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Big government intervention is not the app's fault.
But could it be part of the reasons for its success ?
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> WeChat is lightyears ahead of what the west can offer , in terms of product. It has many many useful features and is smooth, reliable As a westerner, is there like a list of such use cases to help get the point across? The things I've read so far here sound like the kind of things we already have offerings for too (making travel easier or etc), just not usually all under one roof. Sending money via text is a great…
I have lived in China for 6 months, and from the top of my head: - Voice/Text Chat - (Video) calling - Payment service (like Apple or Android pay) - Buy movie tickets - Buy plane tickets - Send money via Chat. - Splitt the bills. - Pay the government (utility companies etc) directly from WeChat - Find people nearby (like tinder? But less so than TanTan) - Chat on desktop (like whatsapp web, but native client) - Log o…
I've always wondered if WeChat benefitted from something particular to the Chinese context, for example, favorable government support.[1] This is not exactly the sort of stellar investigative methodology that's going to answer that question. In fact the article makes it sounds like it's all general business and design principles, yet fails to address why WeChat's success is specific to China.
[1] "A successful stunt during last year’s celebration of Chinese New Year’s Eve saw CCTV, the official state broadcaster, offer millions of dollars in cash rewards to WeChat users who shook their phones on cue." http://www.economist.com/news/business/21703428-chinas-wecha...
Nice & inspiring.
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I have lived in China for 6 months, and from the top of my head: - Voice/Text Chat - (Video) calling - Payment service (like Apple or Android pay) - Buy movie tickets - Buy plane tickets - Send money via Chat. - Splitt the bills. - Pay the government (utility companies etc) directly from WeChat - Find people nearby (like tinder? But less so than TanTan) - Chat on desktop (like whatsapp web, but native client) - Log o…
Does it have end to end encryption though? That's kind of a killer feature.
> Tencent was already one of China’s top internet companies in 2010, and the biggest social company even before WeChat was launched. > At the time, Tencent’s products had ~650M monthly active Instant Messenger accounts. Lesson 1: Start with 650m active users
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How often do messages get deleted?
often, they are very fast deleted from your Moments (Wall), heck is you use sensitive keyword they won't be even delivered to the other party in PRIVATE message, so much for this amazing messenger we should look up to
In it, Nathan brings up a very alarming point in that Chinese communication apps like WeChat have extremely robust inspection and censorship features built-in to the app, that were originally designed to be used by the Chinese government. Even though these features might not yet be enabled for WeChat users in countries outside of China, there is very little stopping an authoritarian government in a different state with widespread WeChat adoption from making use of these features if they just negotiated the right deals with TenCent, instantly gaining unprecedented powers in shaping private communications of its citizens, which can be an exceptionally powerful tool in detecting and quelling dissent.
By exporting WeChat, China not just exporting a chat app, but also exporting a vital function of its Great Firewall: it's ability to control communications between citizens within it. Even for democratic states like India, where WeChat is starting to gain a foothold, this could pose a very real threat to freedom of speech if WeChat were ever to become dominant, and greatly increases the potential power of government should they ever want to overreach for it.