Talk radio is big, and internet based talk radio looks like it could be bigger. In December, BlogTalkRadio’s first full month out of beta it logged 1.9 million listeners. According to company spokesman Luke Armour, BlogTalkRadio is well on its way to 2.4 listeners this month.
Several things differentiate what BlogTalkRadio is doing from “traditional” podcasting…

• Shows are done live, with the talk jock (that’s you) telephoning in and the show going out live to listeners
• You don’t need technical expertise – or even a computer – to be a host
• The host has 5 open telephone lines they can use to let listeners call in and talk or to use to do a talking heads-type show
• Besides listening on the web site, you can telephone in and listen to live shows while you’re driving – one way to amuse yourself doing long car commutes if you have the cell phone minutes to burn.

BlogTalkRadio is free to both hosts and listeners – making its money off of both advertising on each hosts’ home page within the service, and embedding intro and outro audio ads to archived shows.

While what gets talked about tends toward the usual fare of talk radio – politics, relationships, sex and the offbeat – BlogTalkRadio is pulling in some unexpected hosts like Sun Microsystems and The Yankee Group to host more geeky and interesting (at least to me :)) shows, such as a post-CES Analyst Roundtable that aired last week and is available in BlogTalkRadio’s show archive.

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