1w ago

People who've used Xiaohongshu(Red note), how is it like? Also is there any FOSS client?

Have heard of it during the Tiktok ban and most comments about it seem positive.

I generally try to avoid using apps that are non-FOSS or opensource, and tried to use the website. I think it's my network provider, but I can't really use the site as it only seems to be available once every 2-3 reloads(I also use a private dns as without that it take 4-5 reloads). I also think that app users can easily change the interface language, as I couldn't find where the switch was on the website. Couldn't create an account because of the same too.

Is there any foss client for it? If not, is the app decent on privacy n all? I generally avoid meta apps, except Whatsapp(which is the major messaging app in India).

Also, what was your experience there? Most comments about the interactions seem very positive. But I have that doubt whether I'm being biased my pov as a leftist.
So I thought I could ask here and see the general opinion.

Thanks in advance.

37 comments

It's been amazing, honestly. The people on both sides have been having an eye opening experience seeing what's behind the digital wall that has been knocked down.

I've been having a ton of fun, I like the cultural exchange a lot.
Personally I don't care if China has data on me, it's not like it's useful for them and I'd rather them than meta or the US government or whoever.
There's also way more queer/trans content than I was expecting.
- Cool
  I'm Indian, so I'm careful whether using the app directly would clash with what the govt wants.
  
  Not sure about red note, but tiktok used to log all available Bluetooth decide and used to send it to their servers.
  It was the major argument I heard when Indian govt banned tiktok. Not in the media, but in the policy advisory circles.
  I'm guessing red note would do the same given the chance. My point being, you might be okay with your data being with China, you might be putting others data as well. Not discouraging you to use it, just be aware of the consequences.

No social media is decent on privacy.
They’re not private. They’re public. You don’t have the expectation of privacy in public. That’s why people might dress differently walking to the store than they do in their bedrooms.
Social media is an osint treasure trove. It’s lowkey why the idea of osint exists. Don’t expect to have privacy in public spaces like social media and you’ll never be surprised.
This may come as a surprise to you, but lemmy is social media.
小红书 is not private. It’s social media and if what another user said is true then the app version uses plaintext http to transfer data. It’s up to you to determine if that’s a problem for you.
Use a vpn in or around China and your performance might be better. I get a lot of hangs with mullvad us servers.
It’s a nice experience. Check it out if you like.

FOSS
AFAIK It's not even possible to sign up without a Google account, facebook account, or phone number. I'd like to signup in a way the US government can't revoke.

I love it so much!
There's a lot of content so you can browse whatever interests you. My feed is mostly girls (almost) kissing, street food being prepared, pets and interesting questions being discussed. Fashion dancing. There's this bass guitar girl who is the coolest person i have ever seen she's like a character from a movie. I have found many queer and transgender people there which makes me feel very welcome. I haven't received any guff from being openly trans there.
There are very few ads. What there is is influencer style product placement stuff easily avoided. I truly love this aspect.
There is almost no contention. The moderation is swift and heavy handed and if things aren't kept light they get removed. I have seen serious topics like transgender rights being discussed but no arguing seems to be tolerated and no hate speech. There's been a couple 'transgender is a mental illness' posts i saw before they were deleted but they were all by americans. I understand that political posts are removed.
The people are lovely and amazing. I have a post of my cat with 100 comments saying how cute she is and showing me their adorable cats. Everyone i interact with is very nice and positive and they seem to be genuinely caring. Most of them seem truly delighted that we are there. Some Chinese living abroad lament the anglicisation of what was for them a remote window back into China.
the interface is very usable. I use a translation app to write my replies but XHS added an inline translation button and you can long press some other text for translation so understanding things is generally easy. I take screen captures and my photo app translates any other on screen text.
You can't use the shopping tab. Eventually you're presented with a list of chinese cities to choose from and can't input your own city.

I generally try to avoid using apps. I use Lemmy, WhatsApp, banking, email, and the New York Times quiz app. That's it.

I have a feeling they'd take issue with a FOSS client. Even Western social media that plays coy about being a walled garden tends to frown on it.
Also, LGBTQ stuff is banned.

did you know the real chinese name for this app is "Little Red Book"
FYI
- Just a heads up for people reading this:
  小红书 is a Chinese language app (it added translation just a week or so ago!). The founder claims to have chosen the color red and the 红 part of the name because of his Alma mater stanford [!]. The app is pretty much targeted at lifestyle influencers and women and features prominent shopping and payment integration.
  English speakers nicknamed the book Quotations from Chairman Mao the “little red book”. The Chinese nickname is 红宝书 “treasured red book” or “cherished red book”, not “little red book”.
  Many posts on 小红书 are making light of the fact that Americans flocked to the bored housewife shopping app.
  
  so we agree then
- Does it mean that it's policies account for usage by minors too? Like Youtube for kids?
  
  honestly don't know what any of its official policies are or how much the CCP is involved. just seems like a very overt reference to me

No FOSS clients, nobody's got time to reverse engineer it as it happened so fast.
As for privacy, well, it uses plain HTTP for at least all the media, so, not very private. It requests less permissions than Meta's apps however, and only asks when the feature is needed (for example, the Nearby page requests GPS which makes sense). It does seem to like to paste my clipboard which is not very cool, no idea what it's doing with it. I use a VPN for it.
It's still a chinese app under the control of the CCP. Personally, I'd rather China have my data than the US, because at least for China it's useless whereas with the current administration in the US, who knows what they do with that data.
As for the app itself, it's pretty nice. Don't expect free speech, but the rules also make it for a rather respectful and positive experience overall. For what it's intended to be (share cats, recipes, makeup, and other entertainment content) it's pretty good and a breath of fresh air compared to the non-stop political fighting on other platforms. That said it's not as censored as some assume it is: if it's presented tastefully you can usually get away with it. Respect and honesty gets you far on there whereas lies and aggression gets you banned. I've seen guns, LGBTQ, cars, religion, politics, comparing capitalism and communism. They're talking about Elon's nazi salute on there and all.
The massive cultural exchange going on there is quite enjoyable. People from all sorts of countries are trying out new recipes and adapting them to their local taste. Turns out mandarin isn't so bad to learn either. Very welcoming community. Rumors are it made the chinese government consider relaxing the great firewall. The sentiment is very anti-war as people from enemy countries are building online friendships.
I approach it with caution, but I've been rather please with what I see.
- It does seem to like to paste my clipboard which is not very cool, no idea what it's doing with it.
  It's actually very common in Chinese apps because before some logic was introduced into android it was the most performant way to transmit states and info between screens. It was common on US apps too, just not when it was obvious that the clipboard was being used. I'm not sure why it's still around, probably just historical tech baggage, alipay, meituan, and WeChat do the same
  
  I found the setting to turn that off in the settings so that checks out with what you said. Good to know!
  
  I use this to paste text into DeepL for translation, and back into Red Note
- Excellent breakdown and analysis, it's dope over there.

It is fun, it's less brain rot than tiktok, closer to what pixelfed and Instagram is but even then it is different, I think it's more like Pinterest or pixiv but for every day shit
Privacy wise, you're assigned a country by your IP and in china specifically it shows your exact region, you can view posts based on proximity.
You'll have your data harvested for recommendations obviously, but the ads don't seem to have this happen to them, they don't seem to feed their data to ads so they're all very general and based on what you searched up instead
I think xiahongshu is better than tiktok in terms of privacy, but the censorship I do not know about, but I haven't been blocked yet.
You can try it out, you lose nothing by doing so, just know it's nearly all Chinese

37 comments