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Interesting how they'll react to X. WeChat seems to be the closest thing to an "Everything App" that Elon wants to create.

sdfghswe 3y ago
It's still twitter. I love that your previous comment was that "people use twitter because of free speech", and now I can't even look at it without logging in. Proof that on the internet anyone can sound confident.
- sourcecodeplz 3y ago
  What does logging-in have to do with free speech?
stefan_ 3y ago
WeChat is the "everything app" because it has a government monopoly. I'm sure there was and is some organic competition but it's also obvious they picked a winner and ran with it.
- rat9988 3y ago
  Can you tell us more about how the government picked the winner?
  - OfSanguineFire 3y ago
    Under COVID, when being able to board public transport, enter venues, etc. required showing one’s health status from one’s phone, the Chinese state facilitated that through two apps in particular: WeChat and Alipay.
    - MichaelZuo 3y ago
      That sounds like a duopoly, but it's still surprising that there was no third option at all. Are you sure they couldn't even bring printed out forms?
      - deleted 3y ago
        [deleted]
      - OfSanguineFire 3y ago
        > Are you sure they couldn't even bring printed out forms? In China your health status (green/yellow/red) was automatically calculated based on what neighborhoods of the city you had been in, what other people you passed by in the street or on public transportation, etc. So, it could change in an instant, and that is why it was shown from phone apps that constantly updated. It wasn’t a fixed thing like vaccination status, where a printed form would make sense.
        em-bee 3y ago
        yes and no. you needed regular testing and in most cases you only needed to show that you had a clean test. you could get that on paper, it just wasn't practical. i had the issue that sometimes the test station was not able to enter my data because i don't have a chinese ID. in that case they had to print out the test results and i would use those. when i travelled that sometimes meant that they sent me a photo of the results because i did a test in the morning in one city, but the results were not available until i arrived in the other city. to get your digital travel status there was an app you could download (actually each province hat their own app) and you registered on that with your phone number and passport details (or chinese ID). no wechat or alipay required. if you didn't have a working phone then you could log in to that app on any other phone at see your status there. in theory it was possible to travel without a phone and not have the fact that you travelled reflect in the app, but in practice it was not worth the trouble.
    - kredd 3y ago
      WeChat was ubiquitous in China way before the incident. It’s simply being practical and using a method that almost everyone has access to. Whether it was a correct way to do so or not is a different topic.
- em-bee 3y ago
  it doesn't have a government monopoly any more than facebook has a monopoly elsewhere. it just happens to be the most popular app. others do exist but they don't market themselves to the average consumer.
justapassenger 3y ago
X is vaporware. And even if they add those features, adoption is a slightly more complex story. Also look at Facebook. You can talk with friends. Send money. Interact with businesses. Play games. Date. Sell and buy stuff. And many more. But they don’t have state supported monopoly position, so it’s not an everything app.

sdfghswe 3y ago

It's still twitter. I love that your previous comment was that "people use twitter because of free speech", and now I can't even look at it without logging in. Proof that on the internet anyone can sound confident.

sourcecodeplz 3y ago
What does logging-in have to do with free speech?

stefan_ 3y ago

WeChat is the "everything app" because it has a government monopoly. I'm sure there was and is some organic competition but it's also obvious they picked a winner and ran with it.

rat9988 3y ago
Can you tell us more about how the government picked the winner?
- OfSanguineFire 3y ago
  Under COVID, when being able to board public transport, enter venues, etc. required showing one’s health status from one’s phone, the Chinese state facilitated that through two apps in particular: WeChat and Alipay.
  - MichaelZuo 3y ago
    That sounds like a duopoly, but it's still surprising that there was no third option at all. Are you sure they couldn't even bring printed out forms?
    - deleted 3y ago
      [deleted]
    - OfSanguineFire 3y ago
      > Are you sure they couldn't even bring printed out forms? In China your health status (green/yellow/red) was automatically calculated based on what neighborhoods of the city you had been in, what other people you passed by in the street or on public transportation, etc. So, it could change in an instant, and that is why it was shown from phone apps that constantly updated. It wasn’t a fixed thing like vaccination status, where a printed form would make sense.
      - em-bee 3y ago
        yes and no. you needed regular testing and in most cases you only needed to show that you had a clean test. you could get that on paper, it just wasn't practical. i had the issue that sometimes the test station was not able to enter my data because i don't have a chinese ID. in that case they had to print out the test results and i would use those. when i travelled that sometimes meant that they sent me a photo of the results because i did a test in the morning in one city, but the results were not available until i arrived in the other city. to get your digital travel status there was an app you could download (actually each province hat their own app) and you registered on that with your phone number and passport details (or chinese ID). no wechat or alipay required. if you didn't have a working phone then you could log in to that app on any other phone at see your status there. in theory it was possible to travel without a phone and not have the fact that you travelled reflect in the app, but in practice it was not worth the trouble.
  - kredd 3y ago
    WeChat was ubiquitous in China way before the incident. It’s simply being practical and using a method that almost everyone has access to. Whether it was a correct way to do so or not is a different topic.
em-bee 3y ago
it doesn't have a government monopoly any more than facebook has a monopoly elsewhere. it just happens to be the most popular app. others do exist but they don't market themselves to the average consumer.

justapassenger 3y ago

X is vaporware. And even if they add those features, adoption is a slightly more complex story. Also look at Facebook. You can talk with friends. Send money. Interact with businesses. Play games. Date. Sell and buy stuff. And many more. But they don’t have state supported monopoly position, so it’s not an everything app.