To me, _subscribing_ isn't time-consuming. [I'm subscribed to many](https://tripu.info/podcasts.html), but at least half of them are disabled at any given point in time, and even among the ones that auto-update I manage to listen only to a handful. Apart from recommendations, to me the title and description (and the guest, if any) is all I need to decide whether to listen to or mark as played.