Owner’s Manual.” Brandon Chen
When the Chinese app Rednote launched in 2013, it was mainly used for shopping and cosmetics reviews. Now, it’s one of the hottest hubs for Chinese tech workers in Silicon Valley to talk shop about AI.
Rednote is also known as Xiaohongshu, which translates to “Little Red Book.” For Chinese tech workers in the Bay Area working at companies like OpenAI and Meta, Rednote has become a sort of home away from home for shopping and food recommendations. And since the launch of ChatGPT, AI-related content on Rednote has exploded.
Technology-related content on the app has more than doubled in the past year, and the number of tech-related creators has more than tripled, according to Rednote. Many users post video reviews or tutorials of AI models, just like people review their favorite beauty products.
“Every time a new model is out, people on Xiaohongshu will share their reviews,” said Tony Peng, founder of the Recode China AI newsletter. “If I want real user-generated feedback, I go to Xiaohongshu.”
Many American Gen Z users downloaded Rednote in January amid fears of a TikTok ban. More than half of the app’s users were born after 1995, Rednote said.
Tech founders told Business Insider that they have used Rednote to promote their startups, demo products, and hire people. Some of the most popular posts on Rednote focus on Big Tech companies or AI giants such as OpenAI, Anthropic, or Google DeepMind. Users may share their anxieties about the tech job market, ask for help, or discuss the compensation packages they’ve received.
Chinese founders promote their AI startups
Brandon Chen, cofounder and CEO of the AI-powered chat app Intent, needed to apply for a visa last year to work in the US.
To do this, he had to prepare hundreds of PDFs for his lawyer, and he decided to write an AI program to help organize them. He posted before-and-after screenshots of his project on Rednote. Soon, people messaged him asking if he would release it as an app so they could use it.
“I thought it was amazing. I just randomly developed something for myself,” Chen told Business Insider.
He ended up releasing it as a product called Riffo.
Chen said he used Rednote to promote his product and even to recruit workers in Japan. He posted on Rednote asking if any Japanese speakers could help with his social media expansion efforts, and within 15 minutes, someone reached out, Chen said.
Qian Chen, a journalist and media entrepreneur who cofounded the tech media company Valley101, said she distributes her videos on channels including YouTube, WeChat, and Rednote. The videos she has produced on topics like Meta’s recent AI layoffs, and the battle between ChatGPT and Google, have performed especially well on Rednote, she said.
Founders find an audience
Rednote helps startup founders foster communities, users say.
Bill Zhu, founder and CEO of Pokee AI, which uses AI to build workflows, said he found a tight-knit community on Rednote to share his learnings, attract users for his products, connect with others, and ask for feedback. Rednote users are often drawn to posts about personal experiences, Zhu said. In Rednote posts, he has chronicled his fundraising efforts, including successes and setbacks.
“You can actually connect with the founder,” Zhu said. “It’s someone you’re actually talking to. You can reach out to this person building this awesome piece of tech that is able to solve these problems.”
During the back-to-school season in September, Rednote launched an “AI Guide” campaign, inviting 20 professors to join a discussion on the app.
Rednote has gained more international users thanks to its AI translation feature, which enables users to translate posts from Chinese to English or other languages with a single click. And while most of the content that appears on Rednote is in Chinese, the app is increasingly featuring English content, including an AMA, or Ask Me Anything, event with Thomas Wolf, cofounder and chief science officer of Hugging Face.
An atmosphere of “sincere sharing” has fueled a trend of AI-themed AMAs on Rednote, said San Bing, Rednote’s senior director of tech community.
The AMAs are popular because Rednote users are eager to learn about cutting-edge technology, said Peng, the founder of Recode China AI.
“For AMAs, you can get firsthand answers to tell you, what is the next frontier?” Peng said.
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