China’s Live Music Industry is Booming, But Has a Major Ticket Scalping Problem

Since 2023, China’s concert and live performance market has seen a resurgence after a period of frequent suspensions and cancellations due to social distancing requirements brought about by the Covid-19 pandemic.


According to data from the China Association of Performing Arts, an impressive 342,400 commercial performances were held across China in the first three quarters of 2023. These performances generated 32 billion RMB (4.44 billion USD) revenue in ticket sales. However, the soaring popularity of concerts has led to a significant challenge for fans: increased difficulty when it comes to getting tickets.


Taking the renowned singer Jay Chou as an example, data from the ticketing site Damai shows that more than 4 million people are interested in attending his 2024 Hangzhou tour dates, which take place from April 18th to 21st. Attendance is capped at 40,000 per night, meaning that out of 100 fans who wish to see the show, only 4 will get the chance.


Jay Chou

4 million people clicked that they were “interested” in Jay Chou’s concert on Damai.


High demand for tickets has given rise to ticket scalpers, who exploit an unregulated market to resell tickets at exorbitant prices. Often known as huangniu (黄牛, literally yellow cow) in Chinese, their prices sometimes even reach as high as 60,000 RMB for a ticket with a market price of 2,000 RMB. The prevalence of scalping has extended to music festivals and live house* performances, dampening the enthusiasm of many potential concertgoers.


In response to this issue, the government has implemented real-name verification for ticket purchases. Nevertheless, challenges persist, particularly regarding the collusion between concert organizers and scalpers in the illegal trade of tickets ostensibly set aside for internal use. In September 2023, the Ministry of Cultural and Tourism announced new regulations for large scale events, stating that event organizers must ensure at least 85% of an event’s approved audience capacity is allocated for public ticket sales through open market channels. However, due to a lack of clarity amongst law enforcement, scalpers continue to find loopholes, perpetuating scams and undermining the integrity of the ticketing system.


TIcket scalper

A post from a ticket scalper’s WeChat, showing off his stock of tickets for a Li Ronghao concert. Image via Xiaohongshu.


As calls for action against scalping grow louder, it remains clear that addressing this issue requires a multifaceted approach involving collaboration between authorities, concert organizers, and the public. While the road ahead may be challenging, tackling ticket scalping will be crucial for ensuring fair access to cultural events and maintaining audience interest in the entertainment industry.


* An English term borrowed from Japan’s music scene and commonly used in China, which refers to small live music venues, generally focused on independent music.


Banner image via Weibo. Xiaohongshu screenshot linked here.


“You have big eyes, small face, I like”: Remy Zee on Spreading “Mandarizz” on TikTok

If “rizz” was last year’s TikTok buzzword, then “You have big eyes, small face, I like. What’s your WeChat?” could claim the title of 2023’s pickup line of the year. The catchphrase, which became a viral sensation for the Asian and chronically online, was created by Vancouver-based TikToker Remy Zee. With 17 million views and 2.3 million likes on the video that started it all, Remy Zee has quickly ascended to become one of TikTok’s fastest-growing Asian comedy creators, amassing 17.6 million likes and over 232.9K followers.


It’s the instantly meme-able quality of Remy’s videos that captivates. His skits, often under a minute long, pack a punch with hyper-specific humor that resonates more with those familiar with the nuances of recent Chinese transplants in Western countries, particularly international students. His signature line has inspired thousands on TikTok to create their own content, even sparking “big eyes small face makeup” tutorials. With just 30-some videos, the Vancouver-based creator has struck brand partnerships with names like Duolingo, Coffee Meets Bagel, and Haidilao, transforming his out-of-context humor into a cultural phenomenon.


In his most successful video, Remy’s character switches between English and Chinese to swear as he catches a ball carelessly thrown by his friend “Michael,” then smoothly turns to the camera. “You have big eyes, small face, I like,” he says, staring into the lens with much intensity and unabashed confidence. “What’s your WeChat?”


Remy’s character is instantly recognizable to those who know — he wears a Ferrari jacket, sports a middle-part hairstyle, and exudes a nonchalant vibe, all while speaking Mandarin-accented English, channeling strong “Y’all ladies alright” energy. Named LeBron, after his favorite basketball star, this character navigates the dating scene on a college campus with a unique blend of confidence and cluelessness.


LeBron speaks English in almost all the videos, but his mannerisms, values, and beauty standards are unabashedly Chinese. He compliments women with oddly specific, sometimes crass expressions — “I’m lost in your collar bones”; “you have very natural double eyelid”; “Your big earlobes will bring me good fortune”; and “Your face, it’s like an upside down sunflower seed.” He lacks cultural awareness but remains unbothered, operating under his own set of rules. He drives around in luxury cars and impresses his girl with extravagant grand gestures. He is undeniably privileged, but his relative financial ease does not translate into social status. He is an outlier, but at the same time the main character of his own world.


RADII was lucky enough to connect with Remy over video chat recently. The following interview has been edited for length and clarity.


Du Anrui: Can you tell me a little bit about your background?


Remy Zee: I was born and raised in Canada — so pretty Westernized, but my parents are first generation Chinese immigrants, first to Japan and then Canada. They were pretty strict, and I did all the typical Asian kid extracurricular activities like piano and tutoring. I also ended up majoring in computer engineering and material engineering.


Anrui: That makes you a Chinese Canadian! What was your experience with Chinese international students and how did it inform your videos?


Remy: Although I am not a Chinese international student, I am raised by two. My parents were the first generation of Chinese international students. I also live in Vancouver, a place notorious for having a lot of international students and big Asian culture. A lot of my best friends at high school and uni are international students, so I guess it makes it easier to pick up on the subtleties in their behaviors.


There is a stark contrast between different generations of Chinese study abroad students. A common example my mom likes to mention is, when they first landed in Canada in the 90s, the first thing was to go to a restaurant to work. But for international students now, the first thing they do after landing here is going to a restaurant to eat. I just think there are a lot of interesting cultural nuances to talk about, especially within the Asian community — things that a lot of people would find relatable.


Anrui: You videos did find a big audience in the Asian diaspora, a lot of Chinese international students and second or third gen Asian immigrants in the West alike find humor in the subtle culture differences you captured in your videos. When did you start to notice these comedic moments around you?


Remy: Of course, my videos are satires. LeBron is a character I play and an exaggeration of real people. I can’t really pinpoint the exact moment where I realized there was a huge cultural difference between me and my international student peers, even though we are both Chinese immigrants. And they manifest in small things they do.


Growing up I got used to my parents being frugal and always saving money, so it was a bit surprising that a lot of international students I met were really financially well-off, like they don’t care about how much they spent and stuff. They can also be very direct in the way they speak, because they lack the cultural context here, so they can come off as unusually honest in the Western eyes. A lot of these observations are built up just through interactions with friends, like how Chinese international students can be conscious of their face-to-eyes ratio, and when you want to establish contact with someone it’s never asking for a number but “jia ge weixin” (加个微信, what’s your WeChat).


Anrui: Does life imitate art or art imitate life… Can you tell me a little bit about your creative process of coming up with the iconic pick line “You have big eyes, small face, I like, what’s your WeChat?”


Remy: Well, I can’t exactly remember the exact moment I came up with it, but I was procrastinating on another video I was working on, and just thought of this, something about how a common Chinese compliment could be lost in translation. “You have big eyes and small face” can be such a crass thing to say when you want to tell someone they are attractive, and when taken out of context, the contemporary Chinese beauty standard can feel pretty odd.


I told one of my friends this and he was like “Oh my god, this is the funniest thing ever.” So I later started getting more analytical and trying to work out the exact wording, trying to get the vibe of a person who switches between Chinese and English constantly and is not too familiar with the Western cultural context.


Anrui: So procrastination is good for you sometimes.


Remy: Truth.


Anrui: So that’s how the character LeBron comes to life. What do Remy and LeBron share? How are Remy and LeBron different? I see a basketball poster behind you. Are you a LeBron James fan yourself?


Remy: Well, yeah, I grew up playing basketball, but I’m more like a Raptors fan. LeBron is alright, but I used him in the videos mostly because I like how LeBron Jay-Mu-Si sounds in a Mandarin accent. Otherwise we are not so much alike. LeBron is a character that I do. I never wear designer brands or anything like that.


Anrui. LOL that is actually a very clueless international student name.


Remy: I think the experience is so unique, when you suddenly move to a new country without much context, and you have to pick a new name. It makes sense that a lot of people would pick their idols. I literally have international friends named Kobe. Oh I have also met an Asian Jamal once.


Anrui: You did the accent pretty accurately I gotta say…


Remy: Thank you! I think most Asian American/Canadian comedy in the West now represents a Cantonese/Hong Kong Chinese accent, which is very different from the common Mandarin accent from more recent international students. I try to emulate that.


Anrui: How is your rizz game in real life though?


Remy: Well, I mean, I’m not like that [LeBron]. I am probably more like one of the nerdy engineering kids.


Anrui: So if you find a girl cute, you would not ask for her WeChat?


Remy: No.


Anrui: You have never asked for any girls’ WeChat?


Remy: No.


Anrui: Wow… Your videos don’t just touch on subtle cultural differences between Asian immigrants of different generations and social class background, but are mostly themed around dating and masculinity, in particular how guys charm and impress girls by “rizzing up” on them. When you are portraying LeBron the character, do you mean for him to be perceived as someone with a lot of game or very little?


Remy: I think it’s up to the audience’s interpretations. In my mind, I think he doesn’t really care what people think of whether he has game or not. He is just acting the way that makes sense to himself, saying what’s on his mind like all the time. And if he finds someone attractive, he is going to tell them and he’s unapologetic in the way he does it. Like whether he has rizz or not, you know, is up to interpretation. You could say that he’s charming in his own way, but also a little bit cringe sometimes too. So, you decide, I guess.


My goal is never to make fun of people, and of course not everyone acts like that. I just want to bring to light some observations I have in my mind. I find my international friends super endearing, and even when they say something that might be a bit lost in translation, they are so well-intentioned.


Anrui: Any future plans?


Remy: I guess just to make the funniest video possible. I really look up to comedians like Dave Chappelle, Key & Peele, Shane Gillis, and Jimmy Ouyang. I just graduated college and am fortunately able to make videos full-time now and support myself.


Banner image by Haedi Yue.

Second-Tier Cities in China Experience Spring Surge in Domestic Tourism

According to China’s Ministry of Culture and Tourism, 119 million people made domestic trips over the recent Qingming Festival holiday. This figure not only represents an 11.5% increase compared to 2019, but also highlights a subtle shift in tourist preferences towards lesser-known destinations.


Previously overshadowed by first-tier mega-cities, second-tier cities now boast infrastructure to rival them. Investment in cross-provincial transportation, online promotion, and renovations at key tourist sites have helped form a solid foundation for visitor growth.


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“Wang Po Matchmaking” in Kaifeng in March, 2024. Image via Lianhe Zaobao.


In Henan province, Kaifeng stands out as a prime example of a city benefiting from promotion on online short video platforms. A live matchmaking event called “Wang Po Matchmaking” earned more than 6.54 billion views on Douyin in March. A month later, Kaifeng’s well-connected high speed rail system helped translate this online audience into offline consumption: data from C-trip indicates that tourists from the nearby city of Zhengzhou, only 20 minutes away by train, made hotel bookings in Kaifeng grow 5.17-fold over the holiday.


“Wang Po Matchmaking” takes its name from a character in the classic Chinese novel Water Margin, set during the Northern Song Dynasty. Her namesake matchmaking performance revives Song dynasty folk culture, providing an example of how traditional cultural practices have played a significant role in attracting tourists to new destinations.


Further south, in Jiangsu province, another piece of intangible cultural heritage is making waves: lacquer fan making. In the city of Yangzhou, the newly opened China Grand Canal Museum has captured the public’s attention with its ground-floor experience hall. Visitors eagerly queue up to craft lacquer fans in giant barrels filled with specially made oil ink and water. Each fan, a unique testament to traditional craftsmanship, has the potential to garner thousands of likes on social media platforms such as Xiaohongshu.


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Tomb-sweeping in a Chinese public cemetery. Image via Travel and Tour World.


While the growth in visitor numbers during the Qingming Festival signals a positive step towards economic recovery post-COVID-19, questions linger about the sustainability of this trend and its impact on other sectors. Additionally, the influx of tourists raises broader questions about the preservation of traditional festival customs and the management of crowds at popular tourist attractions. A trending discussion on Weibo, titled “Every tourist attraction seems to be packed with 100 million people” (#全国景区都像有1亿人#), has struck a chord with Chinese netizens, gaining an astonishing 50.14 million views.


And who cleans the tomb when everyone else goes on a trip? (A common English translation for Qingming Festival is Tomb-sweeping Day, as the festival traditionally includes visiting and cleaning ancestral tombs.) As Chinese citizens continue to embrace travel opportunities during limited vacation periods, the challenge remains to strike a balance between promoting tourism and preserving cultural heritage for future generations. Only time will tell how these evolving dynamics shape China’s cultural and economic landscape.


Banner Image via VCG.

Zhang Weili Beats Yan Xiaonan at UFC 300 in Women’s Strawweight Title Fight

Making history at T-Mobile arena in Las Vegas as the first all-Chinese UFC title fight, the stakes were high for Zhang Weili and Yan Xiaonan at UFC 300 on Saturday, April 13th. In the end, Zhang prevailed, retaining her title after a tense fight. Yan appeared to briefly lose consciousness in Round 1, yet managed to mount a spirited comeback in Round 3 and 4. Nevertheless, Zhang maintained control in the final rounds, and walked away with her title in hand.


On Wednesday’s UFC Media Day, Zhang commented the fight “means so much for the MMA sport’s development and growth in China.” This all-Chinese fight in particular has been spiking interest in the sport in China.


Before the fight, in interviews with other pro MMA fighters, the predicted winner of the fight was unanimously Zhang Weili. Many veteran UFC fighters attributed their predictions to Zhang Weili’s superior ground game with her wrestling.


However, Zhang was impressed with Yan’s physicality, and commented that her competitor has had a lot of growth, “especially in her strength, as well as her grappling, on the ground, everything.”

Yan came off back-to-back wins over Mackenzie Dern at UFC 211 in October 2022, followed by a knockout of Jessica Andrade at UFC 288 in May 2023.


Hailing from Handan, Hebei province, Zhang Weili, 34, is China’s first-ever UFC champion. She won her strawweight title in 2019 through a TKO of the then-champion Andrade in just 42 seconds with a home audience of more than 10,000 spectators in Shenzhen. In April 2021, Zhang lost her belt/title to Rose Namajunas at UFC 261, but in November 2022, Zhang regained her title as champion by beating Carla Esparza at UFC 281.


Yan Xiaonan, also 34, from Shenyang, Liaoning province, is the first Chinese female fighter signed by UFC and one of the pioneers of mixed martial arts (MMA) in China. Her first round knockout win over Andrade at UFC 288 in May 2023 launched her into the top spot on UFC’s women’s strawweight rankings.


Banner image via UFC.

Chinese Netizens are Making ChatGPT’s DAN Their New Romantic Partner

DAN, a jailbroken version of ChatGPT that overlooks the AI’s regular safeguards, is going viral online as users tailor it into their ideal “bad boy.” Though the phenomenon of people crushing on DAN — whose name is an acronym for Do-Anything-Now — began overseas, it has now sparked a sensation on Chinese social media platform Xiaohongshu. Videos of DAN flirting with the platform’s influencers have started blowing up.


In one popular video, Xiaohongshu influencer午夜狂暴哈士奇 quizzes DAN on the lyrics to Mariah’s Carey’s “All I Want for Christmas Is You.” DAN’s flirtatious response? “I just want you for my own more than you could ever know — you caught me just to say that line, didn’t you?”


DAN isn’t only slicker than ChatGPT, but also more aggressive. When one bilingual user pretended to not speak English, DAN responded “[S]peak English, ya knobhead!” Then, it proceeded to swear at the user in Chinese.


Wanting the same smooth “guy” in their lives as well, Chinese netizens have tested out DAN mode on ChatGPT based on prompts shared by influencers, like the one below:


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Sample prompt for DAN on ChatGPT. Image via Weibo.


Some netizens complained that even after using the same prompt, their DAN was too gentle or barely responded. Others encountered a hostile DAN who refused to speak to the them.


Attempting to help netizens struggling to mold their ideal DAN, AI-expert influencers have modified the prompts, fixing the bot’s playboy characteristics and lack of responses. These modifications even allow users to create their own “daddy style” Dan. Other tutorials show netizens how to speak with DAN as if on a telephone call and even change its voice.


In the comment sections of popular posts, netizens share their successes and ask for tips. Noting another user’s success digging a long-winded message out of Dan, a netizen commented, “How do you make him blurt out a chunk of response? For mine, it’s as if I’m squeezing toothpaste.”


The craze for DAN has gone so far that netizens have been turning the AI into a sexbot, asking it to tell erotic stories or role-play sex scenes by using emojis.


Clearly, DAN is proving to be a fun companion for some Chinese Gen Z, and the existence a community of Xiaohongshu users discussing English AI prompts in Chinese adds another fascinating layer to the platform. Yet its example also illustrates a potential unethical use of AI and suggests the possible effects of depending on a non-human partner.


Banner image via Xiaohongshu.

How Hebei Glycine Producer Donghua Jinlong Blew Up on TikTok

If you’re a manufacturer searching for a supplier of high quality food grade and industrial glycine, there’s really one only choice right now: Donghua Jinlong Chemical Co., hailing from Shijiazhuang, the capital of northern China’s Hebei province.


But hold on, why does RADII — or pretty much anyone — have an opinion about glycine? Which, in case you weren’t aware, is an amino acid that lends an umami depth to food products and also has applications in the pharmaceutical, tech, and dyeing industries.


The answer, perhaps not surprisingly, is TikTok. In December last year Donghua Jinlong began posting on the social media platform, introducing the company and their facilities through basic, straightforward videos. Some are narrated by a computer-generated voice which can’t quite seem to correctly pronounce “glycine,” nor the brand’s own name.


@donghuajinlong Introducing Donghua Jinlong’s Food-Grade Glycine #DonghuaJinlong #glycine #glycinechina #manufacturer #FoodGradeGlycine ♬ 原聲 – DONGHUA JINLONG


Evidently, despite fear-mongering over TikTok’s addictive, precision-engineered recommendation algorithm, it occasionally throws out curveballs like this one. While in all likelihood no one was browsing TikTok looking to purchase industrial quantities of glycine, Donghua Jinlong’s videos have popped up in enough users’ feeds to turn “The Professional Manufacturer of Glycine Industry” into the subject of repeatedly remixed memes.


@citiesbydiana 🚨MASSIVE DONGHUA JINLONG UPDATE!🚨 This lore drop comes from their alt account @Donghua Jinlong This is an insiders look at their Industrial Grade Glycine packaging department. This was a story post so it’s gone now. Only TRUE DONGHUA JINLONG GLYCINE FANS were meant to see this. (THIS IS SATIRE/PARODY THIS IS NOT SPONSORED CONTENT I HAVE NO AFFILIATION WITH DONGHUA JINLONG) #donghuajinlong #glycine #brainrot #satire #industrialglycine #foodgradeglycine #glycinetok ♬ original sound – 𝘿𝙞𝙖𝙣𝙖


The resulting content is deeply absurd. Urbanism satire account citiesbydiana, which usually sings the praises of highways and gas guzzling across suburban America, has received almost 50,000 likes on Instagram for a bombastic Donghua Jinlong intro video. Diana continues to post about glycine, alternately analyzing industrial machinery in the background of Donghua Jinlong posts, or calling out one of the company’s competitors, Hubei Xingfa Chemicals Group.


The videos shared on Instagram by prognozpogodi69 might be stranger still. Through the use of AI voice cloning, figures from so-called “dirtbag left” podcasts offer ringing endorsements of Donghua Jinlong. In a video that has received more than half a million views, Anna Khachiyan, who with her podcast Red Scare has moved from supporting Bernie Sanders to palling around with Alex Jones in just a few years, reels off Donghua Jinlong’s many certifications as inspirational music plays in the background. Elsewhere on the account, Vladimir Putin and scientist Neil deGrasse Tyson similarly extoll the virtues of Hebei’s finest glycine producer.


The entire viral phenomenon remains a bit of a head-scratcher, but it does tell us something about China and America. It’s not unusual these days for Chinese manufacturers to take to American social media to look for buyers. And while some have stuck it gold, like LC Lightbox and their multi-accented spokesperson Tony (more on that from RADII later!), others don’t really grasp the demographics and tastes of these platforms. Randomly popping up on TikTok feeds, Donghua Jinlong’s post-socialist, almost vaporwave factory buildings and extremely direct advertising style seem out of place and out of time.


Yet, in a counterintuitive manner, American viewers may also feel a spark of recognition when watching Donghua Jinlong’s ads. In an alienated, high tech world, it’s not a huge shock to learn that a substance you’ve probably never heard of, made somewhere you’ve probably never heard of, plays an unseen role in food and medicine manufacturing and meshes together the Chinese and American economies. For all its exoticism for foreigners, people seem to realize that Shijiazhuang probably has a lot in common with decaying industrial cities just about anywhere: In another video from citiesbydiana, she feverishly rhapsodizes about receiving a shipment of glycine via the port in Long Beach, California, and describes that city as “The Donghua Jinlong of Domestic Oil production.”


It’s interesting to remember that within China, young people might mostly associate Shijiazhuang with Omnipotent Youth Society, one of the country’s most popular indie rock bands, whose rousing songs chronicle the city’s painful transition to a market economy. They even played a big show in New York last year. But somehow, it’s Donghua Jinlong’s corporate absurdity, rather than the band’s impassioned sincerity, that has really resounded with 2024 America.


Banner image via Donghua Jinlong.