Last month, a video went viral showing a "ghost" haunting a market in Solo. It was actually a man in a white sheet pranking his friend. It got 40 million views. A documentary about the actual folklore of the region got 2,000.
Reza is a "Content Architect" for Gita Production , one of the hundreds of digital studios that have, in the last five years, cannibalized Indonesia’s traditional television industry. On his screen is their latest weapon: "Kisah Malam Jumat" (Friday Night Tales) , a 12-minute horror-comedy sketch about a satpam (security guard) who mistakes a genderuwo (hairy ghost) for a lost Gojek driver.
“That’s low for us,” Reza says, not looking away from the screen. “We need three million by sunrise. The algorithm gods are hungry.”
The video has been live for four hours. It has 1.2 million views.