From a touring heavy-metal rock star to tech giant Baidu’s international spokesman, Kaiser Kuo has seemingly done it all over his two decades in China. Likewise, Jeremy Goldkorn’s 20-year China stint includes living in a worker’s dormitory, managing several Chinese and English-language magazines, producing a documentary about African soccer players in Beijing, and riding a bicycle from Pakistan to Nepal via Xinjiang and Tibet. Amid all this, one of the duo’s longest-standing projects has been the Sinica podcast, where Kaiser and Jeremy explore China-related topics that vary from climate change and healthcare to Beijing’s microbreweries and the blossoming hip-hop scene in Chengdu.
Having spent the past 20+ years in China, how has Sinica changed Kaiser and Jeremy’s perspectives? We will sit down with the Sinica cohosts for a fireside chat to discuss how Sinica came to be, some of its most meaningful guests and episodes, and what may be in store for the future of Sinica and podcasting in China.
_________________________________________________
After making his first visit in 1981, Kaiser Kuo moved to China full-time in 1996. He was a member of the rock group Tang Dynasty before working for a series of internet-related businesses both as an entrepreneur and as a writer. After becoming a digital strategist for Ogilvy China, he joined Baidu in 2010 and currently serves as its director of international communications.
Jeremy Goldkorn moved to China in 1995. He is the founder and director of Danwei, a media and market research firm which was acquired by The Financial Times in 2013. He is also an affiliate of the Australian National University’s Centre on China in the World and founder of Great Wall Fresh, a social enterprise to help Chinese peasant farmers run small tourism businesses.
