|
PE Interview With Toodou Founder Gary Wang, Part 1
Call it "Web 2.0" if you must, or simply a user-generated, interactive, multimedia content website. Whatever you call it, Toodou.com is one of a select few startup companies leading the push toward interactive online services in China...or anywhere else.
Less than one year after the podcasting medium arrived on the scene, Toodou, which launched in April of this year, is already hosting video podcasts.
Overseas returnee and Bertelsmann veteran Gary Wang and Holland native Marc van der Chijs got the idea for Toodou in late 2004. One of China's pioneering podcasting websites, Toodou has been increasingly popular and now has over 120,000 registered users.
Pacific Epoch recently visited Toodou in their new office at "Su Hang Cang Ku" in Shanghai - a hip development in an historic warehouse. Toodou's office fits the typical description of a new media start up: graffiti-covered walls surround a sparsely furnished large single room, with laptops humming on industrial tables strewn in intentionally random fashion. The following are excerpts from our recent conversation with Toodou co-founder Gary Wang about the wild world of podcasting in China.
For Part Two of Pacific Epoch's interview with Gary, click here.
Pacific Epoch: What was the idea behind starting up Toodou?
Gary Wang: My partner Marc and I got the idea last year. We first heard about podcasting in September 2004 and we talked about it for a while and thought the technology was going to take off. This was a new way of looking at media, from how it is created to how it's distributed. We started very simply with just playing around with podcasts. In January, I left Bertelsmann to start Toodou. We launched the website on April 15, 2005. Through the first three months, we had 20,000 users. Over the past three months, we have added almost 100,000 users. We have not done any marketing yet. It has all been word of mouth. There has also been quite a bit of media attention on Toodou, including the blogger community and some traditional media.
The idea behind Toodou is very simple, though it actually goes a little bit beyond basic podcasting. We are really trying to create a personal media service. We want to create a platform - a theater - thatÂ?s open to all content providers. We want to make this a huge theater that might have hundreds of thousands of screens where people can come in to watch whatever it is they want to watch. All content on Toodou is user generated. Toodou users will ultimately be able to access the content through broadband Internet, through podcasts and eventually through 3G mobile networks.
PE: After taking a quick look at the site, it seems that a lot of the content is video. Is Toodou focusing on video podcasts?
Gary: There is a natural progression from audio to video with any type of content - and this is now happening with podcasting. We started out not wanting to do a lot of video; there was not really much video out there anyway. When we first started out about one percent of content was video compared with more than half now.
PE: How are people using the site?
Gary: Currently, 99.9 percent of users are downloading our content to their PCs because portable devices [capable of playing video] are not widespread in China. And it is not yet feasible for users to download content to their mobile phones over the wireless networks. Most view or listen to content on our website directly or download content to their PCs.
PE: What kind of censorship does Toodou have to do?
Gary: Well, this is China, so we do have to make sure that none of our content is pornographic or violates any Chinese laws. All of our content is screened and approved by Toodou employees and volunteers.
PE: As Toodou grows, won't that create the need to have more and more people monitoring content?
Gary: At most we would need five to ten censors. Up until now the content on our site has been very clean; we have had no problems with content.
PE: What is Toodou's target audience?
Gary: Most of our content producers are 18 to 25 years old. However, there are also several who are in their 30s or 40s, and one of our oldest podcasters is a 75 year old guy who does calligraphy and makes videos of those outdoor gatherings where a mostly older group of people practice ballroom dancing.
PE: What is Toodou's eventual plan for generating revenues?
Gary: We believe sending content to users over wireless mobile networks will be an important channel for us. We have to wait for these mobile devices to take off and then we will provide content to them. As I mentioned before, right now it is just not feasible.
However, some of the new mobile phones coming out in the next few months are starting to really get close. A lot of companies are coming out with new multimedia-focused phones. In another five to six months, I think the devices will be there. Of course, we are looking forward to when 3G mobile services are available and more widely accessible. When that happens, we will be in a good position to feed content to these devices.
There are also ways to generate revenue through broadband Internet services. People are getting used to being entertained through the Internet, and many will pay for it. If you go to the Internet cafes, many people are watching movies (some pirated, some not) online.
These are the most obvious ways of generating revenue, but there are others. I think revenue for Toodou is still a year or two away. We are not too focused on revenue models right now. Right now we are focused on improving the website, the user experience. Six months from now we may look at revenue models.
PE: Has Toodou raised money to finance development over the next few years?
Gary: We have been financed, but we have not yet announced anything. In a month or two we may think about announcing something.
For Part Two of Pacific Epoch's interview with Gary, click here.
|
