Spend a few minutes on TikTok now and you’ll see that it’s filled with farewells, heartfelt thank yous, considerable anger at American politicians, and a lot of talk about something called Red Note.
Zero hour is quickly approaching for TikTok, with the U.S. Supreme Court set to issue its ruling on whether or not the TikTok ban should be delayed or take effect on January 19, which happens to be the day before former and future President Donald Trump is. takes office. Trump has delved into the TikTok topic. After launching the call for a ban during his first administration, he ran into deep trouble, as did the platform, and now indicates that he might want to save italthough it is not clear how he can undo it if the ban comes.
While Red Note is clearly a workable solution for those who aren’t ready to give up on TikTok, it’s also another Chinese app.
Although the Supreme Court has not yet ruled, most have not yet been pronounced accepted the judge’s comments during oral arguments as a sign that they were not on TikTok’s side. There has been late news that TikTok’s parent company, China-based ByteDance, would agree to let Elon Musk buy TikTok. Because the company characterized that report Mobile World Live as ‘pure fiction’ I bet it’s just a lot of wishful thinking on the part of Musk and X (formerly Twitter) fanboys.
Believe me, that won’t happen.
An alternative emerges
What’s happening, however, is that TikTok users are building digital life rafts and floating to other platforms. Many creators already post content on Instagram Reels and YouTube Shorts, but nothing looks like TikTok… nothing, except Red Note.
I’d recommend searching for “Red Note” in the Apple App Store, but you’d quickly get confused. This is a Chinese app. No, I don’t mean just any Chinese-owned app. This app has a Chinese language name in the app store. For best results, enter “Red Note,” but you won’t see that name anywhere in the official app. When I threw the Chinese characters into a translation app, it came back with ‘Red Note’ or ‘Red Book’.
Naturally, I downloaded the app and got started. At first, even though the instructions were in English, setting up an account was a bit of a challenge. The app asks you to enter a phone number to set up an account (all necessary international prefixes are possible) and to log in with an SMS PIN sent to that number. I tried this a few times, but no PIN came through. Hours later they did so, but the system rejected it. I tried again, and hours later a useless code arrived. I shelved the app overnight and tried again the next morning. A code immediately appeared and I used it to quickly activate my account.
The setup involved entering my age (those under 14 are ostensibly required to verify their identity, but I realize there is no way for Red Note to know if you’ve lied about your age) and selecting a number of option stakes. You will also need to go into the settings and make sure your language setting is English.
TikTok refugees
Red Note is bursting with #TikTokRefugees as they call themselves. They introduce themselves and are greeted in a friendly manner by Red Note veterans who are enjoying the influx of English-speaking users.
The app looks and works a lot like TikTok, but is not an exact match. The For You page is a grid of starting points rather than an instantly scrollable stream of videos. For that, you might want to check out “Trending.” I also noticed that the video editing capabilities are minimal compared to the robust tools in TikTok.
There are a lot of Chinese-language posts and, as you’d expect from TikTok’s audience, memes about American users trying to learn Chinese quickly. There are also impostors, like a fake Pedro Pascal and a lot of unlicensed American content from TV shows and movies. Comments appear to be a mix of English and Chinese.
While Red Note is clearly a workable solution for those who aren’t ready to give up on TikTok, it’s also another Chinese app. Unlike TikTok, there have been no attempts to Americanize the platform, and no efforts have been made to protect our data from the Chinese Communist Party (CCP), which has access to the data of any company operating within its borders.
The irony is rich here, but I also think that’s the point. Angry TikTok users who think the US government is making a huge mistake are showing them how quickly they can put an end to these rules. Take away TikTok and they won’t necessarily flood to US companies and their products, i.e. Meta’s Instagram Reels and Google’s YouTube Shorts. Let’s also take a moment to think about the name: Red Note. The Chinese flag has five gold stars on an entirely red background. Red is literally a cultural symbol in China.
The rise of Red Note as the current number one app (TikTok is now number 13) is especially comical because, unlike TikTok, there is nothing American about this app or the company that runs it, Xingin. There are no US operations and no promise of US data protection on US servers. It is the CCP that all US lawmakers fear in the case of TikTok.
What happens next
I imagine a rapidly evolving game of whack-a-mole. TikTok is banned and Red Note takes its place. Red Note is banned and Lemon8 (also owned by TikTok) steps in. And Lemon8 isn’t just waiting in the wings: it’s already at number 2 on the Top Apps list and is also part of the TikTok refugee conversation. But it could also be banned, and then something else, probably developed in China, will take its place.
I don’t know what will happen between now and January 19th. TikTok could survive, but in a more likely scenario it will eventually disappear. The app will still work on your phone for a while, but that could be a matter of days or even hours, as it becomes a violation of US law if third-party companies support the platform; For example, Oracle will no longer be able to host and store TikTok data. So while the app won’t disappear from your phones, it can no longer be used. But you might not care because you’re already on Red Note, Lemon8, or some other relatively unapproved social media platform.