“WECHAT” – NEW TERM OF SOCIAL APP IN CHINA.

What is WeChat?

WeChat is one of the most popular social apps in China and designed with the main purpose is served for Chinese people.

Although it just appeared from 2010 under the original version “Weixin”; at present, there are more than 960 million users using this application and more than 90% of users are Chinese.

This app has been developed by Tencent – the most valuable company in Asia and top 10 biggest companies in the world; and its head office is located in Shanghai, China.

Why this app becomes the Top One social app in China?

There are many reasons that make this app becomes the number one social application in China. And two main reasons that have a direct influence to the position of this app in the digital sphere:

First of all, this is the encouragement of China Government for the development of digital technology in this nation. To support for social app that creating by the Chinese, the government invested a lot of money for tech companies such as Tencent to build up their own apps.

Besides, China also said “NO” with all the social platform which did not make by Chinese. To be more specific, the government built an “Online firewall” to ban all global sites such as: YouTube, Facebook, Instagram, and Google.

These actions support for Chinese companies such as Tencent could earn a large proportion in digital sphere as well as make “WeChat” become the Top One social app in this nation

What makes it different with other social platforms?

The main difference between this app and other social sites is its multi – function. WeChat is well known as a ‘Super App’ in China when it contains more than 10 million third – party apps. It means that the companies or corporations can create their own app – known as “official account” from their WeChat accounts.

Therefore, the users could be beneficial by using WeChat and could do many things on this social platform compared to using other social platforms. For example, while the social app such as Facebook, Instagram have the main functions are connecting and sharing the information with friends, the communities.

Within WeChat, its function is over, our imagination when users do not only use it as a “Connecting and sharing” tools but also can use it as an online bank, a map, an “App store” to download or buying other apps.

How Chinese people use “Wechat”?

Actually, many Chinese people use WeChat as an integral part in their life. Because most of Chinese basic demands could be done easily by using the ‘WeChat’ app; from shopping, sending messages, booking tickets, finding information for their other demands.

This video will be a good example to showcase the effect of this app to its users in their daily life.

“Introduction about WeChat in China“. Source: YouTube

This video has released that ‘WeChat’ could control the information about its users from all aspects, include:

“What you talk about – Who you talk with – What you read – Where you go – Why you’re going there – Who’s there – Online Spending – Offline Spending”.

Therefore, if comparing the number of customer information that could collect from one app, ‘WeChat’ can be considered as the No.1 on the world instead of Facebook, Instagram or Whatsapp.

And the information of users from this app would be very useful for companies if they would like to target their potential customers, especially from China.

On the other hand, when a huge number of information that could be controlled by one app and this app has a good relationship with not only Chinese government but also another corporation. The question about “Online individual privacy” on WeChat should be careful consideration.

What would happen if one day, all the user information on WeChat be revealed to the “Third – party” without the agreement of users?

The question about “Online privacy” is not quite easy to answer, especially in a country like China. In following blogs, this issue would be deeply analyzed and following by the experts point of view in digital sphere.

Comment under this blog to answer this question:

What do you think about ‘WeChat’?

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Feature image: ‘Individual privacy on the internet in China – Thinking and Reality’. Source: Canva.com; edited by: Anthony Lee. Used with permission.