Will RedNote be banned in the US?
Are We Leaving the U.S. Out of Discrepancy? @thesleepydm, An Analysis of the Decline of TikTok
Is the US government forgetting our founding principles? We are a nation built on spite,” user @thesleepydm posted on TikTok, where they have over 200,000 followers. We are giving our information to the Chinese government. The communists just have our information directly because of … what you did.”
The irony that Americans are leaving TikTok for a Chinese app has not been lost on some users, who see the move as defiance against U.S. legislative efforts to ban it.
Duolingo, the language learning app, tweeted on Wednesday that it has seen a whopping 216% increase in Mandarin learners in the U.S. compared to this time last year — adding that people “learning Mandarin out of spite” are “not alone.”
Plus, since most of the app’s content is in Mandarin, subtitles are suddenly rampant — as are posts from Americans who want to learn the language, including by exchanging translations of popular slang phrases with Chinese commenters.
Those include some 546 derogatory nicknames for Chinese leader Xi Jinping, as well as discussion of events such as labor strikes, geographic discrimination, student suicides and criticism of the Chinese Communist Party.
The content moderation team at RedNote decided to limit orban posts about sensitive topics after a trove of documents was leaked by the China Digital Times.
“Welcome but don’t mention anything about the gay community.” Thank you!” wrote a user in Beijing, in one example reported by Newsweek. The Advocate reported that some American users have had their content removed or accounts suspended, including one woman who was banned for wearing a low-cut top in one video and mentioning “trans plight” in another.
In a group chat this week, participants discussed censorship and shared tips on how to avoid being banned from the platform for bringing up politically sensitive topics, according to the New York Times.
What to Know About RedNote, the Chinese App that American Tik Tokkers are Flooding: An Analysis of Xiaohongshu
It is known that RedNote could be banned under the Protecting Americans from Foreign Adversary Controlled Applications Act. A US official has confirmed that, saying it “appears to be the kind of app that the statute would apply to.”
In the seven-day period beginning January 8, mobile downloads of the app doubled compared to the previous week, and tripled compared to the same period last year.
RedNote moved up to the top spot in the free app charts on Apple’s store after a big jump in search and social media activity over the first few days of the week. The market intelligence firm Sensor Tower told NPR that its data indicates RedNote is also the top-ranked social app on the Google Play store on Wednesday — a big jump from #162, where it stood this time last year.
Over the years it grew steadily and took on the name Xiaohongshu, which translates to “Little Red Book.” That is a phrase referring to quotations from the Chinese Communist leader Mao Zedong.
It was renamed to “Hong Kong Shopping Guide” in order to appeal to Chinese tourists.
RedNote is not the same as the other app. It’s considered China’s answer to the photo sharing service, with a similar layout and focus on travel, makeup, fashion and shopping.
Source: What to know about RedNote, the Chinese app that American TikTokkers are flooding
What is the fate of the TikTok platform? What can it tell us? A comment on a Facebook post by Abe, a Chinese user who didn’t connect for awhile
One Chinese user who was identified as Abe said in a now-viral post that he and other Chinese people had been unable to talk or connect like this for a long time. We can get to know each other and create something amazing together. You are not just welcome here, I really, really hope you will stay.”
The path we should take is based on all of this. Right now, its American user base appears comparatively minuscule; it’s not clear how many US users it had before the past week, but Reuters reports that it gained about 3 million US users in one day this week, compared to about 170 million monthly US TikTok users as of last year. The risks Congress saw in TikTok appear to affect a small group of people. The risks that may actually decide its fate are a little more complicated.
The law mentions TikTok by name as a national security threat, so that platform is basically cooked — the divest-or-ban deadline was set in motion once the law was signed, bypassing much of the process above. The law says any subsidiary of ByteDance is also covered by the law, so while the company and US government have not yet commented on apps like its social network Lemon8, they’ll likely face scrutiny, too. The President has more authority in deciding the fate of other apps.
If a company meets the legal criteria, the buck passes to the president, who can decide whether to initiate a divest-or-ban procedure. This requires a number of steps.
Chinese app RedNote has become the number one app on Google Play Store in the US amid reports of TikTok users leaving for the app. The US government is considering a bill to ban the app under a law called the “Protecting Americans from Foreign Adversary Controlled Applications Act”. American users have been comparing it to the Chinese app Xiaohongshu.