PodFest Cairo 2024 - a gathering for podcasters and listeners in Egypt

PodFest Cairo 2024 took place on Saturday, 2 March 2024 at The American University in Cairo’s (AUC) Tahrir campus in the historic Ewart Hall. This was the fifth edition of the event. It was hosted by AUC’s Department of Journalism and Mass Communication (JRMC).

Highlights from the day’s events were Latif Nasser’s keynote address, which focused on finding good stories to tell. He shared the need to be constantly curious and follow different newsletters to seek content that might take you down a rabbit hole. His presentation and Q&A session was engaging, informative and inspiring.

Additional sessions included an opening forum hosted by The Passionfruit Podcast founder Maya Morshed, where ideas about implementing podcasting in the classroom were shared. Other panelists spoke about their experiences and challenges in the production process.

Mark Somers, an actor, podcaster and voice-over artist moderated the session Audio Products: Audiobooks and Audio Dramas. The panelists included Nada Atef, co-founder, of Podrama Cast; Ahmed Zaki, CEO, Iqraaly; and Mostafa Eltelwany, head of content, The Potcast Productions. They addressed many aspects of audio production including creativity and the increasing interest in audiobooks.

The panel Planning and Conducting Interviews for Audio Stories was moderated by Heba Fouad from Reuters. The experienced audio storytellers, Reem Elmagharaby, junior producer, JAR Audio, Toronto; Roshy Zangeneh, AUC adjunct professor and freelancer; and Shiva Bayat, freelance audio producer, provided many practical interviewing tips including technical issues related to remotely recording audio interviews.

PodFest Cairo 2024 concluded with Jasmin Bauomy from TRZ Media in Berlin and a JRMC alumna, who encouraged attendees to build a happy podcasting community. Kim Fox, the conference founder and organizer final comments, “I’m proud of the way our audio community shows up to support each other. And proud of our PodFest Cairo team for their commitment to this annual event.”

You can watch the archive of PodFest Cairo 2024 on our Facebook Page.

PodFest Cairo, Egypt and Africa’s first podcasting conference featured conversations focused on producing audio content in English and Arabic.