Welcome to this week’s “podcast on Indo podcasting”. Yes, this podcast is devoted to Indonesia's podcasting industry.

As we established last week with our coverage of the country's streaming video industry, online media is one of the most promising parts of Indonesia's consumer internet. This week, we continue our "Sino Indo Tekno" sub-series with partner Art Dicker of the Shanghai-based Gan Bei podcast to interview Tyo Guritno, founder of leading Indonesian podcasting platform Inspigo. During the podcast, we compare and contrast Inspigo with its counterparts in China, including the massive Ximalaya platform with more than 500m registered users.

China podcasting derives revenues largely from "pay-per" content, subscription plans and virtual gifts. Tyo on the other hand expects advertising to drive Indo podcasting revenues, although early paid trials on Inspigo have also shown encouraging results.

While the initial appeal of podcasting in Indonesia centered on entertainment, the COVID-19 pandemic has led many listeners to seek self-improvement programming (which is China's largest category). More uniquely to Indonesia, mindfulness has become a massive category in the stressful pandemic period. Tyo expects Inspigo to continue to deliver a broad amalgam of content, from "UGC" (user generated content) to "PGC" (professionally generated content).

Successful entrepreneurs, university professors, television personalities and a range of "grass roots" personalities top the charts as hosts of both Chinese and Indonesian podcasting. Our session also included an interesting dialogue between Art and Tyo comparing "content moderation" and censorship techniques to ensure that podcasting does not fall afoul of laws and regulations in China and Indonesia.

We hope you enjoy this latest instalment of "Sino Indo Tekno"!