Governing voices: self-gatekeeping and the negotiation of creative labour on Chinese audio platforms

Audio-based platforms remain underexplored in research on platform governance and creative labour, despite their growing cultural and economic significance and the distinct governance challenges of voice-mediated environments. This study examines how creators navigate overlapping governance pressures on Chinese audio platforms. The findings identify three interrelated dynamics: identity uncertainty shaped by visibility, contractual dependence, and economic precarity; self-gatekeeping as a creator-level response to regulatory, platform and commercial pressures; and a persistent grey zone in which legitimate creation and potential violation are recontinuously negotiated. Experiences within the grey zone, in turn, inform subsequent risk assessment and self-gatekeeping. By developing self-gatekeeping as a creator-centred governance mechanism, the study shows how governance becomes embedded in everyday creative decision-making and how the affordances of audio intensify the interpretive labour involved in this process.