The Terrible Red Fruit and Byte Time of the Chinese Internet |

Why are red fruits so popular?

The first time I heard about Hongguo was last yearIn Linfen, Shanxi in NovemberExcellent micro-short drama base, the general manager of a cultural company asked me:微短劇還有多長Trend period? Can Hongguo develop further?

Only then did I know that Hongguo is a byte inAn APP launched in August 2023. it開創了With the “free viewing + advertising split + gold coin incentives” model, users can watch dramas for free, and can also receive gold coin rewards by signing in and watching dramas every day. this與傳統視頻網站的會員付費、點播付費模式formed a clear反差。

Each episode of Hongguo short drama only has1～3 minutes, often dozens or even hundreds of episodes, the theme is usually逆襲、Overlord, revenge,打臉、豪門、甜寵、玄幻, power schemes, workplace pain points, feelings about family and country, etc., the plot is full of high-level衝突、高反轉、高刺激。Once there is a hot item,算法就會Feed the same type的劇情, similar content quickly emerged in large numbers.

I often read today’s headlines,Red fruits often flow on top. I downloaded it and uninstalled it after two or three days. First, I felt that the plot was too extreme, and second, I felt that it took a lot of time but lacked any nutrition.

In order to write this article, I downloaded Hongguo again and watched “Some episodes of “Armed into the Song Dynasty” and “Emergency Fish King”. It feels like the content is more diverse than before, and some of it is quite meaningful and interesting.專業性，並不會“降智”, but it is definitely time-consuming and easy to get addicted.

The popularity of Hongguo seems to prove once again that entertainment is human nature. contentThe lower the threshold, the stronger the feeling of pleasure, the more intense the conflict, and the less brain-consuming it is, the easier it is to become popular.

This is not a Chinese characteristic. Mobile Internet is currently popular all over the world“Short duration, high frequency, strong emotions”Short drama application.在American market, short dramaAPPReelShortThe average daily viewing time of users exceeded the mobile viewing time in the fourth quarter of last yearNetflix,Amazon Prime Video andDisney+.Short dramas promoted by Byte overseasAPP PineDrama，去年12月上線，到今年9月Cumulative downloads exceeded1billion, daily activity approx.700萬。

Compared with foreign short dramas, Hongguo’s算法更強，AI content supply is more sufficient, platform ecology is stronger, and免費模式, so the development in ChinaIt is faster and users use it much longer than abroad (The average daily usage time of ReelShort users in the fourth quarter of last year was 35.7 minutes).

首先是算法。紅果 的Recommendation capabilities go further than Douyin: short videos provide fragments化Exciting, skit則Provide continuous narrative stimulation，幾乎At the end of every episode一個懸念, the requirements for the audience are very simple, that is“Watch one more episode”, just slide your finger。

Second is supply.據統計， 20261～8月，全國共Online micro-short drama430,000, 13 times that of 2025 as a whole, of which AI dramas account for more than90%, production costs are greatly reduced, and supply is massive。

再次是生態。Users can browse short drama slices on Douyin and jump to Hongguo to watch the full episode with one click; provided by Tomato Novels了大量網文IP，Entire network in 2025The most popular short drama of the year中，由番茄小說IP改編的佔6Above 0%, short plays can also bring a large number of new readers to the original work.

Finally it’s free.Users do not have to pay to watch, only 需Look at the ads. Hongguo sells users’ attention to advertisers，Monetize through advertising and then distribute the accounts to the creators, forming a closed loop of commercialization.

So Hongguo is not an ordinary videoAPP, but aMonetized by free content, algorithm recommendations, and advertising、Driven by the platform ecologyEmotion distributor and time absorber.

In Hongguo, you don’t need to look for content, and you don’t need to know what you want to watch. You only know that you are watching Hongguo and let it choose for you. it根據你的Stay, slide, finish, catch up, continue爲你推送“e-feed” and get you used to it being more compact and without any lagAttention structure.Compared with that, everything長內容都顯得更慢了，也越來越難以獲得你的First minute.

Hongguo does not force you to stay, nor does it require you to commit to watching it for dozens of minutes; it just uses“The next episode will be more exciting” to attract you——Automatic broadcast, continuous suspense, free viewing, accurate push, gold coin incentives,These emotional massages will make youResistance to leavingGreatly reduced, while the probability of retention and immersion is greatly increased.

Comparison of two content ecologies

在紅果Under the impact, the four major long video platforms使用時長All dropped a lot。In response,騰訊近日推出了Green Bubble skit, embedded in WeChat mini program，以“Green” fights “red”.

Tencent’s biggest moat is its social relationship chain, and also has quite rich content, such as WeChatOfficial accounts, video accounts, Tencent Video, Tencent Music, and China Literature等，內容生態和社交關系Support each other. Over the years,字節系的產品——Toutiao, Douyin, Xigua Video, Tomato Novel, Soda Music, Hongguo, etc. are all trying to用戶的time from social relations中抽走，轉入算法推薦的內容流。If Tencent cannot hold its ground on content, its social stickiness will also be affected.

Therefore, Tencent must build a good content ecology.One of the reasons for the success of the video account is that it is based on social relationship chains, which can be seen by opening WeChat.Through social recommendations such as “Friends are watching”,Helps reduce customer acquisition costs and improve conversion efficiency.And it can keep the traffic within the Tencent ecosystem.

If the video account attracts users through plot slicing, Green Bubble takes over the viewing of complete episodes, and WeChat provides social communication and advertising monetization, Green Bubble may retain people in the WeChat ecosystem who would otherwise watch short dramas, but can it compete with Hongguo?

I personally am not optimistic about this. The main reason is that Hongguo, like many other products of ByteDance,是Highly algorithmically driven distribution machine. Byte’s innate gene is to use algorithms to control human nature.His understanding and control of human nature can be described as “reaching the pinnacle”.

Starting from Toutiao, Byte has used recommendation algorithm andA/BTesting replaces human experience and role in traditional content production,Only some improvements require manual analysis and confirmation. Its cornerstone is the algorithm architecture. After continuous improvement and huge investment in computing power, it has formed a powerful computing base that can support multiple front-endAPPReuse and distribution capabilities. Some Byte engineers once said that the algorithm architecture is a “wine bottle”, the locally trained user behavior data is “wine”, and Douyin contains data from Chinese users.美國的TikTokIt contains the data of American users, but the “bottle” is roughly the same.

Byte’s users are living people, but the way Byte captures users is algorithmic recommendation. It is like a mechanical beast fed by data, growing stronger as it grows.

In contrast, Tencent’s DNA is social networking, and Tencent also produces content. It is not only a content platform, but also produces some of its own content. The original Tencent.com and Tencent News were born inPC In the Internet era, the editorial department was still very important. People in the editorial department still had strong control over the content and would considerTaste, direction, influence, etc. In addition, Tencent also acquiredMany content assets (such as Shanda Literature).

Tencent’s content ecology also uses algorithms, but algorithms are not its original intention, its foundation, and it cannot cover all products.Unified operating system.For example, ByteDance pours different wines from an algorithmic wine bottle, andTencent has multipleWine bottles include plastic bottles, glass bottles, metal bottles, and carefully crafted wooden bottles. different content products,各有Each bottle.

In addition to the difference between one “bottle” (base) and multiple “bottles”, from the perspective of creators, in Tencent’s content ecosystem, top creators tend to have more traffic, and there are traces of “centralization” to a certain extent. The algorithm of Douyin is more “decentralized”.Distribution does not entirely depend on how many fans the creator has. Even a new account may be recommended based on user feedback on a single work.

Finally, although WeChat’s social relationship chain is very conducive to content distribution, it also has the interference of “social pressure”. For example, if you post something in Moments, you will consider what others will think and whether it will be bad if someone sees it. And look at Douyin and Hongguo,It’s hard for others to know what you’re looking at.除了字節This sophisticated “attention machine.”

Looking back at history today, the past two to three decades have been an unprecedented explosion of digital content in human history. The production side has shifted from the “monopoly” of creative rights by professional institutions to the creation of all people. The demand side has shifted from one-way passive acceptance by the audience to billions of people consuming it online around the clock. The form of the content itself is also extremely diverse. In this broad and profound change, ByteDance, which was born in the mobile Internet era,生而With algorithms and automated systems at its core，The recommendation algorithm, advertising system, creator ecology, and streaming distribution are integrated into an industrial assembly line.

Byte time can exceed Tencent time, Douyin time can exceed WeChat time,Hongguo’s daily life can far exceed loveYouteng and Mango are essentially more “ruthless” machines.卻讓Algorithm-driven content distribution and content supply create higher efficiency.This is also a “new quality productivity”. Whether this “quality” can represent high quality is a topic in another dimension.

from history“煽情小報“To this day, short videos have been defined as “vulgar” and “vulgar” by elite creators, but “vulgar” naturally has a larger market, and人類也No overall stupidity——New balanceIt will always be established, and different content has its own audience.。

如同No instant noodles顛覆正餐，短視頻短劇也Won’t kill long content. But the impact is indeed strong——Douyin and Hongguo像是給人性The release fixed a line最省力的路，No need to search, no need to choose, no need to pay, just get it“容易”做到了極致, in this case, long,深Content that is professional, professional, and thoughtful, and content that relies more on real people’s creation and performance, will inevitably encounter systemic impact.

｜Tencent is working hard to build new advantages of autonomous intelligence with its massive user data and huge WeChat ecosystem.

Outlook and Thoughts on “Where Does Time Go?”

Life is time, what is filled with time determines the quality of life狀態。When users put more and more多的時間交給“byte time”，把大Leave the amount of free time to the algorithm安排，也就在transfer part of的主動權, as well as the time that can be used for outdoor activities, companionship, learning, socializing, and resting。

If an audience of hundreds of millions認知帶寬Being firmly occupied by endless homogeneous short dramas for a long time, if people become more and more accustomed to“即時兌付情緒” (although this is also human nature), and “machine +算法“Through industrial gradeScale and personalization for thousands of people will be兌付情緒content competition中Invincible, people’s獨立思考、Will deep thinking be eroded?

As a creator who comes from traditional media, my thoughts will definitely be regarded as“老登”。但我的確認爲，當Users are accustomed to low barriers to entry、輕松的Instant gratification, every day的A lot of time is spent on high stimulation, low choices, and difficulty in exiting的“爽感”裏，現實會顯得更加平淡Powerless, I am responsible for many things耐心will pass quietly。

Of course, the audience has their own right to choose, and their pursuit ofRelaxing entertainment and emotional release、碎片消遣are completely legitimate. The problem is that when machine algorithms treat people的注意力導向一種Uncontrolled, unconscious的內容使用state, once you leave and feel at a loss, the short play will occupy more than just用戶的時間, but to reshape了用戶如何產生Emotions, how to organize attention, how to understand the world的心智。 The less you need做出主動選擇，Sensitivity to information qualitywill get lower and lower.

一些關乎“Restraint” governance measures have emerged.

從今年From September 1st，“Measures for the Development and Management of Micro-Short Dramas”Begin implementation,Requires classification and filing of micro-short plays,AI-generated content must be labeled, and the use of algorithmic models that induce addiction and excessive consumption is prohibited.

On October 21st, Hongguo Short Drama issued an announcement announcing that it would phase out the platform’s gold coin function.從Starting from November 1st, Hongguo Short Play will no longer provide gold coins to new users.到今年At the end of December, the gold coin function of the platform will be completely offline.（注：The gold coins and cash balance rights that the user has obtained will not be affected.）

These signals show that the Hongguo short drama can no longer run as wildly as in the past. But history also proves that even if there are restrictions, they cannot fundamentally prevent the audience from making choices. There is a high probability that Hongguo will continue to expand.

Looking to the future, short dramas will still be in an explosive period, and the market may form一種K-shaped structure: bottom floor是海量AI爽劇，填滿用戶time, top會有少量真人精品和強IPworks for the industry建立口碑. The live-action short drama in the middle part is not enough精品，下不夠便宜, life is the most difficult.

而紅果, after the binding factors begin to take effect, there will be從Outstanding流量狂歡, gradually becomesRegular contentscategory, and its leading position in the short drama market is difficult to shake.

The content war between Tencent and Byte will continue for a long time. Tencent will find a balance between social and algorithm, and its content is already partially algorithmic. Although from the perspective of total user time, the Byte system surpasses the Tencent system, and Douyin surpasses WeChat. But time is not the only measure of content, nor is it even the most important measure. The transcendence of time does not mean the transcendence of value. existPremium content, brand trust, and social communication, Tencent’s ecosystem is very strong, but inFragmented, high-frequency, low-threshold content consumption中, the efficiency is not as good as the consistent algorithm distribution of bytes.

In my opinion, Hongguo users every dayThe usage time of 125 minutes is a good figure for Byte, but it is not comforting for users and society. The opportunity cost of 125 minutes is less time in nature, less time reading, less time thinking, and less time with loved ones. The price of this “coolness” is high, and its impact will be long-lasting.

I hope Byte can use its powerful content flow to contribute more to social value to make up for the social cost. In this regard, Toutiao and Douyin have made some efforts and have achieved certain results.

I also hope that Tencent can still maintain its own persistence in this content world where efficient algorithms are rampant. For the Byte machine, human nature is fundamental and algorithms are everything. In Tencent’s content ecosystem, there are many people-oriented and responsible choices.

More than ten years ago, Ma Huateng once said,“Sometimes you did nothing wrong, it’s just that you were too old.” What he meant at that time was that with the advent of mobile Internet, user habits are changing, and the past practices may be eliminated.

Such rules also exist in the content world. Zhang Yiming is a generation younger than Ma Huateng, and the content path he chose is a new path created by machines.

In fact, looking at it today, being old is not a fault, but may be an advantage. Because China is aging rapidly and has a huge middle-aged and elderly population, Tencent has a strong foundation for its content ecosystem. More importantly, content that can travel through time, classic content, cannot be completed with such a simple logic of Shuang Wen Shuang Drama. The immersion brought by classic works and the immersion created by AI short dramas are not the same thing.

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