WeChat and the Surveillance State
I absolutely hate WeChat (not necessarily just for the reasons in the article, but many other <i>technical</i> reasons) but I&#x27;m forced to use it because all of my friends and my entire social life happens on it. And I live in the Bay Area. If I don&#x27;t use it I would basically be locking myself up in a prison where I would never see my friends.<p>Even the majority of my friends who work at Facebook and Google use WeChat to organize social events. Hell, I&#x27;ve visited friends at Facebook&#x27;s HQ and had to tell them by WeChat that I&#x27;m downstairs in the lobby.<p>I personally totally get why this happens, and the network effect is so strong that my first instinct to contact my friends is via WeChat as well. I too organize social events on WeChat, because I know my friends don&#x27;t really check anything else, so in the process, I too am guilty of propagating this network effect.<p>I still hate the app though. I just don&#x27;t hate it enough to want to ditch my social life.