However, RedNote’s rise in popularity is not guaranteed to last.
There’s no reason to believe it won’t face backlash for the same reasons as TikTok: concerns that China could use it to spy on Americans.
It’s unclear how long Beijing will be open to such unhindered exchanges — control of the Internet is key to its repressive regime.
The irony of the situation was noted by one Chinese user who wrote: “Don’t we have a (fire) wall? How can so many foreigners get in when I clearly can’t get out?”
Generally, Chinese Internet users cannot directly interact with foreigners. Global platforms like Twitter and Instagram and search engines like Google are blocked in China, although people use VPNs to get around these restrictions. Sensitive topics — from history to dissent — or anything seen as critical of the Chinese government and ruling Communist Party are quickly censored.
It’s unclear to what extent RedNote is censored — it’s mainly used by young and middle-aged women in China, where they share images and videos. This is not unlike Weibo, another Chinese app where discussions and airing of grievances are much more common, resulting in frequent deletions of posts.
But a handful of new RedNote users say they’ve already received messages saying their posts violate the guidelines, including one who asked in a post whether the app was “LGBT-friendly.”
Another said they asked, “What (sic) Chinese people think about gays?” and received a similar notice that they had violated the principles of “public moral order.”
And Chinese users continue to remind Americans on the app “not to mention sensitive topics such as politics, religion and drugs.”
One Chinese user also advised them to adhere to the “one-China policy,” a diplomatic pillar of US-China relations in which the US recognizes and maintains official ties with China, rather than Taiwan, a self-governing island that Beijing claims as its own.
