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The U.S. government will officially ban TikTok on Sunday, Jan. 19, unless the U.S. Supreme Court decides to do something to stop it in a last-minute ruling. The looming ban has caused a large number of TikTokers to migrate to a new Chinese video-sharing app called Xiaohongshu—Red Note or Red Book, in English—as a general fuck-you to the American ruling class. And with RedNote maintaining the number one spot on the Apple App Store in the U.S. for a second day, it’s a fascinating thing to watch.
It’s unclear whether Americans will actually stick around on RedNote for the long term, especially if TikTok is saved through a successful sale to an American company or President-elect Donald Trump somehow intervenes. A Bloomberg report that Elon Musk may try to buy TikTok was quickly swatted down by TikTok on Monday night. But it’s really interesting to see both American and Chinese users discuss the migration to RedNote in very techno-utopian terms.
Internet users in the U.S. and China have been separated by an immense digital moat for so long that RedNote users, both old and new alike, are talking about how this finally feels like an opportunity for real cultural exchange between average citizens in the two countries. Because back in the 1990s, the idea of a “global village,” where everyone could freely communicate peacefully around the world, was a big part of humanity’s technological dream for the future. But things like China’s Great Firewall and the U.S. surveillance apparatus have put a damper on that vision.
“Seeing TikTok refugees pouring into red notes is so nostalgic for me,” one user on Red Note called Zoey said in a video. “It reminds me of the early 2000s when the internet first made a global village possible.”
Zoey compared it to how people of the 20th century often had pen pals, a common way of communicating with random people you didn’t know on the other side of the world. Physical letters were exchanged through the postal service, often coordinated through schools, so that kids could practice their language and writing skills while learning about different cultures. Zoey said her exercise in school was just about pretending she and her fellow students were actually writing to a pen pal, but the idea was the same.
“I remember back then. In China, when I was little, when I first started learning English, we practiced writing by pretending that there is a pen pal from the United States or the UK,” Zoey said. “And we write them in English. That feels very much like what is going on on Red Note right now.”
Zoey concedes that “it’s a bit chaotic” but says that overall people are very curious about each other.
“It’s just almost magical that the will to connect and gather can still transcend so many boundaries, especially in an age when the internet is so fragmented and algorithms have built really strong echo chambers that prevent people from understanding each other,” Zoey says, going on to call it very magical.
Zoey doesn’t have to pretend to be writing to a pen pal anymore. At least not for now. But Zoey knows that it could be an illusion, and this brief moment could go away very quickly.
“I might be over-romanticizing this, but it’s been so long since I’ve felt this way. Like, people can actually connect and people are genuinely interested and curious about each other,” Zoey said. “I don’t know how long this moment will last. I’m not an optimistic person, but I really hope this can stay a little longer.”
Other English-speaking users based in China have spoken about their conflicted feelings seeing an American influx on the app. One creator said that she was a TikTok Live host and would come to Red Note (or Red Book, as she called it) to complain about Americans she encountered on TikTok.
“Red Book is also the place where I can talk about my American customers behind their back. So I was wondering where I should post those things now,” the user jokes.
The user also encouraged Americans to start learning Mandarin, a common sentiment that has popped up frequently for U.S.-based users who are trying out the site.
But it’s not all serious discussion, of course. There are countless jokes on Red Note about the American surge of interest. Many users have joked about being spies on TikTok and wanting to keep up their spying as more U.S. users move to Red Note. That kind of joke has also been extremely common among Americans on TikTok in recent days and weeks.
Other Red Note longtime users speaking to Americans have welcomed the new users but provided tips about everything from ignoring trolls to engaging in Mandarin if you can.
“At the end of the day, we ain’t that different,” one Red Note user said in English about the cultural divide between American and Chinese users. But that same user also spoke in coded language about the “rules” of Red Note.
“Yes, there are rules here,” the user says. “The place is pretty chill, but not without rules. To be honest, I don’t know much about it, because I don’t really have to, if you know what I mean.”
The user goes on to say that “the things you should be saying” in the United States, “chances are you shouldn’t be saying here either.” The user continues, “You see what I’m trying to say here?” while encouraging Americans to “just use common sense.”
Red Note is not a utopia from the perspective of any American who cares about the ideals of liberal democracy and free speech. The app plays by the rules of the Chinese government, which means you’re not going to find any criticism of the Communist Party. And China isn’t a utopia for LGBT people. Recent years have seen a crackdown on LGBT advocacy groups by Beijing.
The only area where Americans may find more freedom are topics like Luigi Mangione, the 26-year-old man charged with killing United Healthcare CEO Brian Thompson back in December. Social media sites like TikTok have been playing whack-a-mole to suppress content celebrating Mangione but there seem to be no such restrictions on Red Note.
One of the more funny realizations for Americans on TikTok in recent days has been that other English-speaking creators they may enjoy around the world aren’t necessarily getting booted from the platform. As one U.S. user called Mystery of Kyle joked about British users who will remain on the platform, saying, “We’re not going to be able to make fun of each other anymore. What are you going to do without us?”
“It’s going to be literally a British app now. And there’s not many of you guys,” he continued. “They’re all contained within a restricted area with horrible cuisine. What are you guys gonna do? Talk about tinned fish? There’s a guy called tinned fish reviews. He’s probably going to be the number one creator on this app when we’re gone.”
The utopian ideals of a global village online were always a romanticization. The U.S. intelligence community literally helped build the internet from its earliest days in the 1960s and 70s, with the NSA and CIA spying on it ever since. The internet was a creation of the Cold War, and the borders of the web were set up along those same Cold Warrior battle lines. The first internet node outside the U.S., after all, was set up in Norway to monitor Soviet nuclear tests.
China, though late to the internet party, has a government that’s been spying on the internet for nearly as long as the Americans, corralling and censoring its population by blocking access to American websites for decades. And now it’s the Americans’ turn to learn about serious forms of censorship with the TikTok ban.
If there is a critical mass of Americans on Red Note weeks from now, the U.S. government could very well make moves to ban that app under the guise of “national security” concerns. But with Trump taking office on Monday, it’s unlikely that a new ban for a Chinese-owned app will be front-page news. With everything Trump has promised to do on day one—from mass deportations to serious suppression of political opponents—another app getting banned will just be any other Monday in America.
