Listeners need a web connection and a device to play the podcast , such as an iPod or Smartphone or computer . Controls allow the user to skip through the audio , perhaps by using a mouse or swiping a finger , and often resembles the old boombox type controls : play , pause , fast forward , skip , and replay . A political podcast 's icon is valuable " graphic real estate " since it is one of the few visual cues that identify a particular program . Podcasts can be downloaded into a device and then played offline at the listener 's convenience ; if podcasts are played directly from the Internet without being downloaded , it is sometimes referred to as streaming . Podcast producers do not necessarily require that the host and guests be in the same physical space , such that a host in California can interview a guest in Maine , for example . Broadcast technology can vary from complex studios to basic setups , with the general trend being that equipment is getting more powerful and less expensive as time goes by . One journalist described how he souped up a laptop to handle a podcast : On June 22 , 2015 , President Barack Obama sat down with host Marc Maron for the 613th episode of the WTF Podcast . This was the first appearance of President Obama 's presidency on a web-based podcast , and the first appearance of a sitting president on an online podcast . The WTF Podcast was broadcast from Marc Maron 's garage in Los Angeles , California . The conversation between Maron and President Obama covered a range of subject , starting with the president 's upbringing in Southern California and Hawaii then evolving into in a discussion about the main issues which the administration was dealing with at the time , gun laws , universal healthcare and the current political divide in America . The President cited the Sandy Hook Elementary School shooting , the deadest school shooting in U.S history , as an example of his frustrations with the current Senate at the time and their inability to act due to lobby groups like the NRA , and the effects of the inaction on public opinion
Sandy Hook Elementary School shooting
Sandy Hook Elementary School shooting
Political podcast