Sarah Koenig on 10 years of Serial: 'I didn't know we were making a true crime podcast'

But she admitted that isn’t the case for her, saying: "I don't look at true crime, I don't read it, I don't watch it. I didn't know that was what I was making."

Asked how she felt about inspiring a true crime podcast boom, Koenig replied: "It's weird. It seems an obvious way to tell those stories [in a chapter-by-chapter narrative]. But I don't listen to them, so I don't have an opinion." Does she view female-led true crime podcasts as her spawn? "No! But if you're doing it well, I'm happy to claim them as my spawn. But I'm worried at the level of crap that gets made."

Responding to a question on whether the rise of amateur sleuths, seen most notoriously in the Nicola Bulley case, was a product of true crime podcasts, she was suitably appalled. "I think that's horrible. It's terrible and cruel. Anything that's seat of the pants, [someone thinking], 'I'll just put this out there,' I think that's terrible."

Is there anything that she personally has learnt from the making of Serial and other podcasts? "Most importantly to warn interviewees and sources about what their involvement means. That’s my main ethical concern, that we’re exposing sources to the public in ways they hadn’t anticipated. In series 1, it felt horrible that [interviewees] had people going to their houses, contacting them on social media. Now we can tell them what’s likely to come and help them deal with the exposure."

What about the family of the victim from series 1, Hae Min Lee? They were never involved in the podcast but had a lot more exposure during a terrible time in their lives.

"They never wanted to cooperate, we tried so hard to get them involved. At Adnan Syed’s 2023 retrial was the first time I heard Hae Min Lee’s brother say he thought Adnan was guilty. It didn't make a difference, I think there was something wrong with the case. The series was about the system and why it's not working, why it's flawed.

"I feel terrible for Hae Min Lee’s family, it must be so painful for them. When I was reading the transcript of what Hae Min Lee’s mother said in court during the trial, I knew what was on the page, but when I came to read it for the tape, I couldn’t get through it without crying.

"There will always be pain in those circumstances but as a journalist you can’t stop because you’re worried about causing pain, as long as it’s not egregious, sensational pain."

Did making the podcast have an impact on her? "There are things that keep me up at night while making the series, like how what I’m planning to say will affect the subjects, but afterwards I’m more able to let it go."

Does she think that Serial has had a profound wider impact? "I can’t see anything major that has changed. What’s been heartening is hearing people say, ‘I became a lawyer or a journalist or joined the Innocence Project because of you.’ A lot of young people have been inspired."

So what podcasts does she listen to? "I don’t really listen to podcasts. I knew you’d ask that and that I’d have to make up something. I’m a terrible audience because I’m over-critical. I work from home, I exercise (not as much as I should) but I like to have no noise. I don’t even listen to my own work. I haven’t listened to the Guantanamo one [series 4]."

Talking about things she may have heard on podcasts that annoy her, she said: "Those throat-clearing sort-of set-ups, ‘Are you comfortable?’ ‘Do we have water?’ and so on. Stop doing that! The other thing, and I have compassion for people doing it, is having to fill time, for whatever reason, and you can hear them stretching material too far, repeating the main points again and again."

At the end of the evening, Koenig was awarded the International Women’s Podcast Award for Recognition of Global Impact by fellow podcast queen Alice Levine.

Having had such a lauded career for investigative journalism, she must get a lot of people asking for her help to look into cases for them? "Yes, a lot. I even had calls from people in prison. Some of them were funny, just crazy. This one guy wanted me to investigate a lawyer he says shafted him out of $1,200! And he’s asking me. He sent me a bundle of papers on it, and in the middle of it is something saying he murdered his wife in the driveway! But he wants me to investigate his lawyer!"

Check out more of our Audio coverage or visit our TV Guide and Streaming Guide to find out what's on. For more from the biggest stars in TV, listen to The Radio Times Podcast.