits not working

Podcasters

• Unable to manage splits for a claimed podcast

• Claim podcast option missing from show page menu

Navigation

• Botton nav bar missing on certain pages

Settings

• Show settings missing from show page when accessed via search

Just as a reminder, you can share feedback with us or submit a feature request via the main menu in the app, or by emailing hello@fountain.fm. We really appreciate your input and aim to get back to you within 48 hours.

Nested Navigation

Previously the bottom nav bar was only visible on primary screens. This caused some navigational headaches once you tapped through to a nested screen - particularly if you were multiple levels deep - and required a lot of back button bashing.

In version 1.1.6 we pushed an update so that the bottom nav now visible across most screens in the app. If you’ve tapped on a comment in the home feed, then a profile, then some activity on their profile page, you can now easily go back to where you started by tapping the home icon in the bottom nav. 

If you want to help test new features out before they get released, or if you want to share feedback or send a feature request, you can join Fountain Beta on Telegram. All iOS and Android users welcome. Thank you to all the beta testers who have helped us get this update ready for release.

• A new offline caching database to make offline playback more reliable and reduce system resource requirements

• A simpler data model that reduces mobile data and memory usage

• Fixes to long-standing playback issues such as the queue re-arranging

Pay BOLT-11 Invoices

You can now withdraw funds by generating a lightning invoice using any app that supports lightning payments, then paying it from your Fountain wallet.

When you tap the Withdraw button on the Wallet page, you will now see two options:

• Pay Lightning Invoice: Scan any lightning invoice or paste from your clipboard to send the amount requested. We’ve also added a scan icon to the top right of the Wallet page for easy access.

• LNURL-Withdraw: As before, you can also generate an invoice that you can paste into other lightning wallets.

Previously we just supported LNURL-Withdraw, which only a few other lightning wallets support. Now you can withdraw to popular apps like CashApp and Strike that allow you to exchange your bitcoin for your preferred currency and transfer it to your bank account.

It’s also now possible to pay for anything in bitcoin with your podcast app. Next time you’re buying a coffee and you can pay in bitcoin, open Fountain, scan the invoice and watch the cashier lose their mind.

Artist Pages

From any Track or Album page you can now tap through to the Artist page to see all tracks. Play all tracks from an artist and skip through them on the player, or add individual tracks to your library, your queue or a playlist. We will be adding Artists to search very soon.

If you want to help test new features out before they get released, or if you want to share feedback or send a feature request, you can join Fountain Beta on Telegram. All iOS and Android users welcome.

We regularly hear from both listeners and podcasters that the social features in Fountain are a great way to discover content that’s worth listening to.

When you support a podcast, or comment on an episode, your message is surfaced to your followers in the Fountain home feed and anyone that sees it can add the content to their library.

But this came with a few problems. When you first start using Fountain you wouldn’t have any followers so your posts wouldn’t get seen. If you wanted to share something you were listening to, you had to choose between leaving a comment on Fountain, or sharing on another social platform.

Today we are excited to announce a massive update to Fountain that solves these problems with Nostr - a simple, decentralised messaging protocol that allows social activity to be shared across different apps.

With Fountain’s new Nostr integration:

• You can bring your existing profile and followers to Fountain

• Your boosts and comments will be surfaced in other Nostr clients

• Posts shared from other Nostr clients relating to audio will appear in your feed

• Conversation and interactions now flow freely across multiple apps

Keep reading to learn more about how Nostr is changing the way we share and interact with audio content on Fountain.

Get Fountain 1.1 on iOS/Android

What’s changing in Fountain?

Fountain is now a Nostr client. Your Fountain profile is the same as you Nostr profile and your activity will now be surfaced across the Nostr ecosystem. As a result, any content you interact with will reach more people and see higher engagement.

Connect or create a Nostr profile

You can create a Nostr account in the Fountain app, or connect an existing account by importing your keys. To find people you were following before on Fountain, tap the icon in the top right on the home screen.

Share your boosts and comments on Nostr

When you boost or comment on Fountain, your message will be shared on Nostr along with a Fountain link. Listeners on other Nostr clients will be able to see this activity, interact with it and start following you. Choose whether you want your activity to be shared on Nostr each time you boost or comment. If you choose not to share your activity on Nostr, it will still be visible in Fountain but other listeners will not be able to interact with it.

A new and improved home feed

The Fountain home feed is now the audio layer of Nostr. You can switch between the Following feed (which just shows you audio content shared on Nostr by people you follow) and the Global feed (which shows you all audio content shared on Nostr). You can also now filter the home feed and profile pages by content type to just see podcast or music content.

Audio posts from Nostr clients now appear in Fountain

Whenever a link to any audio content is posted on other Nostr clients like Primal, this activity will be surfaced in the Fountain home feed. If you’re linking to a podcast or music which is indexed in Fountain, we render it as a playable content card and it will appear on the content page as a comment.

Zaps

Listeners on Fountain and other Nostr clients can zap your post and send you a payment to show their appreciation. Zaps replace what were previously called likes on Fountain. You can still like something, but likes are now free.

Mentions

You can now mention another person in a comment, making it easy to send your listening recommendations to a friend or tag someone in to a conversation. Just type @ followed by their username to find their profile.

Get Fountain 1.1 on iOS/Android

What is Nostr?

Nostr is a simple, decentralised messaging protocol that stands for Notes and Other Stuff Transmitted by Relays. On Nostr, you have one identity and one follower graph that can be ported over to any Nostr client. When you create a Nostr account you are given:

• Public Key: A public username that allows anyone to find your profile

• Private Key: A secret password that you can use to log in to any Nostr client

Other key concepts within Nostr are:

• Notes: Posts that can contain plain text, an image, a video, a link, or other stuff

• Relays: Servers that broadcast notes to any clients connected to that relay

• Clients: Apps like Fountain where you connect your keys and query relays for notes you care about

The real magic is that Nostr gives apps a common language to talk to each other. The most popular clients are social media apps offering a similar experience to X such as Primal, Damus and Amethyst. We hope that more modern podcast and music apps will be excited by the potential of Nostr and the ability to deliver a more connected experience by building social features on top of it.

The Nostr specification is defined by Nostr Improvement Possibilities (NIPs). Fountain uses NIP-73 to associate posts with podcast episodes using the globally unique <podcast:guid>.

What’s next?

The Nostr protocol is evolving rapidly and Fountain 1.1 is only scratching the surface of what’s possible. In the coming months, we will be fine-tuning Fountain’s social features and adding new ones too.

If you want to help test these features out before they get released, or if you want to share some feedback or send a feature request, you can join Fountain Beta on Telegram. All iOS and Android users welcome.

If you’re interested to learn more about how Nostr is revolutionising the way social media works, we are building up a playlist of some must-listen episodes here.

Let’s be real. If you’ve been to a conference before, it’s the satellite events at bars, restaurants and hotels around the conference where lasting memories are made and new connections are formed. Bitcoin 2024 in Nashville this week will be no different. 

Bands at Bitcoin 2024 is where we will be spending most of our time. Three days of free live music from amazing artists taking place on the fourth floor at Embassy Suites Downtown, just across the street from the conference venue.

If you didn’t make it to Nashville this week, you can join the Bands at Bitcoin 2024 livestream in the Fountain app and on web. Day one kicks off today at 11:00 CST (late on Thursday afternoon if you’re in Europe). You can find full details on how to join the livestream below.

Join Livestream on Fountain Web (Audio & Video)

Click here then log in with your Fountain account and boost the artists using your Fountain wallet. Or you can log in with Nostr via the Alby browser extension (no Fountain account required).

Our new web experience supports video and features a live chat that surfaces boosts, zaps and comments from other apps streaming the event. You will need to log in with Nostr to join the live chat. We’re going to be giving away prizes in the live chat every day, so this is the place to be.

Join livestream on web

Join Livestream in Fountain App (Audio Only)

Click here then choose “open in Fountain”, or just open the app and search Bands at Bitcoin 2024. Hit the follow button and the livestream will be pinned to the top of your library every day. If you have push notifications from Fountain enabled, you will receive a notification when each livestream starts.

In the app there will be no live chat, but you can still boost and stream sats to the artists performing. You will also be able view and reply boosts from listeners on Fountain and other Podcasting 2.0 apps.

Join livestream in the app

Thursday 25th July

11:00 CST - KEVIN EMBLETON
12:00 CST - CHRIS WENSKE
13:00 CST - TRACEY BLAKE
14:00 CST - ARREIS
15:00 CST - TBA
16:00 CST - THE BLUEHOUSE BAND

Friday 26th July

11:00 CST - CHARLEY T
12:00 CST - ALICIA STOCKMAN
13:00 CST - THE HIGHER LOW
14:00 CST - ZHAKLINA
15:00 CST - JOJO SCOTT
16:00 CST - HERBIVORE

Saturday 27th July

11:00 CST - SARA JADE
12:00 CST - EMILY D'RANGED
13:00 CST - ROCK N' ROLL BREAKHEART
14:00 CST - ADAM CURRY BOOSTAGRAM BALL LIVE FROM TEXAS HILL COUNTRY
15:30 CST - JUSTLOUD
17:00 CST - JOE MARTIN

A big thank you to Phantom Power Music for bringing these exciting artists together and the all the other partners involved. Now let it rip.

If you’re going to be in Nashville for the Bitcoin 2024 conference next week, you will not want to miss this. Phantom Power Music are hosting three days of free live music to showcase the power of lightning and other open protocols like RSS and Nostr.

An eclectic line up of emerging artists will take to the stage at Embassy Suites Downtown between 11am - 6pm CST on July 25 - 27, including Joe Martin, Sara Jade, Herbivore and The Retrograde. The venue is just a 2-minute walk from Music City Centre where the conference is being held and food and drinks will be served all day.

The event will be streamed live on Fountain so the audience in the room and listeners around the world will be able to support each performing artist in real time. We will be sharing details on how to join the live stream ahead of the event.

You can find the full line up below and at phantompowermusic.io.

Thursday 25th July

11:00 CST - KEVIN EMBLETON
12:00 CST - CHRIS WENSKE
13:00 CST - TRACEY BLAKE
14:00 CST - ARREIS
15:00 CST - AMBER SWEENEY
16:00 CST - THE BLUEHOUSE BAND

Friday 26th July

11:00 CST - CHARLEY T
12:00 CST - ALICIA STOCKMAN
13:00 CST - THE HIGHER LOW
14:00 CST - ZHAKLINA
15:00 CST - JOJO SCOTT
16:00 CST - HERBIVORE

Saturday 27th July

11:00 CST - SARA JADE
13:00 CST - EMILY D'RANGED
14:00 CST - JOE MARTIN
15:00 CST - ROCK N' ROLL BREAKHEART
16:00 CST - THE RETROGRADE

If you would like to hear the top tracks from all the artists performing ahead of the event, we have put together a Bands at Bitcoin 2024 Playlist.

Listen to the playlist