Here are the results of the poll that was on the website for the last 4 days. Two thirds of the participants prefer a longer format, while one third likes the shorter version better.
I kind of expected that the longer version would be more popular, and I actually expected the number to be even higher. So it looks like there is still a sizable portion of users wanting a shorter update.
Why not just keep the 1 hour update? - Simply, costs. The higher quality text-to-speech output is quite expensive, and it wouldn't be sustainable to run different versions in parallel long-term.
I think with the recent changes to the format I covered the wishes of the majority. We have a longer format now that updates every 4 hours, so you can catch up on the latest stories. Stories from earlier episodes are skipped, so you get completely fresh stories every time. It's worth pointing out though that this selection skews toward more recent stories. What I mean by that is that you get the best stories of the last 4 hours, plus possibly stories that didn't make it into the last broadcast (if they rank higher than ones in the current 4 hour window). I think this comes close to the HN algorithm itself, which often also surfaces older posts (say, 20 hours old), if they have enough points.
On the other hand, with the broadcast format, there's the fear of missing out. Theoretically, the top story of the day could have been in the broadcast 12 hours ago, which you will miss if you didn't listen to that episode. Ultimately, to get a complete overview over just the top stories of the last day, you would have to go through 6 episodes.
So now I'm thinking that maybe there should also be a once-a-day recap, that simply presents the most popular stories of the last 24 hours, every 24 hours. So people who want to check in once a day to get the most important stories in one go won't miss out.
I think this version would also make the most sense to include in the RSS feed.
Another alternative would be to just get rid of the unique constraint for the stories, so consecutive episodes could include the same story. That way, you would always get a snapshot of the last 24 hours, but stories would repeat across episodes. What do you think? Time for another poll?