What happened at PodFest China 2019
This article is at least a year old
PodFest China 2019 was a half-day conference held in Shanghai on November 9, 2019. This year’s conference was themed “Chinese podcasting takes off in 2019” addressing three topics.
Over 240 people showed up, although it was originally planned for 160. The event attracted attendees from Beijing, Chengdu, Hangzhou and all over the country.
As far as we know, we are the first to hold annual podcasting-focused event in China, so that explained the hype. But still that was quite a surprise to us considering the flight and accommodation cost while the event itself is just 6 hours.
Who attended?
- 14% podcasters, 81% listeners, 5% in the audio business
- A bit to our surprise, while less than 1/7 attendees already have their own podcasts, 1/3 who showed up at the event said they were most interested in learning about podcast monetization.
- 40% attendees out of 94 people who responded to our post-event survey said they are on the way to launching their podcast in the next 12 months.
What did we discuss?
- “How to produce a narrative storytelling podcast?” This session invited best practitioners in the fields, including Emanuele Berry of This American Life (formerly with Gimlet), Peng Han (Sound Designer of the NYT-credited Gushi FM), and one The Moth-like storytelling platform called Unravel Storytelling in Shanghai. Speakers shed light on techniques, procedures and critical lessons learnt from their production experience.
- “Podcasting, beyond production” Three speakers representing Himalaya, One Ventures, and Qingmang shared their view of empowering Chinese podcasters with tools and venture capital; JustPod shed light on branded podcasting for large enterprises; Joshua Ogden-Davis shared experience hosting multiple paid and unpaid shows that eventually led him to become a full-time podcaster.
- “Chinese podcasting: breakout year” was a session to celebrate all types of entities entering the podcasting space in the past year: individuals, publishers, media veteran, entertainment companies, etc. New starters spoke about why and how they started podcasting and they all see huge potential of the medium in China’s crowded internet content space.
In addition to these three sessions, and fourteen speakers, we also had four hands-on workshops covering: narrative storytelling, sound design, field recording, and community engagement.
You’ll also find a longer write-up in JustPod, a Chinese podcast newsletter.
