Podcasts
Starting in 2018 I began developing podcasts at the South China Morning Post, sitting down with reporters and editors to figure out what we wanted to sound like. what was going to make for good listening, and who wanted to do the talking on the microphone.
Here are examples of what we’ve made with links for you to subscribe.
Visit the SCMP’s podcast page for the full list of podcasts I produce
Originally a monthly deep-dive into a specific topic, mixing independent reportage and exclusive interviews to bring unique insights into China. Other episodes include:
Migrant workers and the Alliance of Beijing Drifters
The disease killing the men who built Shenzhen
Farming snakes for medicine, meals and money
In this podcast you can hear the new generation of Chinese science fiction authors speak about what motivates them, what they think makes writign different from American science fiction, their inspirations and what the success of Liu Cixin’s Three Body Problem and the movie The Wandering Earth means to them and their fellow authors.
Featuring interviews with Xia Jia, Chen Quifan, Baoshu, Regina Kanyu Wang and Neil Clarke editor of Clarkesworld, the American editor translating their stories into English.
I conceived of this podcast upon the premise that most conversations in Hong Kong include two basic questions: where have you been to eat recently and where are we going next for something to eat. Originally a fortnightly podcast broadly about food and chefs in Hong Kong, it’s now monthly deep-dive feature, focussed on one subject per episode.
This podcast was the original format, where I would follow foodie reporters Bernice Chan and Alkira Reinfrank around Hong Kong recording interviews and features based on the different aspects of Hong Kong’s tremendous local and international food culture. The SCMP podcast team has expanded – in the new episodes you can hear deep dive features on bubble tea, dim sum, pad Thai and sriracha sauce.
It’s been an absolute pleasure to work with SCMP tech reporter Zen Soo to build this into one of the most popular podcasts in the SCP roster. Each week she digs through the tech news being talked about inside and outside of China, to bring essential background, context and analysis with industry insiders, analysts and SCMP’s network of reporters based in Beijing, Shanghai and Shenzhen.
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The audio of this podcast was based on an extraordinary piece of reporting by our colleague Meng Jing who recorded an interview with someone who describes themselves as a ‘cyber sanitation worker’.
Zen Soo and SCMP’s technology editor Chua Kong Ho present an extended version of the interview with the head of the ‘content security team’ overseeing one of China’s largest live-streaming websites, talking about how they monitor, regulate and stop content from being streamed, and the mix of human and AI needed to be able to do the job .
A podcast made for grown-ups who are gamers, this series brings together three people from very different corners of the SCMP for a common purpose: get gaming discussions to the next level. It’s a freewheeling conversation about the big issues affecting the gaming industry as well as deep dives into the biggest gaming sensations being talked about around the world. Featuring the Ravi Hiranand from Abacus, Victoria Ho from Goldthread and Shea Drisoll, SCMP’s social media editor.
Video games that become movies. Seems like a pretty easy target… but according to the You Died panel Detective Pikachu might just be able to undo the damage wrought by Pixels, Street Fighter and Mortal Kombat. This was one of my favourite podcasts to produce as it offered me the chance to sample the Galaga opening screen, Vanilla Ice doing the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtle rap, and Raoul Julia all in one episode.
