Although Beijing appeared to score a propaganda coup last week when hundreds of thousands of American TikTok users flooded to the social media app RedNote, observers say the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) is worried about any cross-cultural exchanges happening online.
The Chinese government blocks various U.S.-based platforms, including Facebook, YouTube, and X, which are only accessible via virtual personal network. The government also heavily censors topics considered sensitive to policymakers.
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Dali Yang, William Claude Reavis political science professor at the University of Chicago, wrote on [social media]:
"Apparently Xiaohongshu is frantically trying to adapt to both accommodate these new American users but also reduce their interactions with Chinese domestic users. Haha, that sounds like going in the direction of what Bytedance did with Douyin/Tiktok."
Rush Doshi, senior fellow for China and director of the Initiative on China Strategy at the Council on Foreign Relations, wrote [on social media]:
"The PRC end game will be to bifurcate the app, as they did with Douyin, between a foreign and domestic version to avoid too much interaction between US and PRC users.
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After indicating he would rescue TikTok, Trump on Monday signed an executive order postponing the TikTok ban for 75 days.
He has suggested, however, that the U.S. should acquire a 50 percent ownership in the company, telling reporters it is "worthless" if he doesn't approve a deal to keep it going in the country.
Evan Feigenbaum, vice president for studies at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, told CNBC such a joint venture is unlikely, given that China regulates the algorithms as national security property and that China is "basically being asked to force over its core intellectual property."
In a related article, The Diplomat reports that unlike TikTok, RedNote primarily operates in China. As a result, concerns over content censorship, data privacy, and CCP control are even greater.
RedNote imposes strict content censorship on the posts visible on the platform. Discussions on politics are generally limited and hidden. Similar to the situations in other Chinese-controlled websites and mobile applications, users need to use jargon, memes, acronyms, and intentionally mistyped words or characters to express limited opinions on public affairs in China. The platform [RedNote] has a notorious record of limiting LGBTQ-related topics. Media reports suggest that some U.S. users have already seen their posts taken down by RedNote as they are deemed “too sensitive.”
The significant number of U.S. users entering the app led to some unplanned pressure for RedNote to fulfill its censorship requirements imposed by the Chinese cyberspace administration officials. After the first wave of user influx, RedNote was reported to be urgently hiring English-language content moderation employees. The job posting has no prior job experience requirements for the new hires and offers the recruits paid training. Reports also suggest that RedNote is developing features that segregate users based on their IP address to minimize its political and content moderation risks.
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