Star Creating on Xiaohongshu (Mechanism and Interface)

In the future, everyone will be world famous for 15minutes. — Andy Warhol

To be short, these are just thoughts through my own experiences on how Xiaohongshu’s algorithm make it very easy for anyone to become an influencer on social media, long or short.

A little bit of me, I am a recent PhD graduate in Cognitive Neuroscience studying visual perception of action prediction. Like most other PhD, I have hundreds of interest to “procrastinate” on. One of my interest is idol culture, from JPop Johnny’s Idol to Kpop Idol groups (e.g. BTS but I also keep up with new groups). For the last whole year, I started a new fan accounts independent from my “real life” account, where I experienced how different the dynamic of Chinese social media is.

Here I am going through of how the platform direct the traffic and manage violations to eventually shape the unique community that now has more than 300 million daily active users.

What is the app looking like (Skip this part if you know this app)

On the audience side:

Main Feed Page of Xiaohongshu

The app is quite simple, you have your personal page, feed and shopping page.The feed page separated into following, explore, nearby

Most people scroll through the explore page and all the contents are recommended by the platform’s algorithm that looked like a Pinterest page.

On the creator side: Easy to create new contents

Each post The word limit are 1000 characters (no longer than 5 min read) , 18 pictures and 15 minutes video. It also allows the author to create contents in multiple media format.

The editing tool inside the app includes basic tools to create various kinds of contents like adding text with trending fonts and stickers to photos. Video editing tool includes clip, speed up/ down, add stickers/text, combine multiple clips.

Content Creating Page

Observation

1. The app takes a day or two to learn from what you will be interested in.
2. You will soon find out something you are seeing are also popping up in your friends feed (physically close friends and also online friends).
3. You will find the classmate that you never talked with from 10 years appear on your feed.
4. Prefer contents that is controversial, but at the same time has automatic censoring (probably one of the strict censoring) and human censoring.
5. Randomly a post attracts a lot of views, usually within 2 to 48 hours, usually because of a comment.
6. Posts advertising for product, explicitly or not, has limited number of views.
7. Over the next two to twenty four hours comments will be naturally organized with the funny ones and most liked to the top.
8. Every user sees a unique order for the comments inside each post.

Potential Mechanism

1. Prefer unpolished contents. Plausibly one way to reduce advertisements on the platform is prioritizing more personalized and less overly polished content.

Left: more polished photo Right: Photo with daily lightening. Eye: number of views. More number of views with unpolished photos.

2. Users’ posts receive increased traffic as a reward when their comments garner a significant number of likes on another post. Presumably, viewers who engage with a user’s comments will also see that user’s posts featured in their feed.

My posts get more traffic following a popular comment under another user’s post.

3. Track the shared links to identify connections among users, so that if someone opens a shared link, they will subsequently be recommended similar posts.

4. The posts recommended to users are significantly influenced by their physical location, determined through IP address analysis, so that the feed primarily features content that others in their vicinity are viewing.

5 Less is more. An excess of tags can actually reduce the traffic directed to content.

6 Auto tag: The platform analyzes comments and audience engagement to automatically add tags and make recommendations, boosting the visibility of new users’ posts without them needing to navigate the tagging system.

My post get auto-tag from one user’s comments and recommended to other interested users afterwards.

7. New comments are elevated to a higher position for enhanced exposure, ensuring every comment is read and has the potential to be seen.

8. User can tune the algorithm. Users can tweak the algorithm with a feature that avoids recommending their content to acquaintances and vice versa. Yet, even with this setting activated, the platform continues to suggest content based on common interests and popular posts.”

User’s option to tune their own feed page and algorithm to exclude themselves from recommending to someone they might know

9. Equity in exposure: The app ensures every post and comment receives a similar amount of visibility.

My own 3 accounts’s first posts have similar number of total views, despite the differences in contents.

The tricky part: Violation

For any platform that prefer engagement, especially for a platform rely on engaging with strangers, is prone to cyberbullying. The following are rules in place to help with that.

• Posts flagged for rule violations are either not recommended or hidden from the main page, yet appear normal to the original poster, likely unnoticed by casual users.
• Comments violating rules are deleted without notification to the commenter, with human moderators involved for potentially malicious reports, creating a moderated conversation atmosphere.
• To mitigate potential political issues, the platform may restrict the reach of viral posts, displaying false violation alerts for posts exceeding 1,000 views in 5 minutes.

Reporting Violations

The Unique Community

1. There are no permanent influencers, influence isn’t solely measured by follower counts, which don’t necessarily align with the number of impressions and likes. This dynamic ensures that the spotlight isn’t fixed on a select few, but rather shifts to afford everyone the chance to shine.

2. Everyone becomes an integral part of the community, contributing to and shaping a unique platform-specific language during interactions.

3. While you remain anonymous within the community, you’re also connected to its physical aspect, blending digital anonymity with tangible, real-world interactions.

4. An influencer can also be a master commenter but not necessarily content creator.