Amid fears that TikTok is being shut down, many U.S. Internet users are flocking to another Chinese social platform, Xiaohongshu, and have started an entry for“Tiktok refugees.”. This has propelled little redbook up the App Store rankings in the US, where it briefly topped the list of free apps. A reporter from the global times noticed on the 14th that a lot of creators and users whose IP addresses are located in the United States can be found on Little Red Book, they had a lot of fun and friendly interactions with Chinese netizens and others who had migrated from TikTok.
File photo, Source: Visual China
“Our government demonizes China and says China will use apps to turn us against the United States, which is ridiculous! So we’re going to make a playful protest, move over to Little Red Book and challenge them,” Émi, a user from Massachusetts, told the global times.
Asked whether he feared the Chinese would“Spy on and collect data on Americans”, as some US media have claimed, Émi said: “In fact, the U.S. government is the one who is constantly spying on its citizens and leaking our data,” she said, arguing that China has no interest in knowing“What we like to eat.”. According to Émi, many of her friends on TikTok have found each other on little red books, “It’s great to interact with the Americans who have moved here with us. I feel like it’s a revolution! It’s also great to communicate with Chinese netizens, even though our culture may be a little different.”
The reporter noticed that on the 14th little red book almost“Three steps an American”, they posted in English, or in Chinese, which looks like it was translated by a machine, many people also post short videos or even open livestreams to interact with online friends. Many U. S. netizens posted videos of pets, children, breakfast, dinner and dancing, saying they would learn Chinese. A large number of Chinese netizens also left enthusiastic messages, sharing their pets or offering suggestions for their use.
Some American netizens saw the aerial video of the night scenes in Shanghai, Chongqing and other cities and directly said, “I never knew China was like this,” and said they must go to China to see it. Some American netizens also asked, “How can the shopping area be displayed in English? I see so many interesting things that I can’t see them in the United States!” Chinese students also appeared on the platform asking American netizens for help, interesting scenes of American netizens asking Chinese people for help with math problems.
“We don’t want to move to other American apps like Instagram or Twitter because the ceos of these companies played an important role in pushing for the TikTok ban,” Nina, a texas-based user, explained to the global times. Amy, for her part, says she and her friends hate Meta because she thinks it is funding a push by US politicians to ban TikTok so they can switch to Meta-owned apps, but they don’t.
“At a time of tension between the U.S. and China, a new u.s.-china friendship is sprouting on an app that had few international users before,” the Wall Street Journal said Thursday. “I hope the two countries will come together,” the newspaper quoted a 32-year-old user from Seattle as saying. The Global Times noted that as of Wednesday evening, the post under the“Tiktok refugees” tag on Little Red Book has 120 million page views and 2.812 million discussions.