Chinese social media app RedNote, known in China as Xiaohongshu, gained nearly 3 million U.S. users in one day earlier this week as a flood of self-proclaimed “TikTok Refugees” joined, according to new data from analytics firm Similarweb.
The Chinese-language app had about 3.4 million daily active users across both iOS and Android devices in the United States as of Monday, up from fewer than 700,000 the day prior, and around 300,000 the week prior, according to the Similarweb estimate.
The influx of users has been driven by a looming U.S. ban on TikTok, used by 170 million Americans, on national security concerns.
The data suggests an even larger shift to RedNote by U.S. users this week than was previously known, explaining its dramatic rise to the top of U.S. app store download rankings. Reuters reported on Tuesday that more than 700,000 new users had joined the app in only two days.
Meanwhile, U.S. usage of TikTok declined ahead of the ban, down 2.1% week over week to about 82.2 million daily active users, Similarweb said.
Uhmmmm no thanks lol WTF
But why would any legitimate app ask for a permission for which there is practically no legitimate use? I thought Rednote was a social media thing, not a Caller application, so why does it need to make and manage phone calls on my behalf?
What else is it doing that it doesn’t need to ask permissions for? Please think critically.
And yes before someone mentions It, yes this can be used for getting a phone number automatically, but It can just prompt for my phone number (which it doesn’t need anyway, unless you post), no legitimate need to ask for such a broad permission.
More to the point, why tf are y’all so chill about this? Surely this is like literally a sign of malware 101? Like I’m only a compsci & cybersec grad so what do I know, but this to me is equivalent to opening “not a virus.exe” from “veryrealmoviedownload.com”. Literally first malware I got as a kid on Android was like this.
I thought awareness of this was pretty commonplace. The below image is literally a Facebook-tier meme that even grampa probably knows.
Are y’all just that desperate for a win? Sorry, good things don’t actually happen in our hell world.
Is this a normal thing for apps to do these days? I don’t use any other SM apart from Lemmy and only F-Droid FOSS apps so i’d legitimately like to know. Does tiktok also prompt for making and managing phone calls?
Basically every mainstream social media apps do want your contacts these days, yes. Obviously bad for OPSEC so you should avoid them if you’re worried about that even after blocking those permissions.
There’s a “don’t allow” button right there. And the message on top of it for “System Permissions” literally says, “you can say no to giving permissions and only certain functions of the app will not work”
I don’t know what the issue is here. You can probably call people through the app, since you sign up with a phone number.
It’s for collecting phone number, network cell data etc. It’s basically the most sensitive permission and usually not needed for apps to request.
If an app only needs a phone number, it can ask it with user input instead.
you need to give them your phone number to create an account
for the rest, you can simply select “don’t allow”. That’s why its not really a concern.
Yes please everyone from the banned app move to an app that has a solid chance of being banned for the exact same reason. Unbelievably dumb but I guess we are talking about the tictok user base so I shouldn’t be surprised.
That’s the point? It’s people signalling they’re not dumb enough to believe the US’s “national security” shit and would trust China’s products over american ones like Meta or Xitter
Despite China history with the Uyghurs, child labor, and many other human rights violations and completely ignoring the fact that the people of China have a mile long list of apps they’re not allowed to download and a longer list of things they’re not allowed to speak about. These people sure know how to signal.
There’s more child labor, both legal and illegal, in the United States than in all of China.
It’d also be so fucking funny if the US forces people to use a VPN to access Xiaohongshu. How the turntables.
Soon we’ll be routing our internet connections like flight paths to get around sanctions.
Is any reporter going to actually look into this? I have serious doubts that a slew of English speaking TikTok users who can barely use their phones to begin with are going to mass migrate to a Chinese language app just to watch lame ass videos. This really feels like some sort of propaganda campaign.
I just checked it out today and it seems like at least a third of the active users are american. I’m sure that will die down some after the curiosity dwindles but there is absolutely a massive surge of English speakers on there.
Most of the activity is in the comments. Lots of culture shock happening as I type this.
There are English speakers on Lemmy too. And some of them post Chinese propaganda. I wouldn’t doubt if a lot of this “surge” is manufactured/faked.
Most of the English speakers on Lemmy post Five Eyes propaganda. They don’t mean to, they just don’t know any better. It’s all they’ve ever known. I try to point them toward developing real media literacy.
Just read this. Is it Opposite Day? Why are dems being corporate shills and republicans being based??
https://apnews.com/article/tiktok-ban-trump-executive-order-1e95d9836bf6f8c0c245ed1c3234d968
Democrats had tried on Wednesday to pass legislation that would have extended the deadline, but Republican Sen. Tom Cotton of Arkansas blocked it. Cotton, chair of the Senate Intelligence Committee, said that TikTok has had ample time to find a buyer.
“TikTok is a Chinese Communist spy app that addicts our kids, harvests their data, targets them with harmful and manipulative content, and spreads communist propaganda,” Cotton said.
They’re equally racist. Dems are probably trying to damage control and convince people not to join Rednote and stay on Tiktok until it’s banned
Never forget the broad bipatisan support for blind support of the genocide being carried out by Israel.
The current Republican party is definitely the worse of the two, but it’s small margins. The Democrats, with a few exceptions (that I’m sure would be Independents if there was actually any point to that in the American electoral system,) only barely qualify as liberal these days. They keep shifting further right to try and capture some of the less rabid “disenfranchised” republican voters. End of the day this is doing damage to American democracy too.
Meirl
Just so you know, PRC is not a very inclusive place. Have a look at this article for more info.
A crowd sourced encyclopedia is only as trustworthy as the editors that control the page. I wouldn’t trust wikipedia for anything to do with geopolitics or current affairs any more than I would trust any other mainstream media source.
Yeah they have a long way to go like most of the world; wish they’d just copy Cuba and the GDR on that.
Also you’d be better served with a specific documentary like this one instead of just lazily linking to wikipedia.
As of at least 2023, Chinese public attitudes towards the LGBTQI community continues to become increasingly favorable.
Literally all that “article” says is that China has its issues but is making progress in the right direction.
The important thing is that LGBTQ people in China can and do currently live free, safe, and open lives, and that the state is consistently moving towards providing queer people with further right and protections.
