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How Candise Lin Became the Unofficial Ambassador of Chinese Internet Culture
Long before TikTok refugees discovered Red Note, Candise Lin was giving Americans a portal into the wild, hilarious world of Chinese social media.
Starting in December 2023, Lin, who has more than 2.3 million combined followers on TikTok and Instagram, uploaded a series of viral videos introducing Red Note (known as Xiaohongshu in Chinese) to Western audiences as a destination for people searching for brutally honest makeover suggestions. Lin later expanded to covering Chinese celebrity gossip, TV shows, beauty trends, and absurd internet memes—all the things that an average young, super-online person in China would be scrolling and posting about on a daily basis. But in this case, the hilarious commentary is coming from a random Chinese person on the other side of the world, who is probably totally unaware that their quick wit is also being appreciated by millions of people who speak a different language.
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