Why the Most Powerful People Take Social Media Seriously

A few days ago Yann LeCun announced his new role in a LinkedIn post, something almost unthinkable in China.

Author: Koutian Wu; GitHub: ktwu01

In China the usual way is an official press release saying so and so has taken a position. The person does not post it himself and then collect likes from a crowd of friends underneath. So I went and looked into it.

My conclusion came as two little known facts. First, the people at the very top, the ones with power and money, all put real care into their social media.

Second, in my circles, having a decent number of followers on X carries far more business weight than owning a few nice cars or houses.

In business, social media shows more than wealth and strength. A potential partner badly wants a fuller picture of you. Your everyday thoughts, your stance on current events, even your love life and your little habits. That is what they use to decide whether to work with you.

A business card built on social media is more trustworthy in my partnerships than the same mass produced luxury cars and yachts. Anyone can rent a car to impress a client. What your partner cannot see is how strong you were last year, or the year before, and what state of mind you were in.

What they really want to know is your thinking, your decisions, your energy and your values over a long stretch of time. They would rather work with people like themselves.

In China and the Chinese market in North America, Xiaohongshu works far less well as a business card than X and other overseas platforms. But once I have built that card on other platforms, adding Xiaohongshu takes almost no extra effort.

There are of course many other ways to answer this question.

In the education I received, everyone should have their own position and values, and that is a basic right. Most of the time your values and mine will never fully match, and it is hard to say who is right.

So as an independent person, I have every duty to let more people hear the values I believe are right. Social platforms like Xiaohongshu happen to be a tool for amplifying a voice.

When you and I disagree, I do not care whether I change your mind. I only need a wider audience than you.

I believe those two angles are enough to answer the question.

So, with no offense meant to whoever asked, I find it hard to believe someone could ask why big names would bother with Xiaohongshu. It is like a man with a Qing dynasty queue who has time travelled into the present asking me why I use electric light.