Zhang Yiming: TikTok’s tech boss

Summary

Good Bad Billionaire: Zhang Yiming - TikTok’s Tech Boss

Episode Release Date: September 16, 2024
Hosts: Simon Jack (BBC’s Business Editor) and Zing Tsjeng (Journalist, Author, and Podcaster)

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Introduction

In this episode of Good Bad Billionaire by the BBC World Service, hosts Simon Jack and Zing Tsjeng delve into the life and legacy of Zhang Yiming, the enigmatic founder of ByteDance, the company behind the global sensation TikTok. They explore Zhang's journey from his humble beginnings to becoming one of China's wealthiest individuals, scrutinizing his business acumen, personal traits, and the broader impact of his creation on society.

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Early Life and Education

Zhang Yiming was born in 1983 in Fujian Province, China, into a family of civil servants. His upbringing was steeped in science and technology, with his father working for the city’s Science and Technology Commission. From a young age, Zhang exhibited a voracious appetite for knowledge, reportedly reading around 25 newspapers a week during his teenage years.

When choosing a university in 2001, Zhang had a unique set of criteria:

• A well-respected institution within China.
• Located far from his parents to ensure privacy.
• Gender-balanced to aid in finding a girlfriend.
• Experiencing snow in winter, which he had never seen.
• Proximity to the coast for access to good seafood.

Ultimately, he attended Nankai University in Tianjin, where he studied software engineering after not meeting the grades required for biology. During his time at university, Zhang built his first business by fixing computers for fellow students, earning between 2,000 to 3,000 yuan a month. This venture not only provided financial independence but also introduced him to his future wife, Liu.

Notable Quote:

"If you keep an ordinary mind, accept yourself as you are, and do well for yourself, you can often do things well."
— Zhang Yiming ([04:16])

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Founding ByteDance

After graduating in 2005, Zhang’s initial attempts to start a software company with friends failed. He then joined a startup called Kushun, where he quickly rose to manage 50 people before moving to Microsoft’s Asian research lab in Beijing. Dissatisfied with the unchallenging work environment at Microsoft, Zhang left to join a short-lived social media site, Fanfu, which was shut down in 2009 due to Chinese government censorship.

In 2012, encouraged by investor Joan Wang, Zhang co-founded ByteDance with his university roommate, Liang Rubo. They began in a modest four-bedroom apartment, developing various apps. By 2013, ByteDance had raised $5 million in funding, marking the beginning of Zhang's ascent in the tech world.

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Development and Ascendance of TikTok

ByteDance’s early success came with the launch of Toutiao, a personalized news aggregation app leveraging advanced AI algorithms to curate content for users. However, competition was fierce, with established players like NetEase and Sohu dominating the market. Despite numerous lawsuits over content usage, Toutiao gained traction, setting the stage for ByteDance’s explosive growth.

In 2016, ByteDance launched Douyin, a short-form video app in China, modeled after the American app Vine. Despite initial technical glitches and lukewarm reception, Zhang’s strategic revamp of Douyin in 2017—including improved algorithms, enhanced editing features, and strategic sponsorships—propelled it to 100 million users in China.

ByteDance's pivotal moment came in 2017 when it acquired Musical.ly for $1 billion, merging it into what became known globally as TikTok in 2018. This acquisition expanded ByteDance’s user base to 1 billion downloads within months, solidifying TikTok’s position as a global powerhouse.

Notable Quote:

"If someone hadn’t done TikTok, someone else would have done it. It’s the nature of the media."
— Simon Jack ([44:50])

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Geopolitical Challenges and Regulatory Scrutiny

TikTok's meteoric rise was not without controversy. Concerns over data privacy, censorship, and potential Chinese government influence led to significant geopolitical tension, particularly between the US and China. In 2020, under the Trump administration, the US government threatened to ban TikTok, citing national security risks. Although ByteDance denied these allegations, TikTok faced a ban in India—its biggest foreign market—alongside 59 other Chinese apps.

In April 2024, US President Joe Biden signed a bill requiring ByteDance to sell TikTok to a non-Chinese company within nine months or face a complete ban. This legislative move underscored the intense scrutiny TikTok was under and placed Zhang Yiming at the center of a complex geopolitical struggle.

Notable Quote:

"TikTok is one of the first platforms many young people share social activism content on."
— Simon Jack ([28:42])

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Personal Traits and Leadership Style

Zhang Yiming is portrayed as a private, modest, and unassuming individual, quite different from the more flamboyant tech moguls. Despite founding and leading a colossal company like ByteDance, Zhang stepped down as CEO and chairman in 2021, citing a lack of managerial skills and a preference for solitary activities such as reading and daydreaming.

Notable Quote:

"The truth is, I lack some of the skills that make an ideal manager. I'm more interested in analyzing organizational and market principles."
— Zhang Yiming ([29:54])

Zhang’s departure coincided with the Chinese government’s crackdown on tech giants, leading him to relocate to Singapore while retaining his Chinese citizenship. Despite stepping down, he still holds over 20% of ByteDance's shares, valuing him at approximately $43 billion.

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Philanthropy

Zhang Yiming maintains a low profile regarding his philanthropic efforts. However, he has made notable donations, including:

• $100 million to education in his hometown.
• $14 million to the Chinese Red Cross for medical workers.
• $7 million to his alma mater, Nankai University.
• $10 million towards the development of a COVID-19 vaccine.

While these contributions highlight a commitment to social causes, they represent a small fraction relative to his vast fortune.

Notable Quote:

"Teen accounts are set to private by default and that teens have an opt-out 60-minute screen time allowance before they're prompted to enter a passcode."
— TikTok Spokesperson ([37:12])

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Impact and Legacy

TikTok has fundamentally transformed social media and digital culture:

• Influence on Music and Pop Culture: Platforms like TikTok have launched careers (e.g., Lil Nas X’s "Old Town Road") and created viral memes.
• Content Consumption Habits: The app’s algorithm-driven content delivery has been both lauded for its personalization and criticized for contributing to shorter attention spans.
• Social Behavior: TikTok has fostered a culture where capturing and sharing moments is ubiquitous, influencing social interactions and privacy norms.

Despite the challenges, TikTok’s success underscores the pivotal role of AI algorithms in shaping user experiences and content virality.

Notable Quotes:

"It's a case of doom scrolling, although I think TikTok would argue that it's a case of joy scrolling because it gives you the videos that you really want to watch."
— Zing Tsjeng ([33:14])

"We give them extra points to that, don't we?"
— Simon Jack ([34:11])

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Judgement: Good, Bad, or Just Another Billionaire

In the concluding segment, Simon and Zing evaluate Zhang Yiming across several categories to determine his stance:

1. Wealth:

   • Zhang Yiming: $43 billion
   • Score: 7/10 (Acknowledging his immense wealth but noting his modest personal display)

2. Rags to Riches:

   • Background: Comfortable upbringing, not starting from extreme poverty.
   • Score: 6/10

3. Villainy:

   • Negative Aspects: Concerns over TikTok’s data practices, censorship, and its role in geopolitical tensions.
   • Personal Traits: Not overtly villainous, but responsible for a platform with significant societal impact.
   • Scores:
     • Simon Jack: 3/10 (as a person)
     • Zing Tsjeng: 7/10 (for TikTok’s negative impacts)

4. Philanthropy:

   • Contributions: Significant but small relative to his wealth.
   • Score: 4/10

5. Power:

   • Influence: High due to TikTok's global reach, though Zhang himself is less personally influential post-CEO tenure.
   • Scores:
     • Simon Jack: 2/10 (personal power)
     • Zing Tsjeng: 8/10 (platform’s power)

6. Legacy:

   • Impact: Irrefutable influence on social media, culture, and content consumption.
   • Scores:
     • Simon Jack: 7/10
     • Zing Tsjeng: 8/10

Final Judgment:

• Simon Jack: Just Another Billionaire
• Zing Tsjeng: Just Another Billionaire

Both hosts agree that while Zhang Yiming is not overtly villainous, his creation, TikTok, has profound and complex impacts on society. They conclude that Zhang represents the archetype of a tech billionaire who, despite his humble personal demeanor, has engineered a platform with significant cultural and political ramifications.

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Conclusion

The episode wraps up by teasing the next installment, which will explore the life of Sam Altman, CEO of OpenAI, setting the stage for another deep dive into the minds of influential billionaires shaping our technological landscape.

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Notable Quotes Recap:

• "If you keep an ordinary mind..." — Zhang Yiming ([04:16])
• "TikTok is one of the first platforms..." — Simon Jack ([28:42])
• "If someone hadn’t done TikTok, someone else would have done it." — Simon Jack ([44:50])
• "They write over their own videos..." — Various ([33:14], [37:12])

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Disclaimer: This summary is based on the transcript provided and aims to encapsulate the key discussions, insights, and conclusions from the episode. For a comprehensive understanding, listeners are encouraged to tune into the full podcast.

Transcript

[Simon Jack]

This BBC podcast is supported by ads outside the uk.

[Michael Lewis]

Hey there, it's Michael Lewis, author of Going Infinite Moneyball, the Blind side and Liars Poker. On the latest season of my podcast, against the Rules, I'm exploring what it means to be a sports fan in America and what the rise of sports betting is doing to our teams, our states and ourselves. Join me and listen to against the Rules on America's number one podcast network, iHeartradio. Open your free iHeart app and search against the Rules. Listen to against the rules on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you listen to podcasts.

[Zing Singh]

Welcome to Good Bad, Billionaire from the BBC World Service. Every episode we pick a billionaire and we find out how they made their money.

[Simon Jack]

Then we judge them. Are they good, bad, or just another billionair?

[Zing Singh]

I'm Zing Singh and I'm a journalist, author and podcaster.

[Simon Jack]

I'm Simon Jack. I'm the BBC's business editor.

[Zing Singh]

And on this episode, we have one of the richest people in the world, whose name you might not be familiar with, but whose product you almost certainly will be.

[Simon Jack]

You say almost certainly will. It is TikTok, and I have to confess that I am not a TikTok subscriber. I don't have it on my phone, but I'm going to download it right now. I will start my TikTok journey during this podcast.

[Zing Singh]

And I think the billionaire creator Zhang Yiming, the man behind TikTok, will be very happy to hear he signed up another customer. So while Simon is downloading the app for the very first time, let's quickly go over Zhang Yiming in numbers. So he's 41 years old and he's currently worth a very cool $43 billion. Now, this makes him the second or third richest person in China, depending on the day you're looking it up.

[Simon Jack]

He founded the tech company ByteDance, which I have heard of because it became very politically sensitive in the U.S. byteDance makes apps, including TikTok.

[Zing Singh]

ByteDance has also been called the world's most valuable ST startup because it makes TikTok, which also has over a billion users worldwide and a new one.

[Simon Jack]

Okay, so listen, whilst I'm downloading it, you tell me about TikTok. What's it all about?

[Zing Singh]

So TikTok, for those of you who have been living under a rock.

[Simon Jack]

Oh, thank you.

[Zing Singh]

Is one of those social media apps that has exploded in popularity over the last few years. So it really took off during the pandemic when everyone was locked at home just scrolling through their phone and what it is is basically a never ending newsfeed of videos. Videos all over the world from all sorts of different users. You don't even really need to be following anyone for your feed to be populated with videos that TikTok thinks you will like. And it turns out that TikTok is very good at knowing what you're like. We'll discuss its super powerful algorithm later on in this episode.

[Simon Jack]

So in a way, this is a story about the power of AI, the power of algorithms, social media, how they keep our attention, how they drain our attention, how they shorten our attention.

[Zing Singh]

Yes. And I actually do think there is an argument you could mount for TikTok dramatically reducing my attention span and the attention span of people that I know. It's also super addictive and super creative, some would say. So young people really love it. You know, the reason why it's become so successful is because people are just pumping content into it non stop. And the algorithm is very good at serving it to people.

[Simon Jack]

Okay. The first thing it's offered up to me is choose my interests. So comedy, animals, fashion, accessories, Definitely no for that one. Pop culture. Yep. DIY and life hacks, let's go for that one. Okay. But the person behind it is the thing we are discussing today. So Zhang Yiming apparently lives a very private life. He's not a very flashy individual.

[Zing Singh]

No, we actually don't have that much information about how he spends his time and money.

[Simon Jack]

Oh, hang on a second. Sorry about that. Hang on.

[Zing Singh]

See, TikTok just launches you straight in there. Okay, so we do know that Zhang is a big admirer of Mark Zuckerberg. At one point, he even styled himself like him by purchasing 99T shirts and wearing a new one every day for 99 days. Presumably this is some kind of life hack to save time.

[Simon Jack]

Mark Zuckerberg, of course, founder of Facebook and now Meta, which owns WhatsApp. It owns. What's the other one again?

[Zing Singh]

Instagram.

[Simon Jack]

Instagram, of course. And we've already done him on our billionaire podcast, so have a listen to that one if you haven't heard it yet. But unlike Mark Zuckerberg, who's kept an iron grip on the company he founded, Zhang stepped down from the company he founded. In his last speech at the company, he said some media want to add drama when they report on startups and people's stories by making, experiencing, legendary, or dramatizing people's characters. I often said it was nothing special. We're very similar to one another. We're all ordinary people. If you keep an ordinary mind, accept yourself as you are, and do well for yourself. You can often do things well. Ordinary people can do extraordinary things. So, ordinary people, not really why we're here.

[Zing Singh]

Yeah, maybe he's very humble, maybe he's modest, maybe he's just downplaying it. But is he really such an ordinary guy?

[Simon Jack]

And more importantly, is he good, bad, or just another billionaire? Let's get back to the start.

[Zing Singh]

Zhang Yiming was born in 1983 in Fujian Province, which is a kind of southeast region on the coast in China.

[Simon Jack]

He was the only child of civil servants. His mother was a nurse. His father worked for the city's Science and Technology Commission.

[Zing Singh]

So he grew up in a kind of scientific family. As a kid, he heard his dad talk about the latest technology at the dinner table, and that kind of gave him the dream of being a scientist.

[Simon Jack]

When he grew up, he was a voracious reader. He read magazines in kindergarten. Apparently by the time he was a teenager, he was reading around 25 newspapers a week. I reckon I've got that beat, but I'm not a teenager.

[Zing Singh]

Yeah, I mean, you'd have to be a pretty big nerd to be reading 25 newspapers a week in your teens. But he was clearly very hungry for knowledge. And actually, he said before, if I could have accessed Wikipedia and YouTube, I would be so much smarter than I am now. In 2001, when he had to choose a university, Zhang had a really specific set of criteria. So first off, the university obviously had to be good and well respected.

[Simon Jack]

He wanted to remain in China, but it had to be far away from his parents so they couldn't visit and chastise him if he got bad results.

[Zing Singh]

Very clever. It also had to be gender balanced because he wanted to find a girlfriend.

[Simon Jack]

And it had to have snow in winter because he'd never seen it before.

[Zing Singh]

Also, it had to be near the coast because he wanted to eat good seafood. So, all in all, quite the shopping list.

[Simon Jack]

It's quite. This is, I feel like AI parameters for what might be interested in.

[Zing Singh]

So it turns out that in China, the only university that fits all these criteria is somewhere called Nankai University in Tianjin, which is a port city.

[Simon Jack]

Yeah. He wanted to study biology but didn't get the grades needed. So he ended up doing software engineering. Who knew you need better grades to do biology than software engineering?

[Zing Singh]

But of course, this change in plans gave him the opportunity to, as he puts it, apply textbook theory to real life applications.

[Simon Jack]

He described his first years at university as lonely and boring. He didn't like playing games or drinking, like, like his classmates. And he didn't want to join clubs or group activities.

[Zing Singh]

But he did create a very lucrative sideline in fixing his fellow students computers. And this actually became the stuff of his first business.

[Simon Jack]

Yeah, it earned him between 2 to 3,000 yuan a month, which is around 250 to $360, which is quite a lot of money for a student at.

[Zing Singh]

That time and for someone who was relatively unsociable. It also helped him to meet people because he'd be able to say, hi, I installed your computer. And crucially, it introduced him to his girlfriend, a woman called Liu, when he fixed a computer. And she is now his wife.

[Simon Jack]

So the route to the woman's heart is fixing her computer Depends on how.

[Zing Singh]

Badly your computer runs.

[Simon Jack]

But sure, he also became close to his roommate, Liang Rubo, and they shared a computer they programmed together. They played badminton at weekends. And he's still around. He's currently CEO of ByteDance.

[Zing Singh]

So there were two key partners at university that he met. One romantic, one business. And in 2005, after graduating, Zhang spends a few years in the tech industry.

[Simon Jack]

Yeah, first he tried to start a software company with two school friends. They weren't able to market it successfully. It quickly failed.

[Zing Singh]

Then he joined a new tech startup called Kushun. Within months, he went from engineer to managing 50 people. He ended up leaving that company to join Microsoft's Asian research lab in Beijing. But there he only lasted a few months.

[Simon Jack]

Yeah, he found the work so unchallenging, he says that he spent half his time reading books, including biographies of entrepreneurs like Mark Zuckerberg and guides like Stephen Covey. 7 Habits of Highly Effective People. And I'm so ineffective, I never read that book.

[Zing Singh]

I'm sure Microsoft will also be thrilled to know that the founder of ByteDance found their work in Beijing completely unstimulating.

[Simon Jack]

So on leaving, he briefly joined something called fanfu, a Twitter style social media site. But that was shut down temporarily in 2009 due to censorship of websites by the Chinese government after the government claimed that rioting in the city of Urumqi was organized online. Interesting.

[Zing Singh]

Now this is even more interesting because Zhang actually blogged about those restrictions at the time. And he said, go out and wear a T shirt. Supporting Google if you block the Internet, I'll write what I want to say on my clothes.

[Simon Jack]

Brave.

[Zing Singh]

Yeah. Pretty rebellious.

[Simon Jack]

Yeah. But he's about to be headhunted by an investor who is going to change his life.

[Zing Singh]

Now this is a story about mobile apps like TikTok so let's do a little bit of context setting at this point.

[Simon Jack]

Yes. In 2007, Apple had just released the first iPhone. And Zhang said, I was shocked when I bought it. I could build a website, I could write a program on it. And by 2011, China surpassed the US to become the world's biggest smartphone market with just under a billion smartphone users.

[Zing Singh]

And the rise of smartphones completely revolutionized how users received information in China. So people were moving away from desktop computers to cell phones. But, you know, at this point, these apps operating on smartphones, they weren't great.

[Simon Jack]

Yeah. It's also probably important to note that newspapers, radio, television are and were regulated by the Chinese government, but the government was not so good at regulating the huge number of sites appear on the Internet. They weren't quite at the races when it came to regulating that.

[Zing Singh]

And one day, Zhang was watching commuters in Beijing completely absorbed by their phones. And he had this kind of light bulb moment. He said, I noticed that fewer and fewer people were reading newspapers on subways. I thought smartphones could replace newspapers to become the most important medium of information distribution. So he decided to start a mobile news app.

[Simon Jack]

At which point, I'm going to give you a newsflash because I have successfully downloaded TikTok.

[Zing Singh]

Excellent.

[Simon Jack]

I'm scrolling, I'm swiping up rather than left or right. Someone is filming their luggage coming around a carousel at an airport. Fascinating.

[Zing Singh]

I feel like maybe TikTok hasn't quite nailed your interest yet.

[Simon Jack]

Well, I've only been on 10 minutes, so basically the algorithm hasn't quite got into my brain yet.

[Zing Singh]

No.

[Simon Jack]

Yeah, okay, got it.

[Zing Singh]

Keep scrolling, keep scrolling, man. I'll talk about the investor who basically changed Zhang's life. So now we're back to 2009, and Zhang's been headhunted by this investor called Joan Wang. And she remembers him being this top engineer from Kushan. And she persuades him to come be a CEO at a new sister startup called 99fang.com which is essentially a real estate search engine.

[Simon Jack]

She was right in her instincts, because after two years of running the company as chief executive, 99Fang.com was the largest real estate search site in China.

[Zing Singh]

But one day, Zhang asks Joan to meet him for a coffee, and they talk about AI and Zhang's idea for this news aggregation app. He maps it all out in a napkin. And Joan is actually very understanding of her colleagues moonshot idea. She writes to her colleagues at the investment company saying that Zhang seeks their understanding and Permission to leave 99 Fang and start his new company.

[Simon Jack]

She put some money where her mouth is as well. She made 80,000 US dollar angel investment in the new company. So in March 2012, Zhang officially co founded the new company called ByteDance, which we know today with his old university pal and badminton partner, Liang Rubo.

[Zing Singh]

They rent a four bedroom apartment and they live and they work on bike dancers, various apps.

[Simon Jack]

That's so typical of the kind of tech bro kind of scene, isn't it? They all sort of live in the same house together.

[Zing Singh]

I know, I really shudder to think what the bathroom looks like.

[Simon Jack]

But in the real world of finance, they had raised $5 million. 3 million came from Jones Investment Co. SIG Asia. The rest coming from Chinese venture capitalists and some from Zhang himself.

[Zing Singh]

Now, it's not clear exactly how much he invested personally, but he sold his own apartment to contribute, which means he's probably not a millionaire yet. But he has just set up ByteDance, the company that will go on to make him billions.

[Simon Jack]

Selling your apartment and putting all the money in, you know, that's a ballsy move.

[Zing Singh]

Yeah, essentially moving in with your colleagues.

[Simon Jack]

Yeah, you're sacrificing your personal life for your business life. What kind of person does that?

[Zing Singh]

So he rarely does interviews, he's very private. There's actually however, a video of him and Liang visiting the apartment they used as an office. You kind of get a sense of how mild mannered and unassuming he is. He's in this kind of zip up hoodie with middle aged dad glasses. I mean, he looks more like someone picking you up from gym class than a billionaire tech entrepreneur.

[Simon Jack]

And he's been described as a gentleman, down to earth, nerdy and un intimidating. Not your typical billionaire that we've come across.

[Zing Singh]

But he has also been described as coldly analytical and rational and pragmatic. So those are slightly more billionaire traits, I'd say.

[Simon Jack]

And we are in China. So he was running the company. Like many Chinese companies on this996culture, that means staff are expected to work 9am to 9pm six days a week, but are often encouraged to work outside those hours too.

[Zing Singh]

And those extreme work hours clearly paid off because at ByteDance, they quickly released over 12 different apps, continuously testing what worked and what failed. And this includes his idea for the news aggregation app, which he calls Toutiao. And it pulls from various sources across the Internet into a single feed, sort of like Google or Apple News.

[Simon Jack]

But he could see that there were too many news sources for people to really know what they wanted. He felt they would have a unique product if an algorithm could order the stories for users based on their interests.

[Zing Singh]

Yeah, things are starting to sound very familiar at this point. So the key to this algorithm was going to be personal recommendation using artificial intelligence. Now, Zhang had been following the development of AI in the West. He'd actually blogged that it was the future, but he was actually struggling to learn anything about it.

[Simon Jack]

Yeah, AI was. Well, it's pretty much still in its infancy. There wasn't very much information available, especially in Chinese. He had to scour the Internet for any information he could find. In fact, he tried to get an advance copy of a book on AI that was due to be published in China, but the author said no. But funnily enough, he would later go on to actually work for ByteDance.

[Zing Singh]

I'm sure that person must be thanking their lucky stars that they didn't anger Zhang too much by saying no initially. But Zhang basically absorbed everything that he could about AI. And within six months of founding ByteDance, they were able to release their first personalized recommendation system for Toutiao.

[Simon Jack]

Yes, it learned from its users reading habits, what they tended to click on, how long they stayed there to drive recommendations, and they started hiring new AI experts from some of their competitors.

[Zing Singh]

All this meant that by the end of 2012, they had 1 million daily users. But there was a lot of competition because there were other news reporters like NetEase and Sohu, which had 200 million users.

[Simon Jack]

And Toutiao had faced more than 100 lawsuits from newspapers, other content makers who claimed their content was used without permission. This is obviously in our world of journalism, this is a big deal, Right, Exactly.

[Zing Singh]

And in a few cases, ByteDance actually had to pay content creators for using their work.

[Simon Jack]

Yeah. And even while ByteDance apps were growing in popularity, Zhang struggled to find new investors.

[Zing Singh]

Yeah, Joan introduced him to at least 20 Chinese venture capitalists. No one was interested. They were apparently very unimpressed by Zhang. They thought he was too young and mild manners, not like that confident, outgoing entrepreneurs that they were used to.

[Simon Jack]

Okay, quick pit stop. Can I go back to my TikTok feed here?

[Zing Singh]

Yes. And see what they've learned.

[Simon Jack]

Okay, this is interesting. This is. This is some comment I can really get behind. So they've got to pick someone going down the M4 past Heathrow Airport, and they've got a big sign up saying slow down speed limit for air quality. And the comment is, only in London could they impose a 60 mile an hour speed limit for air quality on a motorway running next to the world's Busiest dual Runway airport. I'm liking that.

[Zing Singh]

Yep. TikTok's now got what, a hit rate of one out of four or three for you?

[Simon Jack]

Yeah, because I lingered quite a long time because we were chatting. They'll push a lot of of air travel related stuff my way.

[Zing Singh]

Exactly. Or car stuff.

[Simon Jack]

Okay. Anyway, after failing with Chinese venture capitalists, they put out the idea to global investors and finally one agreed to a meeting. A man called Yuri Milner.

[Zing Singh]

So he's definitely someone we need to do on this podcast because he is an Israeli Russian billionaire who's been called the world's most successful investor in social media. We definitely need to put him on the list.

[Simon Jack]

Yeah. At one point he earned 8% of Facebook, 5% of Twitter. The New York Times has reported he gets hundreds of millions directly from the Kremlin. We cannot confirm, will deny that.

[Zing Singh]

So clearly a man with quite a lot of geopolitical intrigue attached to him. But either way, Zhang impressed him because Yuri understood the potential of this algorithm for social media.

[Simon Jack]

So Yuri invested in the company, raising 10 million pounds. Along with Joan Wang, he's one of his first investors company Sig Asia.

[Zing Singh]

Do you think that investment from Yuri is worth more than just the money? It's about the kind of credibility and reputation that comes attached to some with someone like that.

[Simon Jack]

I think that's true. I think that if you, for example, get the blessing of some of the tech gods, like Sequoia Capital, for example, or Andreessen Horowitz and people like that, these are people who have successfully made billions out of investing in the companies of the future. If they give you their blessing, that means you do have a certain amount of credibility. You have a sort of aura about you, because these are the smartest people in the world and they've decided they want to be on your team.

[Zing Singh]

So it's kind of unclear how much money at this point Zhang had personally, but ByteDance was valued at $60 million in 2013. So safe to say he's probably a millionaire at this point.

[Simon Jack]

Yep, millionaire. Well done. But he's got quite a few failures ahead of him before he reaches that magical billion to be on our list.

[Michael Lewis]

Hey there, it's Michael Lewis, author of Going Infinite Moneyball, the Blind side and Liars Poker. On the latest season of my podcast, against the Rules, I'm exploring what it means to be a sports fan in America and what the rise of sports betting is doing to our teams, our states and ourselves. Join me and listen to against the Rules on America's number one podcast. Network iHeart. Open your free iHeart app and search against the rules. Listen to against the rules on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you listen to podcasts.

[Zing Singh]

Now, remember, at this point, he still hasn't yet created TikTok, but he has this news app, Toutiao, which is, you.

[Simon Jack]

Know, is doing okay, but he's in a competitive field. Everyone's trying to be the next big app. They've seen fortunes made in this space.

[Zing Singh]

So Zhang understands that to stand out in a crowded market, he needs to make a product that people really.

[Simon Jack]

So he poaches a new vice president of technology for a competitor who came along and instigated a technical upgrade. And soon more engineers were jumping ship to join them.

[Zing Singh]

So this rise in the quality of the app persuaded more users to get on board, which persuaded more venture catalysts to invest in ByteDance. So by 2014, it was valued at half a billion, but still not quite there yet.

[Simon Jack]

Yeah, the money is following the users, but Zhang now decides he wants to take ByteDance.

[Zing Singh]

In 2015, he launched an English language news app called Top Buzz, but it fails to take off.

[Simon Jack]

He desperately wants to break into America. That's really hard with a news aggregation app. For one thing, they face stricter copyright laws.

[Zing Singh]

And a strategy report suggests the outlook for the international push looks bad. But Zhang refuses to give up.

[Simon Jack]

And something new was about to revolutionize the app market and that was short form video.

[Zing Singh]

So in 2013, an American short form video app called Vinegar vine launches. Vine is, well, was actually, because it sadly is no longer with us, is very short. You think TikTok is shot? Vine was only about maybe maximum 6 seconds long looping videos that just like went on and on and on.

[Simon Jack]

But it was massively popular in back then.

[Zing Singh]

It was huge. Within two years of launch, it had 200 million daily users. And it was strangely influential in its Times.

[Simon Jack]

In 2014, I'm told another video app launched called Musical. It's Musical Ly and that focused on lip syncing short musicals. And it was a Chinese company, but within two years it had nearly 50 million American users under the age of 21. And that is amazingly nearly half of all the teens and preteens in the usa.

[Zing Singh]

Now these apps, vine and Musical Ly, were tapping into a much younger market than a news app, for instance, like Total. And that success is partly down to novelty because prior to these apps, video hadn't really worked very smoothly.

[Simon Jack]

But also, young people love their easy to use editing features. It inspired huge creativity in teenagers who were making comedy videos, music videos, funny memes.

[Zing Singh]

So ByteDance decides to try and steal some of musical Ly's thunder. It launches a very similar app, which they called Douyin, which translates to shaky beat in Chinese.

[Simon Jack]

And this is the app that we now know as TikTok, essentially.

[Zing Singh]

Yes, exactly. Douyin is of the Chinese equivalent of TikTok.

[Simon Jack]

So of the 2000 byte dance staff, a team of only 10 engineers were assigned to work on Douyin. They launched it in September 2016 after developing it for just 200 days, which sounds pretty quick.

[Zing Singh]

It is pretty quick, I would say. And it also meant that Douyin had a lot of technical glitches, so it wasn't very popular. And one creator, when asked to join the app, told Douyin, your product is too basic. You want to get on the highway with this broken old car.

[Simon Jack]

Oh, burn. Feel the burn. But in the meantime, their other app, Tutiao, is doing very well in China. It's becoming the leading news app there, which means bytedance was able to raise a billion dollars in funding in early 2017. So they're moving into the big leagues now.

[Zing Singh]

And Zhang used this money to give Douyin a bit of a revamp. The tech improved. The app rebranded with what is now that iconic, quite glitchy musical note logo you'll recognize from TikTok.

[Simon Jack]

They added filters, they made editing simpler, they made basically the whole user experience more engaged.

[Zing Singh]

And also they positioned the app as a more upmarket product, which appealed to young Chinese living in cities, you know, urban elites.

[Simon Jack]

They sponsored music shows on Chinese television, including a hip hop reality show called the Rap of China. One of the contestants, Vava, then touted as China's answer to Rihanna, said, all the people into hip hop are all on Douyin, and it's kind of like.

[Zing Singh]

This virtuous circle, right? So the more people that use Douyin, the more the algorithm learns what they like, the more the algorithm pushes content they might watch, and they encourage people to stay longer on the platform, et cetera, et cetera. It's like a snake eating its tail.

[Simon Jack]

And on it goes. And Zhang could see the potential for the video app, and as a tech insider, said he threw more money at it than any other company and dared to hunt down the very best people.

[Zing Singh]

He actually also made it compulsory for management teams to upload their own content to TikTok to understand how the platform worked.

[Simon Jack]

He even downloaded his own videos, which he admitted was a big step for me.

[Zing Singh]

And those people with the least number of likes actually had to do push ups to make up for.

[Simon Jack]

I mean, it's bringing sort of military discipline to bear on something like social media. Seems nuts to me. Like down in 10, you didn't get enough likes for your dog picture.

[Zing Singh]

All this meant that Douyin became a more successful app. Within a year, they had 100 million users in China.

[Simon Jack]

Okay, let's do a quick tally here. He's now got two hugely successful apps, Douyin and Toutiao. Both are just though within the Chinese market. So in 2017, ByteDance buys competitors musically for $1 billion in order to enter the US market. While musical Ly is a Chinese competitor, it has a pretty big global audience.

[Zing Singh]

And this acquisition is what gives them 200 million users worldwide. And it also kills the competition, right?

[Simon Jack]

Yeah. And so a week after buying Musical Ly, Forbes declared Zhang was a billionaire. Age 33, he's worth $4 billion. That is just five years after he founded the parent company ByteDance. Wow. That'.

[Zing Singh]

Right. After becoming a billionaire, Zhang launches the app that we all now know in.

[Simon Jack]

Summer 2018, Douyin is now launched worldwide under the name TikTok. It migrates all musical accounts to TikTok and within months, the parent company ByteDance is valued at a cool 75 billion, making it the world's biggest privately backed startup company.

[Zing Singh]

And in six months of launching TikTok, it surpasses 1 billion downloads.

[Simon Jack]

So let's see why it's so popular. As you know, I am a new person to TikTok. I'm looking at it now. I've probably been on it now for about half an hour, 40 minutes ago. And because I've been chatting to you, I've been staying on pages kind of rather randomly, which all seem to involve cars or planes. And it's a full screen image of a video which basically loops itself around and all I do is swipe upwards and I get another one. So if I'm bored of that one, I do another one. Bored of that one, I do another one. And I suppose that is the kind of attention span threat that some people say TikTok poses. So far I'm enjoying it, I think.

[Zing Singh]

Do you remember the videos you watched four videos ago?

[Simon Jack]

I remember one of them. One of them was about saying, how on earth do you have a 60 mile an hour speed limit on a motorway in order to preserve air quality when you're going past one of the world's biggest airports?

[Zing Singh]

That's actually really impressive because I can tell you that when I go on TikTok I could sit on there for half an hour, could probably tell you maybe one or two videos in detail.

[Simon Jack]

That I've watched, but I'm new to it. The rot hasn't set in.

[Zing Singh]

Yes, the brain rot hasn't set in. But I mean, TikTok is hugely popular. I think part of it is also because of the algorithm. It's very good at serving you content that it thinks you will like.

[Simon Jack]

Yeah.

[Zing Singh]

And also, you know, viral memes, viral culture, basically all emerges from TikTok nowadays.

[Simon Jack]

And its influence extends right across loads of different industries.

[Zing Singh]

Exactly. I mean, in music alone, it's launched the careers of people. You know, Leona's X became huge because of his song Old Town Road, which became big. On TikTok, it changes who becomes famous. Random people on TikTok can just suddenly become the most talked about people on the platform. You know, there's a really famous guy called Dogface who went viral for skate boarding and drinking cranberry juice while lip syncing along to Dreams by Fleetwood Mac. Completely random. But I guarantee you will be recognized on the street for years to come.

[Simon Jack]

Are you kidding me? It's like there's an alternative reality out there which I do not recognize. There's what happens over there and there's what happens in what I would call the real world. Yeah, it's like a kind of like through the looking glass kind of experience for many people.

[Zing Singh]

I think TikTok now is the real world.

[Simon Jack]

Gosh. Okay. Well, anyway, TikTok is becoming such a powerful and popular cultural force, concerns started being raised. You always get whenever something comes that popular, the backlash starts. Most were that TikTok could be collecting sensitive data from user that could be used by the Chinese government for spying. You know, there was a war of words between the US and China and this was another front in that tension. Right, this geopolitical tension.

[Zing Singh]

Exactly. In 2020. So under Trump, the United States Department of Justice caught Zhang, a mouthpiece of the Chinese Communist Party, in a legal filing, which is something that ByteDance strenuously denied.

[Simon Jack]

Another that was raised was the possibility of censorship or the app being used to influence public debates. TikTok is one of the first platforms many young people share social activism content on.

[Zing Singh]

And in 2019, the Guardian reported that TikTok actually censored material deemed to be politically sensitive, including footage of Tiananmen Square protests and Tibetan independence demands. ByteDance has said that guidelines like this have actually been phased out and that all moderation is done independently of Beijing.

[Simon Jack]

But in 2020, TikTok was actually banned in India along with 59 other Chinese apps. Security concerns. This is following escalating tensions along the disputed border between the two powers. India had been TikTok's biggest foreign market. It's really causing geopolitical ructions, this.

[Zing Singh]

Yeah. And again, ByteDance has strenuously denied all these claims, but it seems that this app just cannot stop. But being pulled into huge debates about world powers.

[Simon Jack]

It's amazing. You've got people in White House and Washington talking about a social media app all the time. It's central. It's seen as being influencing behavior, thought.

[Zing Singh]

Sports trends and politics.

[Simon Jack]

And politics.

[Zing Singh]

As the scrutiny grows around Tick Tock, Zhang is actually making a surprise move. In 2021. He announces he's stepping down as CEO and chairman from ByteDance and his university roommate and co founder Liang Rubo becomes CEO.

[Simon Jack]

Yeah, in Zhang actually wrote an open letter announcing he was stepping down, outlining the reasons why he was leaving. We can listen to a section from this letter which was translated. Translated on the BBC World Service. Have a listen to this. The truth is, I lack some of the skills that make an ideal manager. I'm more interested in analyzing organizational and market principles. I'm not very social. I prefer solitary activities like being online, reading, listening to music and daydreaming. I mean, what do we make of that?

[Zing Singh]

I just love that someone who's a multi billionaire can list his hobbies as being being online, reading, listening to music and daydreaming. I mean, same, you know, I. I just don't have a billion dollars to.

[Simon Jack]

My name, but I can count on the fingers of one hand, possibly one finger of bosses who say I lack some of the skills that make an ideal manager. You don't hear that every day.

[Zing Singh]

No, it's true. And definitely not from someone who is both the CEO and founder of the app that he created.

[Simon Jack]

Yeah. But it's interesting at this point because he's one of at least five top Chinese chief executives who stepped down around this same time as part of the government's regulation that's either stepped up or changed.

[Zing Singh]

So according to analysts, the Chinese government had become increasingly concerned about the power and influence amassed by wealthy tech entrepreneurs who were multibillionaires, AKA people like Zhang.

[Simon Jack]

Yeah, so basically, you're on the radar of the government. Try and get off the radar.

[Zing Singh]

Yeah, Exactly. Actually, since 2020, the Chinese government has launched antitrust data labor regulations. They fined companies for monopolistic practices, restricted consumers Internet use. So really this is part of a broader crackdown on the Chinese Internet. And that's kind of what has happened to Zhang because today at the age of 41, he doesn't even live in China. He's relocated to Singapore even though he still has Chinese citizenship.

[Simon Jack]

Yeah, he's been described as reclusive, but he's still thought to have over 20% of the shares of ByteDance. That makes him worth $43 billion.

[Zing Singh]

Yeah. But the future of that fortune is very unclear because in April 2024, President Joe Biden signed into law a bill that gives ByteDance 9 months to sell TikTok to a non Chinese company or the app will be blocked in the US and the US is obviously one of their.

[Simon Jack]

That's, you know, this is the coal face of geopolitical tension. This. And bytedance has found itself right in the middle of it because TikTok called this legislation an unconstitutional ban and a front to the US right to free speech. And it would give social media rivals more power and put thousands of American jobs at risk.

[Zing Singh]

And at the time of recording, the US appeals court is still yet to hear TikTok's case against the ban. So it's very much a case of watch this space, okay?

[Simon Jack]

And I'm watching this space on my phone and I've just seen a Ferrari driving through the middle of London.

[Zing Singh]

I don't know what thinks you're a car guy.

[Simon Jack]

I know. How can I do this? What do I need to do to try and get out of this rut?

[Zing Singh]

Do you need to swipe through as many car videos as quickly as possible?

[Simon Jack]

Okay, there's the Grand Canyon, there's a burnt out car. Here's a four. It's too late. I'm done. I'm in the car rut.

[Zing Singh]

Oh, they've lost you.

[Simon Jack]

That's it. Forever I'll be associated with that. Anyway, I can see the appeal of it because if you get bored of that, you just flick, flick, flick, flick, flick, Doom scrolling. Is that what they call it?

[Zing Singh]

Yes, it is very much a case of doom scrolling, although I think TikTok would argue that it's a case of joy scrolling because it gives you the videos that you really want to watch.

[Simon Jack]

Joy scrolling, that's a new line on me. Let's judge this person because we've got some categories we need to run through. So we have to judge our billionaire. This is the point where we basically mark them out of 10 in a series of categories on wealth.

[Zing Singh]

So he's the second or third richest person in China and he's actually the second richest social media Billionaire behind his hero, mark Zuckerberg.

[Simon Jack]

Yeah, $43 billion. That puts him very much in the first division, doesn't it?

[Zing Singh]

Yeah, it really does. So I would give him probably 7 out of 10. I mean he doesn't wear it in a very fashionable way.

[Simon Jack]

Well, that's the thing. Sometimes when people haven't got that much money as 43 billion, but they do think really extravagant things like fly their nail technician on a private jet because they need their nails done or whatever. We give them extra points to that, don't we?

[Zing Singh]

We do. So I think we have to deduct points from Dang because he's not the type to do that.

[Simon Jack]

It's a seven from me for sure.

[Zing Singh]

Now what about rags to riches? How far has Dang traveled to get to where he was he poor when growing up?

[Simon Jack]

I don't think he was from a solidly technocratic middle class kind of family of the way I would describe it. Although I don't quite understand the social stratification in China.

[Zing Singh]

Yeah, I would say that he had a comfortable upbringing, like not particularly upper class or well off but you know, fine.

[Simon Jack]

The way he set out the conditions for which university he was going to attend, like not near my parents so they can come and check up on me. It's got to be somewhere where it snows because I've never seen it before. Needs to be near the sea. Da da da. That's quite picky.

[Zing Singh]

Yeah, it really is. So I would say, you know, I mean it is a great story. He's gone from not one of the best ranked universities in China to being one of the richest people in the country and also the center of all this geopolitical intrigue. So in that sense it's quite the journey.

[Simon Jack]

It's not so much where he's come from, it's where he's reached in terms of what he's achieved. I'm going to give him six.

[Zing Singh]

Yeah, I would give him a six as well.

[Simon Jack]

Okay.

[Zing Singh]

Well, I mean, who knows what's gonna happen to him in his future.

[Simon Jack]

Yeah. We also have a category called villainy. What have they done along the way to get there? Have they done people over? Have they been particularly ruthless or been active corporate malfeasance or anything like that? I think in one of these things we've done it before. We have to separate the person from the company because he seems pretty in a way kind of chilled out, non descript kind of clever guy who founded a company which has grown like a monster, you know, in own way. And so you can probably like Zhang, you mean and hate TikTok or vice versa. So, I mean, as a person, it doesn't sound like he's a particular villain, but your view of his contribution to the world will depend on what your view of contribution to society of TikTok is.

[Zing Singh]

So Zhang Yiming's very private and we actually don't know that much about him. So I feel like I have to judge this category based on TikTok alone because that's the thing that he created, that's the thing he's known for.

[Simon Jack]

Fine, okay. I think that's fair enough.

[Zing Singh]

So we've talked about some of the concerns that have been raised by people about TikTok early in this episode, but there have also been deaths linked to various challenges that have gone viral on TikTok and various lawsuits have been brought against the company. Okay, now, none have been upheld, but there's currently still various lawsuits against TikTok being brought by parents in France and the US who accused TikTok of pushing content about suicide to their children who have since taken their own lives.

[Simon Jack]

A TikTok spokesperson recently told the American news broadcaster NBC that while the company couldn't comment on ongoing litigation, TikTok continues to take industry leading steps to provide a safe and positive experience for teens. They note that teen accounts are set to private by default and that teens have an opt out 60 minute screen time allowance before they're prompted to enter a passcode.

[Zing Singh]

Yeah, and also worth mentioning that TikTok does have clear policies against users publishing content showing, promoting or providing instructions on suicide or self harm and related challenges, dares, games and packs including naming or describing methods showing or promoting suicide or self harm hoaxes and sharing plans for suicide or self harm.

[Simon Jack]

In a way it feels to me, and I might be wrong about this and people can get in touch with us that once you start something like a TikTok, which is algorithmically led, which basically is fed by its own users likes and what have you, you kind of unleash this genie out of the bottle and it does its own thing. And the other thing that people like Facebook have always said is that we're not publish, we're just a platform, we're not subject to the same rules as for example, a newspaper or a TV station like the BBC or would be. And that's been a contentious thing saying, you know, you're abrogating your responsibility for the content that's going into people's brains and minds and into their lives. And that's, I suppose, the Frontier of that entire argument.

[Zing Singh]

Yeah. I definitely think that in the same way Facebook has had to deal with issues of responsibility and questions of whether you're a publisher who's responsible for the content versus just merely the platform that hosts it. I think TikTok is very much at the beginning of that journey with lawmakers.

[Simon Jack]

And the criticism is that some of these companies are very good at using AI to generate users and traffic and all that kind of stuff, but they're not as good at using AI when it comes to moderating the content, taking down stuff which might be offensive or harmful. You know, why aren't you as good at that bit as you are at generating the traffic in the first place?

[Zing Singh]

Especially when you've got $1 billion app.

[Simon Jack]

Yeah, exactly. So, okay, Villainy, I'm going to say. Personally. Personally, he's not a villain at all. So I'm going to give him a three as a person. TikTok, obviously. Listen, I'm early on in my career with TikTok. I don't find it offensive, and it's being blamed for the terrible attention span of people, including my own family members. And this stuff takes out more of a chunk of your day than we've ever seen anything do like that before. And I'm not sure that's an entirely good thing. Oh, TikTok, good. Come on.

[Zing Singh]

H. How do I feel about TikTok? It actually varies depending on the day. There will be some days where I look at TikTok, I'm like, this is so much fun. I'm learning so much. I'm being really entertained. And then there's some days where I look at the amount of time I spent on TikTok and thought, God, I could have read War and Peace.

[Simon Jack]

Okay.

[Zing Singh]

You know, so I think it actually has had an impact on people's attention spans. But then the problem is, is that if Doyen and Tik Tok didn't exist, someone else would have invented it. Someone else would have also created the magic algorithm that sucked people in.

[Simon Jack]

That's true. So it's not. It's not a sort of discreet, malevolent act. It's kind of like it was going to happen. That it's the nature of the media.

[Zing Singh]

Yeah, exactly. But I would say that, you know, for the amount that it's done to kind of pull people away from traditional media sources, even though, you know, people like the BBC are already on TikTok. Yeah, I would give it maybe a seven.

[Simon Jack]

Okay.

[Zing Singh]

It's a challenge to media in the same way that I Think meta is.

[Simon Jack]

But you know, when we talked at the beginning of this series about how one of the interesting things about billionaires and their incredible success is that they sort of hold up a mirror to us of what it is we want or enjoy or, you know, are hooked on. So no one's forcing us to watch these videos. We are obviously part of the engine which generates TikTok success. So maybe it's naive or kind of wrong to blame the app itself. Maybe that we're to blame. I don't know.

[Zing Singh]

I do think, and I see this in my generation as well, that because TikTok is fed with user content, mostly user generated content, it's created this kind of strange attitude in which everyone and everything in life is up for filming.

[Simon Jack]

Yeah.

[Zing Singh]

And I don't know if you've ever encountered, you know, when you go on holiday and suddenly everyone's on their phones capturing content. I think maybe taking photos for Instagram was one thing, but taking video, for me, you know, I've seen people taking videos of strangers on the street who are stumbling around drunk and laughing and putting it up. I mean, the whole thing kind of feels like a Neil breach of the social contract, maybe.

[Simon Jack]

Yeah. It's interesting if you go to a concert as well, you know, just look at all the phones and sometimes the, you know, singers or the act have to beg people to put their phones down just for a few seconds. Okay, so on villainy, I'm gonna give them five. Straight down the middle, you're gonna give seven. Okay, interesting, interesting split there. Philanthropy, how much good have they done? How much money of their vast wealth they've given away?

[Zing Singh]

So Zhang is very private about his spending, but he has publicly donated to various charitable causes, including 100 million to education in his hometown, 14 million to the Chinese Red Cross for medical workers. He's also thrown his former university and call 7 million and given 10 million to help develop a COVID 19 vaccine.

[Simon Jack]

Okay, I'm totting all that up. 140, 120 or 131 million. Not bad. But in context, 43 billion. We don't know the full extent of what he's been up to, so I would say I'm going to give that a. So far work to date on philanthropy, 4 out of 10.

[Zing Singh]

Yeah, I would say maybe. I mean, how much of that is a proportion of overall wealth? Not tons.

[Simon Jack]

Okay, so it's 1, 201 40th of his wealth. Doing the little maths in my mind.

[Zing Singh]

Okay, surely that's.

[Simon Jack]

It's got to Be fewer.

[Zing Singh]

It's a two.

[Simon Jack]

Yeah, right, okay. Power. In 2019, Zhang was named one of the Time magazine's 100 most influential people. Do we agree?

[Zing Singh]

I mean, at the height of his power when he was heading up bytedance. Yeah, probably. But not now. He's in kind of effective seclusion in Singapore. Right.

[Simon Jack]

I don't think he ever wanted to be powerful. He made this thing that had enormous power. Whereas with Mark Zuckerberg, you get feeling is still very hands on, can change the algorithm if he wants to, can moderate humanity in the way they interact with each other. I don't think he's anywhere near that and doesn't want to be anywhere near that. So I would actually give him a. I'd say TikTok clearly has, you know, enormous power, but like I say, that's grown. It's like a thing that's grown itself. I don't feel like he's at the wheel, do you know what I mean? It feels like it's got a life of its own. So personally I would say TikTok as power. You've got to give it an eight. Yeah, right, yeah. Zhang himself, I give him a two, you know, take your pick, split it.

[Zing Singh]

Down the middle and he's kind of a 5 out of 10. Yeah, I would agree with that.

[Simon Jack]

Okay.

[Zing Singh]

I mean, come on, if one of your hobbies is going online and daydreaming, you're not going to score very highly on power. You just don't have the. You just don't seem to kind of have the motivation to exercise it.

[Simon Jack]

Okay, so five each on Power Legacy. I mean, you're never going to get rid of TikTok or apps like it, are you?

[Zing Singh]

No. And I think really what TikTok has done is shown the kind of importance of short form social video apps. I don't think we're ever going to get rid of social video because of platforms like TikTok.

[Simon Jack]

It feels like the Warholian prophecy that in the future everyone will be famous for 15 minutes seems wild, wildly insufficient for what's happened. I know.

[Zing Singh]

It's almost like you want to dig Andy Warhol out of his grave and say, come up with a new theory. Yeah.

[Simon Jack]

Check this out. The point is, if someone hadn't done tick tock, somebody else would have done. They happened on this short form video kind of stuff, which, you know, ultimately anyone could do. There's nothing stopping other platforms doing that kind of short form video stuff.

[Zing Singh]

But I do think, think that there's something about TikTok and I reckon it's to do with the algorithm, which is uniquely good at doing that. And I think we have to give Dang some credit for being the person to invest so heavily in the algorithm, getting all those engineers to work on it, realizing that that was the thing that made the platform so special.

[Simon Jack]

Yeah. I think the Legacy might be making us realize what we are actually. Like.

[Zing Singh]

A shudder just ran down my spine.

[Simon Jack]

Do you know what I mean? I think that it's kind of said, this is who we are. This is what gets us going. This is what titillates, amuses, captivates us.

[Zing Singh]

So for Legacy, I mean, I would score him quite highly on this, I think.

[Simon Jack]

Okay, fine. I'm gonna go seven for Legacy.

[Zing Singh]

I'm gonna give Zhang an eight.

[Simon Jack]

Wow. Okay.

[Zing Singh]

Because I do think that when we look back at the social media war, TikTok is already and will become one of the huge players in that field.

[Simon Jack]

So is he good, bad, or just another billionaire?

[Zing Singh]

For me, it comes down to he's either bad or just another billionaire. I mean, I would say if he was more of a Mark Zuckerberg figure, you know, iron grip on the thing that he's created, appearing in Congress to defend it, you know, those kind of billionaire traits, he would nudge himself into bad billionaire territory. But I kind of wonder. I don't know, the fact that he stepped away from it, the fact that he talks about, you know, his hobbies being a terrible leader, his hobbies being daydreaming and listening to music. He just seems a bit of an idiosyncratic figure who. Like a Dr. Frankenstein who created a monster.

[Simon Jack]

Yeah. Whatever you think about TikTok, he seems to be a very inoffensive person. So I'm going to say he is just another billionaire.

[Zing Singh]

Oh, it's difficult for me. I. I actually would say he is just another billionaire as a person.

[Simon Jack]

Okay.

[Zing Singh]

But the product he created, I don't know. Watch this space. You know, TikTok might very well bring down democracy.

[Simon Jack]

Wow. What a way to end.

[Zing Singh]

So who do we have? On the next episode, we have the.

[Simon Jack]

Man who is leading a technology which will one day kill us all, cure us all. I mean, we can't believe anything we read, see, or hear. AI Wrangler in chief, Sam Altman of OpenAI.

[Zing Singh]

You may have heard of OpenAI because it's made chatgpt. And we'll also be asking their number one product exactly what it thinks of its founder, Sam Altman.

[Simon Jack]

Good Bad Billionaire is a podcast from the BBC World Service. It's produced by Hannah Hufford and Mark Ward, with additional production by Tamsen Curry. James Cook is the editor for the BBC World Service.

[Zing Singh]

The senior podcast producer is Kat Collins, and the podcast commissioning editor is John Mannell.

[Simon Jack]

We'd like to thank Matthew Brennan, who wrote the book Attention Factory, the story of TikTok and China's bite Dance, which is very helpful in translating some of the original Chinese reporting.

[Zing Singh]

So let me search. Let me pull up my TikTok app and search Good, bad, Billionaire. Now it's thinking about it and we're on it. Yeah, we're on the BBC Sounds.

[Simon Jack]

Love this app platform. Love this app. Force for good, no doubt.

[Michael Lewis]

Hey there, it's Michael Lewis, author of Going Infinite Moneyball, the Blind side and Liars Poker. On the latest season of my podcast, against the Rules, I'm exploring what it means to be a sports fan in America and what the rise of sports betting is doing to our teams, our states and ourselves. Join me and listen to against the Rules on America's number one podcast network, iHeart. Open your free iHeart app and search against the Rules. Listen to against the rules on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcast, Podcasts, or wherever you listen to podcasts.