Jakarta –
Earlier this week, Elon Musk officially changed his Twitter name to X. Not only that, Elon Musk also wanted to follow in the footsteps of the WeChat application.
Quoted from the BBC, Elon Musk really wants to change the company he bought last year for US$ 44 billion and make it bigger.
Previously, Elon Musk did praise WeChat and called it an application that could do everything. Starting from chat, dating, payments and social media.
In his tweet, Elon Musk said they would add financial features to X. With this, it is hoped that the company will be able to generate revenue and cover its debts.
So what is WeChat and why is Elon Musk so desperate to imitate WeChat?
This application was launched by Tencent in 2011. There are now nearly 1.4 billion WeChat users. The services provided by WeChat are arguably more than super because they have messaging, voice and video calls, social media, food delivery, telephone payments, games, news and dating apps. This means the same as WhatsApp, Facebook, Apple Pay, Uber, Amazon and Tinder rolled into one.
This makes it impossible for Chinese citizens to do without using WeChat. Chinese citizens actively use WeChat for messaging, then social media such as Facebook and wallets that allow connecting to debit and credit cards. Almost all shops and stalls in China accept payments using WeChat which can be via QR.
People can also pay for household needs, invest and withdraw credit on WeChat. From the government side, residents can also get social security information, pay for tickets to arrange appointments at the hospital.
During the pandemic WeChat became a very important application for Chinese citizens. But there is a minus that WeChat users will experience, namely the memory on the cellphone will quickly run out due to the very large data storage.
Then it is feared that WeChat will not be able to limit the surveillance and privacy of citizens. Especially now that China has blocked access to many foreign websites and news portals from abroad.
This government control is also dangerous for people who discuss against the government on WeChat. It’s not uncommon for Chinese citizens’ WeChat accounts to be suspended for days because they chatted on the app.
(kilo/that)
2023-07-30 06:07:51
#line #WeChat #sophistication #Elon #Musk #smitten
