 Rojak is a colloquial Malay word for “eclectic mix,” and is the name for a Javanese dish that typically combines sliced fruit and vegetables with a spicy dressing. Open for business? The migration of American TikTok users to Chinese social media platform Xiaohongshu this week is a soft power victory for Beijing’s tech ecosystem, but the hype may not last, a Chinese business newsletter argued. The US embrace of the heavily censored app, considered China’s answer to Instagram, has led to a rare cultural exchange between the two superpowers, as users conversed about memes, cat photos, and social issues. While Beijing is likely to crack down on the app, its US success has highlighted the influence of the country’s tech companies, and “presents an opportunity for China to reinforce the ‘openness’ message it’s been trying to convey to the world,” Amber Zhang wrote in Baiguan. But American creators may not survive on the Chinese app, Zhang argued, because they are likely to have a hard time monetizing content as they have on TikTok. Xiaohongshu allows users to sell goods, which isn’t very feasible for foreigners who don’t do business in China or speak Chinese. “It’s not as simple as asking TikTok creators to post the same content elsewhere.” Nothing was the same A new documentary about musician Brian Eno is just as experimental and innovative as its subject. Eno, which was recently shortlisted for an Oscar, uses a generative code to sift though hundreds of hours of footage and choose what will be included in every 90-minute showing. That means about 70% of the film will be different every time, and no audience sees the same version, writer Stephan Kunze recapped following Eno’s Berlin premiere. In his newsletter zensounds, Kunze admitted he was skeptical going in, which he attributed to a shared cultural attachment “to the ‘classic’ format of a static 90-minute film.” But artists like Kanye West, who has modified his albums after their release, show that “a work of art can be constantly changing, updating itself in real time, and never – or always – be ‘finished.’” The biopic didn’t narrate Eno’s story in a linear way, but gestured to the larger universe of his work. Above all, it showed that a person’s life is “not so much one definitive story… but an indefinite mosaic of possibilities.” Rock ‘n’ rolls Chile has adapted sushi to fit local diets, creating an unlikely hybrid cuisine. The South American country, a massive global fish producer, has tweaked the way sushi is traditionally made. Rather than being served cold, it is common to deep-fry rolls, creating a “bright orange concoction” that is then sliced up. Ceviche often replaces sashimi in the rolls, along with oozy cream cheese that the writer of the Hidden Japan newsletter deemed “too much.” Chileans have embraced the changes by renaming sushi to “Nikkei,” a term that can broadly mean “descended from Japanese,” the newsletter noted: “That may be the most accurate way to see all of this. An interpretation of food that once was Japanese.” Now, many generations will see it as something “truly Chilean.” |
