Ep 73: From Ai Wei Wei to Building Generation T (Tatler) | Lee Williamson (Regional Editorial Editor, Generation T, Tatler Asia Group) - a podcast by Ling Yah

Lee Williamson is the Regional Editorial Director of Generation T, Tatler Asia Group and currently oversees three of Tatler’s flagship brands: Gen.T, Front & Female and Asia’s Most Influential. He was previously the Editor at Time Out Beijing and Editor-in-Chief at That’s China and was selected as a WAN-IFRA Young Media Leaders Fellow 2020.

If you’ve ever wanted to know what it’s like to work as a foreign journalist in China, dealing with state censorship, producing “controversial” editorials and also producing media products like the Generation T list, then this is the episode for you!

Highlights:

• 6:48 Moving to China
• 8:58 Working as a journalist at That’s China 
• 11:33 “You’ll Never Be Chinese”
• 15:19 Censorship in China
• 17:26 Relaunching 
• 18:21 Being Editor at Time Out Beijing
• 21:12 Publishing Ai Wei Wei’s first interview following his detainment in China
• 23:14 Working at Tatler
• 25:05 Why Gen.T?
• 26:21 Defining success, influence and power
• 27:17 What’s the point of another “list”?
• 29:42 Building the Gen.T community
• 34:48 Gaining trust
• 35:52 Getting people to share what they really want even after they say “I don’t really need anything”
• 39:05 Seeing Gen.T’s brand value increase
• 43:11 Deciding who gets on Gen.T
• 45:08 Tribes
• 47:21 Safeguards
• 48:57 Trends among Gen.T honourees 
• 50:22 What’s in it for Gen.T?
• 51:09 The Crazy Smart Asia podcast 
• 56:21 Planning for the future of Gen.T

📍Show notes: www.sothisismywhy.com/73     

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