•  
  •  
 

JURNAL KOMUNIKASI INDONESIA

Abstract

The global rise of women’s football has opened new opportunities for media industries worldwide, including in developing countries such as Indonesia. In response to this trend, Kumparan launched kumparanBOLANITA in 2023, the country’s first digital media channel dedicated to women’s football. Drawing on media economy theory, this study examines how globalization, regulation, technology, and audiences shape the dynamics of kumparanBOLANITA as both a corporate social responsibility (CSR) initiative and a strategic move within Indonesia’s media ecosystem. Employing a qualitative case study approach, data were collected through interviews, document analysis, and observations, including insights from editorial team managing the channel. Findings show that kumparanBOLANITA has significantly raised public awareness of women’s football, as reflected in the growing participation of grassroots football schools and high audience engagement with national women’s team coverage – sometimes exceeding that of men’s football content. Nonetheless, the platform faces persistent challenges, including the scarcity of consistent competitions to generate news, social stigma surrounding women’s participation in football, and the volatility of digital audiences in a highly competitive market. Overall, kumparanBOLANITA exemplifies how digital media can harness global momentum and local initiatives to foster inclusivity and support the growth of women’s football in Indonesia.

Bahasa Abstract

Pertumbuhan global sepak bola perempuan telah menciptakan peluang baru bagi industri media di seluruh dunia, termasuk di negara berkembang seperti Indonesia. Untuk menanggapi tren tersebut, kumparan meluncurkan kumparanBOLANITA pada 2023, kanal media digital pertama di Indonesia yang secara eksklusif meliput sepak bola perempuan. Dengan menggunakan teori ekonomi media, studi ini menganalisis bagaimana globalisasi, regulasi, teknologi, dan audiens membentuk dinamika kumparanBOLANITA baik sebagai inisiatif CSR maupun langkah strategis dalam ekosistem media Indonesia. Dengan menggunakan pendekatan studi kasus kualitatif, peneliti mengumpulkan data melalui wawancara, analisis dokumen, dan observasi. Peneliti menemukan bahwa kumparanBOLANITA berperan signifikan dalam meningkatkan kesadaran publik terhadap sepak bola perempuan. Hal tersebut terlihat dari meningkatnya partisipasi sekolah-sekolah sepak bola akar rumput dan tingginya keterlibatan audiens pada liputan tim nasional perempuan, yang dalam beberapa kasus bahkan melampaui konten sepak bola laki-laki. Namun, kumparanBOLANITA juga menghadapi sejumlah tantangan, seperti ketiadaan kompetisi rutin untuk menghasilkan berita; stigma sosial terhadap partisipasi perempuan dalam sepak bola; dan volatilitas audiens digital di pasar yang sangat kompetitif. Secara keseluruhan, kumparanBOLANITA menggambarkan bagaimana media digital dapat memanfaatkan momentum global dan inisiatif lokal untuk mendorong inklusivitas serta mendukung perkembangan sepak bola perempuan di Indonesia.

References

Albarran, A. B. (2024). The media economy (3rd ed.). Routledge.

Bagus, S. I. (2023, August 15). KumparanBolanita: Bakti kumparan kepada masyarakat sepak bola wanita Indonesia. Kumparan. https://kumparan.com/kumparanbolanita/kumparanbolanita-bakti-kumparan-kepada-masyarakat-sepak-bola-wanita-indonesia-20zqecQVbJb/full

BBC. (2023, November 29). Women’s sport to make £1bn in revenue for the first time in 2024, says report. BBC. https://www.bbc.com/sport/football/67554280

Creswell, J. W. & Creswell J.D. (2018). Research design: Qualitative, quantitative, and mixed methods approaches (5th ed.). SAGE Publications.

Deloitte UK. (2023, November 29). Women’s elite sports to generate more than $1 billion in revenue in 2024*. Deloitte. https://www.deloitte.com/uk/en/about/press-room/womens-elite-sports-to-generate-more-than-one-billion-in-revenue-in-2024.html

Demil, B., Lecocq, X., & Warnier, V. (2018). Business model thinking, business ecosystems and platforms: The new perspective on the environment of the organization. Management, 21(4), 1213–1228.https://doi.org/10.3917/mana.214.1213

Fahira, A. (2023, June 7). Mengenang Buana Putri, ratu sepak bola wanita Indonesia medio 70-80an. Kumparan. https://kumparan.com/kumparanbolanita/mengenang-buana-putri-ratu-sepak-bola-wanita-indonesia-medio-70-80an-20YXEZY8s8R/full

Feuillet, A., Alem, A., Durand, C., Terrien, M., & Scelles, N. (2024). What can be learnt from failures in the sports media business? A case study of the Mediapro crash in football media rights in France. Journal of Media Business Studies, 21(1), 1–22. https://doi.org/10.1080/16522354.2023.2189427

FIFA. (2019, October 18). FIFA Women’s World Cup 2019™ watched by more than 1 billion. https://inside.fifa.com/tournaments/womens/womensworldcup/france2019/news/fifa-women-s-world-cup-2019tm-watched-by-more-than-1-billion

Hadinata, H. (2017, July 27). Djarum beri dana ke start-up Kumparan. Kontan. https://nasional.kontan.co.id/news/djarum-beri-dana-ke-start-up-kumparan

Hampel, R. (2023, April 7). The rise of women’s football and its impact on football business.https://www.footballbusinessjournal.com/post/the-rise-of-women-s-football-and-its-impact-on-football-business

Ikhsan, H. (2019, September 5). Sejarah perjalanan PB Djarum: Klub besar yang melahirkan 2 juara Olimpiade. Bola.com. https://www.bola.com/ragam/read/4058564/sejarah-perjalanan-pb-djarum-klub-besar-yang-melahirkan-2-juara-olimpiade

Ipsos. (2022, November 10). More than half of adults across 34 countries plan to watch the 2022 FIFA World Cup. Ipsos. https://www.ipsos.com/en/2022-fifa-world-cup-global-advisor

Junaedi, F. (2017). Merayakan sepak bola: Fans, identitas, dan media (2nd ed.). Fandom.

Kostovska, I., Raats, T., Donders, K., & Ballon, P. (2021). Going beyond the hype: Conceptualising “media ecosystem” for media management research. Journal of Media Business Studies, 18(1), 6–26.https://doi.org/10.1080/16522354.2020.1765668

Kuncahyo, B. (2023, March 19). Djarum Foundation mulai melirik pengembangan sepak bola putri. Antara News. https://www.antaranews.com/berita/3448569/djarum-foundation-mulai-melirik-pengembangan-sepak-bola-putri

Küng, L. (2017). Strategic Management in the Media: Theory to Practice. SAGE.

Kurniawan, A., & Iswara, M. A. (2023). Digital media environment in Indonesia: Enhancing digital safety and resilience [Research report]. The SMERU Research Institute. https://smeru.or.id/en/research/digital-media-environment-indonesia-enhancing-digital-safety-and-resilience

Leslie-Walker, A., Taylor, K., & Jones Russell, E. (2023). ‘Inclusivity for who’?: An analysis of ‘race’ and female fandom at the 2022 UEFA European Women's Championships. International Review for the Sociology of Sport, 59(3), 4590475 https://doi.org/10.1177/10126902231210769

Loureiro, M., & Alves, J. (2024). The growing importance of women in Portuguese football and in the sports press. Proceedings of the International Conference on Gender Research, 7(1), 208–217.https://doi.org/10.34190/icgr.7.1.2266

Meier, H. E. (2020). The development of women’s soccer: Legacies, participation, and popularity in Germany. Routledge. https://doi.org/10.4324/9780429341403

Miles, M. B., Huberman, A. M., & Saldaña, J. (2014). Qualitative Data Analysis: A Methods Sourcebook (3rd ed.). Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage.

Moore, J. F. (1993). Predators and prey: A new ecology of competition. Harvard Business Review, 71(3), 75–86.

Napoli, P. M. (2011). Audience Evolution: New Technologies and the Transformation of Media Audiences. Columbia University Press.

Nicholls, T., Shabbir, N., & Nielsen, R. K. (2017). The global expansion of digital-born news media. Reuters Institute for the Study of Journalism, June, 7–27. https://reutersinstitute.politics.ox.ac.uk/sites/default/files/2017-12/The%20Global%20Expansion%20of%20Digital-Born%20News%20Media_0.pdf

Nugrahanto, A. (2024, July 10). Tanpa dibayar, malah keluar duit: Cerita awal tim pelatih bangun Putri Tangsel. Kumparan. https://kumparan.com/kumparanbolanita/tanpa-dibayar-malah-keluar-duit-cerita-awal-tim-pelatih-bangun-putri-tangsel-22cgq4fZGRF/full

Nugroho, Y., Putri, D. A., & Laksmi, S. (2012). Memetakan Lanskap Industri Media Kontemporer di Indonesia. Jakarta: Centre for Innovation Policy and Governance (CIPG).

Picard, R. G. (1989). Media economics: Concepts and issues. Sage Publications.

Pratama, A. H. (2017, January 24). Pendiri dan mantan karyawan Detik bangun kumparan. Uzone.id. https://uzone.id/pendiri-dan-mantan-karyawan-detik-bangun-kumparan

Onwumechili, C. (2021). Media framing of women’s football in Nigeria from the early twentieth century to present. International Journal of the History of Sport, 38(12), 1249–1268.https://doi.org/10.1080/09523367.2021.1993190

Owers, J., Alexander, A., Carveth, R., Hollifield, C. A., & Greco, A. N. (2004). An introduction to media economics: Theory and practice (3rd ed.). Routledge.

Robertson, R. (1995). Glocalization: Time-space and homogeneity-heterogeneity. In M. Featherstone, S. Lash, & R. Robertson (Eds.), Global modernities (pp. 25–44). SAGE Publications.

Salasah, R. (2025, July 2025). Kita pun kembali bertanya, kapan liga putrinya? Kompas.id. https://www.kompas.id/artikel/kita-pun-kembali-bertanya-kapan-liga-putrinya

Setyadi, A. (2019, July 5). Tolak liga sepak bola putri, ulama Aceh: Main bola untuk perempuan haram. Detik.https://news.detik.com/berita/d-4612892/tolak-liga-sepakbola-putri-ulama-aceh-main-bola-untuk-perempuan-haram

Widyantoro, A. W. (2020). Digital news startup as a new business model in the media industry (Study case at kumparan.com) [Master’s thesis, Universitas Indonesia]. Fakultas Ilmu Sosial dan Ilmu Politik, Universitas Indonesia.

Wrack, S. (2022, Maret 30). Moving the goalposts: Welcome to our new women’s football newsletter. The Guardian. https://www.theguardian.com/football/2022/mar/30/moving-the-goalposts-welcome-to-our-new-womens-football-newsletter

Yunisal, P., & Rismayanti, R. (2019). Peranan Galanita sebagai organisasi sepakbola wanita dalam mengembangkan sepak bola wanita di Indonesia 1978–1993. Jurnal Olahraga, 5(1), 80–94.https://doi.org/10.37742/jo.v5i1.98

Zarkasi, I. R., Kulau, F., Karolina, C. M., & Intana, L. (2025). Collaboration as a co-creation strategy to create a market niche in the media industry. Jurnal Komunikasi, 19(2), 151–167. https://doi.org/10.20885/komunikasi.vol19.iss2.art1

Download

Share

COinS