Pepa Media is a collective of African Creators. The organization works to prepare content about the African continent, and about how Africans are changing the world.
We spoke to Peace Mathew, Pepa’s Senior Content Producer.
1. Pep Media is always working on something new! What’s your daily routine like?
Since the company is still new and we are still growing, we the founders (two) do most of the work.
One of us handles all the production of our main content for YouTube each week, and the other works on the distribution of the previous week’s content throughout the week, until new content is ready.
We regularly have meetings over the phone daily on the progress we are making and brain storming for new projects since we are in different cities. I work full-time from Monday to Saturday, thus getting in the office by 8am, I start working on research for the week’s project and get off by 6:30pm. The routine is quite the same until Saturday when we finalize everything and upload our projects.
2. There are a lot of new regulations and security issues with digital content. Why did you pick this area to work?
We had this idea for a long time, long before the new regulations were ever kept in Tanzania. Having a background in content creation in other African countries and seeing that most Africans really want to know more about their Continent, the new regulations can’t really be a stopping sign for us.
We try our best to be neutral with contents that involve Tanzania and since our contents are not focused only on Tanzanians but the whole world. The new regulations will barely have an impact on us, as the future of Pepa isn’t in Tanzania only.
3. What skills would you recommend our younger readers to develop in order to pursue a career in media production?
I would recommend more and more people to invest in their minds.
Always learn something new everyday of your life. Try every new skills that comes close to you, because I believe that everything can be learnt and with patience and time anything is possible.
Always learn something new everyday of your life.
Be open minded and always try to learn things from people who are different from you and don’t forget to travel when you can – a lot can be experienced and learnt from new places .
4. How do you see East African media companies – what is the future for them?
Most media companies in East Africa are really doing a great job in giving out information to the people, but in most cases they are not giving out what people need.
They only give out what people want to see, and they are not finding the balance to it.
They only give out what people want to see.
The difference in all the media companies in Tanzania (as an example) is so slim. Most of them show the same things, have the same ideas and they aren’t innovative at all.
It might be because of regulations or there is no change in the way people think in these companies. I personally don’t see any bright future if nothing is done right now. If the minds in these companies could be diverse in terms of nationality, political stands, gender and educational background the future of the content produced by these companies would be mind blowing.
5. How much school do creative young people need?
With the way technology is changing our lives right now, having a degree isn’t going to solidify your future being great.
I would say to most creatives – be in school as much as you can but don’t just focus on it fully. Always have another form of learning. Either get a part-time job that allows you to learn a new skill or pursue self-learning through the Internet.
