You could potentially match on audio, though – look for the 15 seconds of podcast audio preceding the ad, and the 15 seconds following it, if folks reported it in a sponsorblock way.
Alternatively, we could build a shazam-style database of 30 second podcast ads, then skip them when they’re identified. There isn’t much variety out there.
The ad on the right side of the home screen always shows up for me, even with a pi-hole setup at home. I actually ended up factory resetting my roku tv and disconnected it from the inyernet entirely a couple years back for that exaxt reason. Except roku OS 10+ actually gas built-in ads on the right side that show up even if you’re offline.
…so how did you get rid of the ads entirely? Because I’d love to do that myself.