(14 Jan 2025)
ASSOCIATED PRESS
14 January 2025
Berlin, Germany – 14 January 2025
1. SOUNDBITE (English) Natalie Sijing Li, Social Media marketing expert:
"As the U.S. considers banning TikTok, another Chinese social media app called Xiaohongshu is seeing a rise in downloads in the U.S."
2. Close of Xiaohongshu logo
3. Phone display showing Chinese social media app Xiaohongshu
UPSOUND (English) Natalie Sijing Li, Social Media marketing expert:
"Xiaohongshu, which means Little Red Book, was created in 2013, during a time when many Chinese people started traveling abroad.”
4. SOUNDBITE (English) Natalie Sijing Li, Social Media marketing expert:
“The app provides a platform for the users to review products or share their shopping experience from overseas."
5. Various of phone display showing Chinese social media app Xiaohongshu
UPSOUND (English) Natalie Sijing Li, Social Media marketing expert:
"Today, it has grown into a popular platform for young people to share practical tips or tutorials on various topics, like beauty, fashion, fitness, adventure or even career advice. The app has over 300 million monthly active users, and most of them are young females living in the big cities."
6. SOUNDBITE (English) Natalie Sijing Li, Social Media marketing expert:
"When you open the app, you can see its layout is quite similar to Pinterest. As you scroll through, you will see content with photos or videos with catchy titles.”
7. Phone display showing Chinese social media app Xiaohongshu
UPSOUND (English) Natalie Sijing Li, Social Media marketing expert:
"Since yesterday we have seen many new posts in English, calling themselves The Tik Tok Refugees.”
8. SOUNDBITE (English) Natalie Sijing Li, Social Media marketing expert:
“And the reaction from the Chinese users have been mixed. Some believe this is a great way for Chinese culture get to a global audience, while some worry this will be a cultural invasion and it may have an impact on the censorship."
STORYLINE:
As the threat of a TikTok ban looms, some U.S. TikTok users are heading to Chinese social media app Xiaohongshu – making it the top downloaded app in the U.S.
The TikTok users, who call themselves “TikTok refugees,” landed on Xiaohongshu as an alternative to TikTok, with some saying that they specifically picked a Chinese app to protest against the TikTok ban.
Supreme Court justices are due to rule on a law that stipulates TikTok must be divested from its Chinese parent company ByteDance by Jan. 19 or face a ban in the U.S. over national security concerns.
After the justices seemed inclined to let the law stand, masses of TikTok users began creating accounts on Xiaohongshu, including hashtags such as #tiktokrefugee or #tiktok to their posts.
Since Monday, Xiaohongshu has become the top downloaded free app on Apple’s App Store in the U.S.
Xiaohongshu, which in English means “Little Red Book” is a Chinese social media app that combines e-commerce, short video and posting functions.
In recent years, the app has gained traction in China and other regions and countries with a Chinese diaspora such as Malaysia and Taiwan, racking up 300 million monthly active users, a majority of whom are young women, who use it as a de-facto search engine for product, travel and restaurant recommendations as well as makeup and skincare tutorials.
Chinese users on Xiaohongshu have so far welcomed the new American users, with some offering to teach them Chinese.
But like most apps and internet services in China, Xiaohongshu is subject to censorship.
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