There must be several YouTube equivalents of audio. But they require you to be Internet users. How about those overwhelmingly huge non-Net users who want their views, and content in general, to get across?
There is a simple way to add that dimension to audio citizen journalism. Set up a premium rate phone line number and let people leave their messages. Buy a solution (and there are some readily available such solutions in the market) that convert those messages into computer audio files (WAV and maybe later converted to MP3). Just post them online. You can even have the IVR of the phone line ask the speaker to summarize the post for you.
And if you have transcription staff you can transcribe those short summaries that go along with the podcast post. Or, since the summary is short, you can try the text-to-speech engine. But I guess you still need some manual help. But not a problem, you can employ some through Mechanical Turk.
The advantage of having a phone line take the messages is that (1) you reach broader audience and not just the Internet users, (2) non-net users do not need anything like an account which is one of the main things that puts a potential user off ….. the users do not need an account because they are paying as per premium rate you set with the operator. The third advantage is (3) the phone revenue will probably be a bigger revenue contribution than what you generate through banner ads.