• RedNote, or Xiaohongshu, has taken the West by storm.
• TikTok users have flocked to RedNote ahead of the looming ban on their app.
• The sudden influx of users has created a mass cultural exchange, but experts say it may not last.

For over a decade, China's social media has been living in its own world.

Without access to YouTube, Facebook, Google, or Instagram, the country instead relies on local apps such as BiliBili, Weibo, Baidu, and, more recently — Xiaohongshu.

Xiaohongshu, now known in English as RedNote, transformed overnight into a bridge between the realms of China's internet and America's, as a sudden wave of US users downloaded the app this week in anticipation of a national ban on TikTok.

RedNote's rise was relatively recent in the Chinese space, with the app only gaining significant mainstream traction from 2018 onward.

It's most often compared to Instagram, with a heavy focus on photos presented through a grid-like feed. In China, it's been largely defined as a popular app for beauty and lifestyle content, especially among young women.

Then came the looming TikTok ban and the Americans. By Monday, RedNote became the most downloaded iPhone app in the US. As of Thursday evening, it still holds the top spot.

The sudden surge in interest in RedNote comes as TikTok inches closer to its divest-or-ban deadline on January 19. The Senate passed a law in April that would require TikTok to stop operating in the US if it didn't divest itself from its Chinese-based owner, ByteDance.

Last week, TikTok appealed to the Supreme Court for an emergency injunction to pause the divestment deadline. The court is expected to rule on TikTok's fate this week.

New US users, calling themselves "TikTok Refugees," flooded RedNote with memes and introduction videos. In turn, their Chinese counterparts uploaded welcome posts and guides on how to use Chinese online slang. Some even asked for help with their English homework.

Cultural exchange on a mass scale

It's a mass cultural exchange on an unprecedented scale.

International users typically have little incentive or opportunity to dive into Chinese social media apps, which cater to local audiences and are often locked behind strict user requirements that align with Beijing's government standards.

Weibo, for example, requires all users to register with their full names, and the app displays their location and gender to other users.

Even TikTok, founded by Chinese company Bytedance, is separate from China's version of the app, Douyin.

Cross-border interactions on RedNote have been mostly friendly, at a time when US-China tensions have dominated global politics.

"It's so amazing to have you here," said one Chinese user in a viral post. "For so long, we haven't been able to connect or talk to each other like this. But now we finally can, and it feels so special."

His video, titled "American friends please stay here," received over 174,000 likes.

Some users began hosting "cultural exchange" livestream audio chats, inviting young American and Chinese people to discuss their lives and befriend each other. One such livestream, seen by Business Insider, was watched by 70,000 users, with hundreds tuning in at a time.

Too early to tell how RedNote will impact US-China relations

Researchers and academics who study US-China relations told BI they're watching the space with interest, but that it's still too early to say how the RedNote migration might play out.

"I think it's likely true that many Chinese are interacting with Americans for the first time," said Stanley Rosen, a professor of political science at the University of Southern California's US-China Institute.

Rosen said China's government might initially be pleased by the influx of American users to RedNote, given how Beijing has criticized the impending ban on TikTok. Congressional leaders who voted to pass the divest-or-ban law against ByteDance had cited concerns about Chinese ownership.

But Rosen added that letting Chinese and American users mingle en masse could eventually disrupt Beijing's careful governance of its online platforms. For instance, a Chinese person's complaints about low pay could be met with well-intentioned — yet potentially contentious — replies from Americans, who might suggest forming a union or going on strike, Rosen said.

American users are still subject to Chinese rules on RedNote. For example, two writers from the entertainment news site The Wrap reported on Wednesday that they uploaded a post about the 1989 Tiananmen Square protests — a heavily censored topic on the Chinese internet — and found that it was taken down within five minutes.

Alfred Wu, an associate professor at the Lee Kuan Yew School of Public Policy at the National University of Singapore, told BI that it's unlikely that any friendly interactions on RedNote would impact US-China relations.

"The tensions between these countries are based on very long-term problems," Wu said.

"I think this sort of passion will die very soon," he added.

RedNote's popularity may not last

In fact, RedNote's newfound popularity in the West could just end up being a temporary phenomenon.

Natalie Pang, an associate professor at the National University of Singapore's department of communications and new media, told BI that such massive user migrations from one platform to another haven't always been sustainable.

"Many years ago, when WhatsApp announced certain features on their platform, people also left WhatsApp and migrated to Signal, but those migrations were not sustained," Pang said.

Platforms are only able to retain these new users if their network moves along with them, she added.

"We have to understand that these 'TikTok Refugees' are moving to Xiaohongshu as part of a protest against the TikTok ban. So if we understand this move as part of a protest, then I think we'll see more sustained migration toward the platform if interest in the protest continues," Pang said.

That said, TikTok may not be out of the game just yet.

The social media platform may get some reprieve from President-elect Donald Trump, who is set to take office on January 20, a day after the divestment deadline passes.

TikTok CEO Shou Chew met with Trump at Mar-a-Lago last month and plans to attend Trump's inauguration.

Trump had pushed for a ban on TikTok during his first term, but has since reversed his position on the platform. The president-elect filed an amicus brief with the Supreme Court on December 27, asking the court to pause the deadline so that he could come up with a political resolution.

"You know, I have a warm spot in my heart for TikTok," Trump told reporters at a press conference last month.

On Wednesday, Trump's pick for national security advisor, Mike Waltz, said in an interview with Fox News that Trump would "find a way to preserve" TikTok.

"He is a dealmaker. I don't want to get ahead of our executive orders, but we're going to create the space to put that deal in place," Waltz said.

• The Chinese foreign ministry says Vice President Han Zheng will attend Donald Trump's inauguration.
• The Trump team said in December that it had invited Chinese leader Xi Jinping, but Xi will not attend.
• Foreign heads of state do not usually attend US presidential inaugurations.

China's foreign ministry says it is sending Vice President Han Zheng to attend President-elect Donald Trump's inauguration on January 20.

The Trump transition team said last month that it had invited Chinese leader Xi Jinping to the event. The move came as a surprise given that foreign heads of state usually do not attend US presidential inaugurations.

"China follows the principles of mutual respect, peaceful coexistence and win-win cooperation in viewing and growing its relationship with the United States," the Chinese foreign ministry said in a statement on Friday morning local time announcing Han's attendance.

The statement said China is "ready to work with the new US government to enhance dialogue and communication" and "jointly pursue a stable, healthy and sustainable China-US relationship."

The White House, Trump's transition team, the Joint Congressional Committee on Inaugural Ceremonies, and the Chinese foreign ministry did not immediately respond to requests for comment from Business Insider.

'A channel of communication'

International relations experts told BI the move to send Han to Trump's inauguration is a positive sign for the US-China relationship.

"Han's attendance is significant, and even though the vice president does not really wield political power, it is still consequential, and he certainly will be able to play the role of an interlocutor and a channel of communication," Dylan Loh, an assistant professor at the Nanyang Technological University, told BI.

"Symbolically, the presence of Han for Trump's inauguration is also important to underline that political communication and cooperation is possible despite the campaign rhetoric and threat of tariffs," Loh added.

Han's visit to the US also allows China to "respectfully accept Trump's invitation without sending too strong of a signal or doing anything overly unconventional," said Austin Strange, associate professor at the University of Hong Kong's department of politics and public administration.

"China's government prefers a better, more stable relationship with the United States, and it can signal an initially friendly posture to the new administration, without making any concrete commitments, by sending a representative such as Han," Strange added.

Ian Ja Chong, an associate professor at the National University of Singapore, told BI that while Han's presence suggests "respect for Trump and the invitation," he isn't a member of China's Politburo Standing Committee, the Chinese Communist Party's top decision-making body.

"That insulates the CCP and the Politburo Standing Committee somewhat from blame should US-PRC relations not turn out as the CCP and Xi would prefer," Chong said.

"The PRC is willing to accord respect to Trump and set relations on a positive footing, but are not ready to engage with the Trump administration on substantive issues at the inauguration," he added.

Trump made tariff threats on the campaign trail

US-China relations have been tenuous since Trump's first term, with both the Trump and Biden administrations imposing tariffs on China.

In May, President Joe Biden announced an increase in tariffs on Chinese-exported steel, aluminum, medical products, and electric vehicles.

Those tariffs could be ratcheted up even further when Trump takes office. During his campaign, Trump said he plans to impose tariffs of more than 60% on Chinese goods entering the US.

In November, Trump said he plans to impose an additional 10% import tariff on Chinese goods unless China does more to curb the inflow of fentanyl into the US.

In January, Trump said in an interview with conservative radio host Hugh Hewitt that his representatives have been speaking to Xi's staff.

"I had a great relationship with President Xi. It was very solid, very strong, very friendly. He's a strong man, a powerful man," Trump told Hewitt in an interview that aired on January 6.

"He's certainly revered in China, but they are having problems and I think we will probably get along very well, I predict, but you know it's got to be a two-way street," Trump added.

Business leaders, including Elon Musk, Jeff Bezos, Mark Zuckerberg, Sundar Pichai, and Shou Chew, are planning to attend Trump's inauguration on January 20. Meanwhile, US companies, including Amazon, Google, and Meta, have made $1 million donations to Trump's inauguration fund.

• SpaceX's Starship rocket exploded during a test Thursday.
• The Federal Aviation Administration issued a warning after the explosion, calling the area "dangerous."
• After the explosion, some flights near Turks and Caicos were diverted, per Flightradar24.

Flights near the Turks and Caicos islands were spotted diverting to avoid debris after SpaceX's Starship exploded on Thursday.

SpaceX was conducting its seventh test flight of its unmanned Starship mega-rocket from its Starbase launch site near Brownsville, Texas. The launch occurred around 5:30 p.m. ET.

The Starship's Super Heavy Booster, which boosts the Starship spacecraft, successfully touched down back to the launchpad, marking another milestone in SpaceX's goal to create reusable boosters.

However, the upper stage of the system, Starship, was lost in what the company called a "rapid unscheduled disassembly."

Videos on social media appeared to show debris light up the sky near Turks and Caicos as it fell back to Earth.

Dean Olson, who captured footage of the Starship debris while in the area, told Business Insider that he heard the sound of constant "thunder" for about a minute after witnessing the explosion.

SpaceX CEO Elon Musk said in an X post on Thursday night that the rocket "had an oxygen/fuel leak in the cavity above the ship engine firewall."

Musk wrote that the leak "was large enough to build pressure in excess of the vent capacity."

"Apart from obviously double-checking for leaks, we will add fire suppression to that volume and probably increase vent area. Nothing so far suggests pushing next launch past next month," he added.

The Federal Aviation Administration issued a warning after the explosion, calling the area "dangerous" and warning of "falling debris of rocket Starship."

"The FAA briefly slowed and diverted aircraft around the area where space vehicle debris was falling," an FAA spokesperson said. "Normal operations have resumed."

Flight data from Flightradar24 showed several aircraft near the Turks and Caicos Islands diverting from destination routes.

One flight was an Airbus A320-232, operated by JetBlue, headed to San Juan, Puerto Rico, from Fort Lauderdale, according to the website. The flight was diverted back to Fort Lauderdale International.

JetBlue and SpaceX did not immediately respond to a request for comment from Business Insider.

SpaceX's Starship mega-rocket has exploded in two of its previous tests.

In November 2023, the Super Heavy booster exploded as it returned to Earth while the Starship continued to climb toward space.

• SpaceX launched its Starship mega-rocket for the seventh time on Thursday.
• It performed an epic booster catch for the second time, but the Starship exploded shortly after.
• The launch marked the first flight of a new-generation Starship.

SpaceX's Starship mega-rocket has stumbled on the road to commercial use. On Thursday, it unexpectedly dropped out of communications and exploded as it screamed toward space for its seventh flight.

Shortly after Starship's explosion, Elon Musk, the founder and CEO of SpaceX, wrote on X, "Improved versions of the ship & booster already waiting for launch."

The mishap happened on the same day the SpaceX rival Blue Origin, owned by Jeff Bezos, successfully launched its New Glenn rocket into orbit. Blue Origin lost New Glenn's booster during Thursday morning's test flight.

What happened to the Starship

After liftoff, the rocket's Super Heavy booster heaved the Starship spaceship toward space, separated itself, and fell back toward Earth. As the falling booster approached SpaceX's Texas facilities, it nailed a complex maneuver that had happened only once before.

The booster fired its engines to lower itself to a catch tower, where a pair of giant "chopstick" arms closed around its trunk and caught it.

This technological feat is key to reaching SpaceX's goal of building a fleet of rapidly, fully reusable rockets to help slash spaceflight costs, advance the company's business model, and ultimately build a city of people on Mars.

"Kudos to you and the whole SpaceX team on the flawless booster catch! Very impressive," Bezos wrote to Musk on X about the achievement.

Shortly after the booster catch, SpaceX said the upper stage of the system, Starship itself, was lost. The company later confirmed on X that it had suffered a rapid unscheduled disassembly, which is another way of saying it exploded.

"We were just coming up to the end of that ascent burn for the ship when we started to lose a couple of the engines," Dan Huot, one of the hosts of SpaceX's livestream of the launch, said in the broadcast.

Then the ship dropped out of communications, meaning there was some kind of anomaly, and Starship was lost, Huot said.

"This was a brand-new vehicle essentially," he added. "With that, there's a lot of things you're upgrading, but there's a lot of things you're going to learn as all those systems are now interacting with each other for the first time."

In an X post on Thursday night, Musk wrote that preliminary indicators suggested Starship "had an oxygen/fuel leak in the cavity above the ship engine firewall that was large enough to build pressure in excess of the vent capacity."

"Apart from obviously double-checking for leaks, we will add fire suppression to that volume and probably increase vent area. Nothing so far suggests pushing next launch past next month," Musk added.

Dean Olson, who captured footage of the Starship debris while he was in Turks and Caicos, told Business Insider he heard the sound of constant "thunder" for about a minute after witnessing the explosion.

"I'm just walking out of the restaurant holding a cocktail, and I just looked up," Olson said. "Everyone's breath is kind of just taken away."

"Nobody knew what was going on," he added. "There was a lot of people panicking, to be honest with you."

SpaceX didn't respond to a request for comment.

SpaceX's 7th Starship flight didn't achieve all it set out to

For the first time, SpaceX flew Starship with a reused Raptor rocket engine.

The Super Heavy booster runs on 33 Raptor engines. For the entire rocket to be reusable, as Musk has said he intends it to be, those engines must be recycled and reused, too.

Aboard Thursday's flight, one of those engines was the same one that SpaceX flew on its October flight.

Also flying for the first time was SpaceX's new-generation second-stage Starship. This new generation comes with significant upgrades designed for "bringing major improvements to reliability and performance," the company wrote on its website.

For example, the flaps on this upgraded Starship are smaller and reoriented, so they're not exposed to as much heat upon reentry. These flaps are designed to eventually help Starship fly back and touch down on land, making it reusable.

But SpaceX has not yet recovered a Starship from spaceflight. So far, every Starship that has flown to space has sunk into the Indian Ocean. The ship on Thursday's flight was expected to have the same fate before it was lost shortly after launch.

Starship was scheduled to deploy a set of 10 Starlink simulators, or dummies. They were about the same size and weight as SpaceX's next-generation V3 Starlink satellites. Deploying them was practice for eventually the real thing, which is a key part of SpaceX's business plan.

Starship is set to make other SpaceX rockets obsolete

In its final form, Starship should be able to release up to 100 second-generation Starlink satellites at a time, increasing SpaceX's internet coverage and a core pillar of its income.

Once Starship is operational, its sheer power will probably make it the cornerstone of SpaceX's business, which has long hinged on the comparatively wimpy Falcon 9 and its hefty counterpart, Falcon Heavy.

"Starship obsoletes Falcon 9 and the Dragon capsule," SpaceX's chief operating officer, Gwynne Shotwell, said at the Baron Investment Conference in November, according to Ars Technica.

"We'll be flying that for six to eight more years," she added, "but ultimately, people are going to want to fly on Starship. It's bigger. It's more comfortable. It will be less expensive. And we will have flown it so many more times."

• TikTok CEO Shou Chew is planning to attend President-elect Donald Trump's inauguration.
• TikTok may go dark in the US the day before the inauguration, as dictated by a divest-or-ban law.
• Trump asked the Supreme Court to give TikTok more time as he seeks a political resolution.

TikTok CEO Shou Chew is planning to attend President-elect Donald Trump's inauguration on Monday, a source familiar with the matter confirmed to Business Insider.

Chew has been invited to sit on the dais alongside other important figures, including Mark Zuckerberg and Jeff Bezos, the source said.

The New York Times first reported on plans for Chew to attend.

TikTok did not respond to a request for comment from BI.

An appearance by Chew is notable, considering that a divest-or-ban law is pushing TikTok to go dark in the US on Sunday, a day before Trump's inauguration.

TikTok challenged the law in the US Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit in December but lost its case. It appealed to the Supreme Court for an emergency injunction to stop enforcement and awaits a decision.

Trump pushed for a TikTok ban in 2020, when he was last in office, but now he says he wants to save the app.

On December 27, Trump filed an amicus brief with the Supreme Court, asking it to pause the enforcement of TikTok's divestment deadline to give him time to find a political resolution. Trump met with Chew at Mar-a-Lago on December 16.

"You know, I have a warm spot in my heart for TikTok," Trump said at a press conference that day.

• Jeff Bezos' space company, Blue Origin, has launched its first orbital rocket, New Glenn.
• New Glenn is one of the largest, most powerful rockets ever built.
• The maiden launch marks a milestone for Blue Origin.

Jeff Bezos' space company Blue Origin has entered the rocket big leagues.

At 2:03 a.m. Eastern Time on Thursday, Blue Origin's 32-story-tall New Glenn rocket fired its seven engines and climbed atop a cloud of fire and steam for the first time, roaring into the skies above the launch complex in Cape Canaveral, Florida.

"LIFTOFF! New Glenn is beginning its first ever ascent toward the stars," Blue Origin wrote in an X post on Thursday morning.

Bezos, who was present at New Glenn's launch, uploaded a minute-long clip of the launch on X shortly after liftoff.

New Glenn belongs to a new generation of the largest, most powerful rockets ever built, next to Elon Musk's SpaceX's Starship and NASA's new moon rocket, the Space Launch System.

These heavy-lift vehicles have roughly the size and heft of NASA's Saturn V — the rocket that launched Apollo astronauts to the moon — but they're designed for even more ambitious goals.

Musk and Bezos have espoused plans to establish permanent human settlements on Mars and on a giant space station, respectively. NASA aims to build permanent science stations on and around the moon and eventually send astronauts to Mars with SpaceX's and Blue Origins' help.

First, though, Blue Origin needs to strengthen its business. New Glenn's maiden launch positions the company to fly payloads to orbit and challenge SpaceX's dominance.

Blue Origin was originally planning to launch New Glenn on Monday. The launch was repeatedly delayed and eventually postponed after Blue Origin said they had to "troubleshoot a vehicle subsystem issue."

"I'm incredibly proud New Glenn achieved orbit on its first attempt," Blue Origin CEO Dave Limp on Thursday. "We knew landing our booster, So You're Telling Me There's a Chance, on the first try was an ambitious goal. We'll learn a lot from today and try again at our next launch this spring. Thank you to all of Team Blue for this incredible milestone."

Blue Origin loses booster in an otherwise successful launch

In a statement two hours after the launch, Blue Origin confirmed that it had lost its booster after it separated from the rocket

The booster was meant to return to Earth and land on a platform in the ocean, which would have been the company's first step to proving the reusability of its booster.

This makes SpaceX the only company to have recovered and reused a rocket's booster. The Musk-led rocket company has been retrieving its much smaller Falcon 9 first-stage boosters for reuse in this way for years.

SpaceX's Starship booster recently proved a different landing method, lowering itself into the waiting arms of a landing tower in October.

Like Falcon 9, and unlike Starship, New Glenn is only partially reusable — its second stage is not designed for reuse.

Musk congratulated Bezos shortly after New Glenn's successful liftoff.

"Congratulations on reaching orbit on the first attempt! @JeffBezos," Musk wrote on X.

Blue Origin's future depends on New Glenn

Trailing behind SpaceX, Blue Origin is one of the leading companies paving the way for reusable rockets, which can help slash spaceflight costs.

Weeks before New Glenn's debut launch, during the New York Times 2024 DealBook Summit, Bezos said Blue Origin "is not a very good business, yet."

He added, "It's going to be the best business that I've ever been involved in."

New Glenn is Blue Origin's second rocket, but its first designed to insert itself into Earth's orbit.

The company began construction on New Glenn in 2016. Bezos has said he isn't happy with the company's speed of progress.

"Blue Origin needs to be much faster," Bezos told Lex Fridman in December 2023. "And it's one of the reasons that I left my role as the CEO of Amazon a couple of years ago."

For comparison, SpaceX began developing its first orbital rocket, the Falcon 9 v1.0, in 2005. It made its debut launch five years later, in 2010.

That said, New Glenn is more than three times more powerful than SpaceX's first Falcon 9.

Blue Origin's comparatively tiny New Shepard rocket, which carries paying customers and other payloads to suborbital space, has been reused nearly 30 times since its first launch in 2015.

New Glenn's maiden voyage is carrying a test payload

As Blue Origin's barge sails the booster back to the coast, the rocket's second stage is scheduled to remain in space for about six hours while carrying the company's prototype Blue Ring pathfinder spacecraft.

Blue Ring is designed for multiple mission types, including transporting, refueling, and communicating with other craft in space. The pathfinder prototype launched on Thursday is a test launch and is set to remain onboard and not be deployed into space.

"There is a growing demand to quickly move and position equipment and infrastructure in multiple orbits," Limp wrote on X in December. Blue Ring is designed to fulfill that need for both government and commercial customers, the Blue Origin CEO said.

The Federal Aviation Administration has granted Blue Origin a license to launch New Glenn to orbit from Cape Canaveral for the next five years.

Blue Origin's customers include NASA, Amazon, and several telecommunications providers.

• Yoon Suk Yeol, South Korea's impeached president, was arrested on Wednesday.
• This was the South Korean authorities' second attempt to arrest Yoon.
• Yoon was impeached on December 14 after he attempted to impose martial law, triggering protests.

South Korean President Yoon Suk Yeol was arrested by investigators early on Wednesday morning, local time.

Yoon's arrest comes after weeks of attempts by South Korean anti-corruption investigators to bring him in for questioning. This makes him the first sitting South Korean president to be detained.

Yoon has repeatedly defied attempts to arrest him. During a particularly tense standoff on January 3, investigators had to stand down after six hours when Yoon's security team barred them from taking the president.

More than 3,000 police officers and anti-corruption investigators were involved in Yoon's arrest on Wednesday morning, per Reuters.

South Korea's Corruption Investigation Office for High-ranking Officials said they had executed an arrest warrant for Yoon at 10.33 am local time, per a statement obtained by Yonhap News.

Yoon said in a statement on Wednesday that he had chosen to comply with the warrant "to prevent unsavory bloodshed," according to a translation by Reuters.

Roughly 6,500 supporters were present outside Yoon's presidential residence when he was arrested, per Yonhap News.

Yoon was impeached and stripped of his presidential powers on December 14. South Korean lawmakers voted to remove him from duties after a stunning declaration of martial law, which triggered large-scale protests and calls for his resignation.

South Korea's nine-member Constitutional Court is set to rule on Yoon's removal from office.

The trial, which must conclude within 180 days from the date of Yoon's impeachment, could take months to resolve. If the court decides to remove Yoon from office, a presidential election must be held within 60 days.

Last month, South Korean lawmakers impeached the country's acting president, Han Duck-soo, after he had refused to fill the Constitutional Court's three vacancies.

Han, who was also South Korea's prime minister, was replaced by the country's finance minister, Choi Sang-mok. Choi said in December that he would move quickly to fill up the court's vacancies.

There are currently eight justices on the court, after two new justices started their terms this month. Choi said he would appoint a ninth candidate after both the ruling and opposition parties come to an agreement on the nomination.

At least six votes are needed to remove Yoon.

• A Chinese social media app called Xiaohongshu is one of the biggest winners from a looming TikTok ban.
• It's so popular in the US that Chinese users have started a new hashtag to welcome Americans.
• The cultural exchange frenzy has birthed posts of people asking for help with English homework, among other requests.

A Chinese social media platform has grown so popular in the US that it's this week's most downloaded iPhone app — and it's become the site of a sudden East-Meets-West cultural exchange.

Xiaohongshu, also known as RedNote, hit the top spot on the US Apple store's ranking this week as a divest-or-ban law threatens to shut off American access to TikTok.

The app, commonly referred to as China's version of Instagram, has been flooded with posts from Chinese users greeting the influx of US newcomers.

One post titled "American please help me" went viral on Monday and received over 10,000 comments after its poster, from Zhejiang, requested help with their English homework.

Other popular posts also featured users, who listed their location as being in the US, offering their assistance for Chinese users' homework.

"Ask me any questions! I can help with your English homework, or answer questions about America (Texas). Thank you for welcoming us TikTok refugees," one post read. Several commenters uploaded photos of English-language worksheets in response.

The surge in American users on Chinese apps has also led to a rise in the hashtag #TikTokRefugee on Xiaohongshu, with dozens of Chinese creators posting guides on how to use the platform. The hashtag itself has been viewed over 64 million times, according to data seen by Business Insider.

"If you see a video that's downright awesome, just comment 6 or 66 or 666," said a cowboy hat-toting user, Big Tooth Chinese Redneck, in one viral video, referencing a Chinese internet slang term.

The sudden interest in Chinese social media platforms comes as TikTok continues to challenge the divest-or-ban law that the Senate passed in April. According to the law, TikTok will have to stop operating in the US on January 19 if its Chinese-based owner, Bytedance, doesn't sell the app.

The divest-and-ban law was passed amid widespread security concerns that the Chinese government could access user data if Bytedance continued to own the platform. TikTok CEO Shou Zi Chew told The Wall Street Journal in 2023 that such concerns are unfounded since the company would work with Oracle to store user data in the US.

TikTok argued its case with the Supreme Court on Friday, saying it will "go dark" in January if the court doesn't extend its divestment deadline. The court is expected to rule on the company's fate this week.

There's a lot on the line for TikTok now — it lost a challenge to the law in December when it brought the case before a panel of three judges from the US Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit.

In December, President-elect Donald Trump asked the Supreme Court to pause the law until after his inauguration. Trump is set to take office on January 20.

Allowing TikTok to operate in the US is a reversal of Trump's policy position on the company. Trump pushed for a TikTok ban in 2020 when he was still president. But more recently, the president-elect told reporters in December that he had a "warm spot" in his heart for TikTok.

Still, TikTok's troubles have brought unexpected benefits to platforms like Xiaohongshu and Lemon8, which both surged to the top two spots on Apple app store rankings. Lemon8 is also owned by Bytedance.

Meagan Loyst, founder of the investor collective Gen Z VCs, told Business Insider on Monday that users were flocking to these platforms to protest the government's planned TikTok ban.

"It really is just retaliation towards the government in the simplest way, but in a way that feels very native to Gen Z," Loyst said.

Representatives for TikTok and Xiaohongshu did not immediately respond to a request for comment from Business Insider.

• Eric Sim retired from his 20-year banking career in 2017 after achieving financial freedom.
• But the former investment-bank managing director says he's not a fan of the FIRE lifestyle.
• Sim became a professional speaker and executive coach after he left banking in 2017.

This as-told-to essay is based on a conversation with Eric Sim, 54, a former banker who became a published author, professional speaker, and career coach. The following has been edited for length and clarity. Business Insider previously published an essay about Sim's banking career.

When I started my career in banking, I didn't give much thought to retiring early.

I figured I would retire at age 65 and engage in typical retirement activities like going on cruises and hanging out with old friends.

But things changed after I became a managing director at UBS. After working for a few years there, where I managed to earn multiple annual bonuses, I realized that I was actually financially free.

That got me thinking: If I didn't need to work for someone else, what would I do?

I knew that I couldn't just quit my job without a plan. I needed to find a meaningful project to which I could devote my energies.

After much thought and reflection, I decided to leave banking to run my own training institute for young professionals. I started the Institute of Life in 2015 with the mission of helping young people achieve success at work and in life.

FIRE isn't as great as you think it is

Even though I have achieved financial freedom, I'm not a fan of the Financial Independence Retire Early, or FIRE, movement.

To achieve FIRE, you must save a lot of your income during your working years. But the truth is, people often don't have a clear idea of what retiring will look like for them or if they'll enjoy it — especially if they're in the weeds and working toward it.

Of course, when you first retire, you can do whatever you want. You can travel overseas, hit the spa, or play golf.

After working for 10 to 20 years, being free from the grind for the first three months feels good. But you'll get bored very quickly.

When you are working, you don't have to plan for what you want to do. Your day job will give you more than enough things to do.

But if you are financially independent, without a regular schedule to adhere to, you need to find projects to occupy your time. If you don't do that, then your days are wasted.

A good retirement isn't just about having money in the bank

To have a good retirement, you will need three types of capital. Besides financial capital, you need human and social capital if you want to make the most of your time.

Human capital refers to the knowledge you possess. You can build this up through your career or through your side hustles and hobbies. By developing your interests and skills, you will know what activities you want to do when you go into retirement mode.

Social capital refers to the goodwill you accumulate with others. The small help that you offer to others can come back in a big way when you retire.

Ultimately, you need to know what you want to do after leaving your day job. If there is something that you always wanted to do, and is meaningful, I would say go for it.

But if you have nothing to look forward to and don't have a mission yet, just stay in your day job. You can still pursue your own interests on the side without quitting your job.

• Blue Origin was set to launch its New Glenn rocket on Monday morning.
• The launch was postponed because of a "vehicle subsystem issue," Blue Origin said.
• "We're reviewing opportunities for our next launch attempt," the company said.

The rocket company Blue Origin postponed its highly anticipated New Glenn rocket launch Monday morning, citing a need to "troubleshoot a vehicle subsystem issue."

The launch, originally scheduled for a three-hour window from 1 a.m. to 4 a.m. ET, was repeatedly delayed before it was ultimately postponed.

"We're standing down on today's launch attempt to troubleshoot a vehicle subsystem issue that will take us beyond our launch window," Blue Origin wrote in an X post. "We're reviewing opportunities for our next launch attempt."

Ahead of the scheduled launch, Blue Origin's leadership — including its founder, Jeff Bezos — awaited the rocket's blastoff at the Cape Canaveral Space Force Station.

A liftoff time of 1:31 a.m. was first set at the beginning of the launch's livestream. It was then delayed from 1:52 a.m. to 2:07 a.m., 2:27 a.m., 2:48 a.m., and finally, 3:15 a.m.

At press time, Blue Origin had not confirmed a new launch date.

Before the launch was postponed, SpaceX CEO Elon Musk had wished Blue Origin well. SpaceX remains the only company to have recovered and reused a rocket's booster stages.

Ahead of the initially scheduled launch time, Blue Origin said on X that the company hoped to have the New Glenn "reach orbit safely."

"Anything beyond that is icing on the cake. We know landing the booster on our first try offshore in the Atlantic is ambitious—but we're going for it," the company wrote on X early Monday morning. "No matter what happens, we'll learn, refine, and apply that knowledge to our next launch."

A successful launch would have greatly boosted Bezos' spacefaring ambitions for Blue Origin.

Besides the New Glenn rocket, Blue Origin has developed other space vehicles, including the New Shepard.

But one of New Shepard's uncrewed missions failed on September 12, 2022, when Blue Origin lost a first-stage booster about a minute into the flight.

That resulted in the New Shepard getting grounded by the Federal Aviation Administration. Blue Origin had to take 21 corrective actions, including redesigning some components, before the New Shepard could fly again.

Bezos founded Blue Origin in 2000. The billionaire told the podcaster Lex Fridman in a 2023 interview that he stepped down as Amazon's CEO in 2021 because he wanted to focus on Blue Origin.

"I've turned the CEO role over, and the primary reason I did that is so that I could spend time on Blue Origin, adding some energy, some sense of urgency," Bezos told Fridman.

Representatives for Blue Origin did not immediately respond to a request for comment from Business Insider.

• DOGE plans to deploy its staffers to major government agencies after Donald Trump takes office.
• Two DOGE representatives will be embedded at each agency, The New York Times reported.
• The commission has been hiring since it was announced in November.

Elon Musk's government efficiency commission is looking to embed staffers at government agencies to lead cost cutting efforts.

Most major government agencies will be given two representatives from the Department of Government Efficiency, or DOGE, after President-elect Donald Trump takes office on January 20, The New York Times reported on Sunday, citing about a dozen people who are familiar with DOGE's operations.

Those who aren't deployed will instead be stationed at the US Digital Service, a branch of the White House that provides IT consulting services to federal agencies, the outlet reported.

Then-President Barack Obama described the USDS as a "startup at the White House" when he created the agency in 2014.

The Times added that DOGE could also have an office at the White House's Office of Management and Budget. The OMB prepares the president's budget request for Congress.

Musk did not respond to a request for comment from Business Insider.

In November, Trump announced that DOGE would be co-led by Musk and biotech billionaire Vivek Ramaswamy. The commission, Trump said in his announcement, is set to conclude its work by July 4, 2026.

DOGE kicked off its recruitment efforts in the same month. The commission started an account on Musk's social network X and asked applicants to send in their CVs via direct message.

Thus far, the commission said it has been hiring for software engineering, information security engineering, HR, IT, and finance roles.

Back in October, Musk said that DOGE would help the government to save at least $2 trillion, though he didn't specify where the savings would come from. The federal government spent $6.75 trillion in the 2024 fiscal year.

Last week, Musk said that saving $2 trillion would be "the best-case outcome" for DOGE, adding that his commission had a "good shot" at saving $1 trillion.

"If we can drop the budget deficit from $2 trillion to $1 trillion and free up the economy to have additional growth such that the output of goods and services keeps pace with the increase in the money supply, then there will be no inflation. So that, I think, would be an epic outcome," Musk told Mark Penn, the chairman and CEO of marketing company Stagwell, in an interview on January 8.

• Xpeng CEO He Xiaopeng said that competition within the auto sector will be even more heated in 2025.
• He said in an internal letter that the industry will face an "elimination round" from 2025 to 2027.
• The Xpeng founder-CEO said in November that most Chinese carmakers wouldn't survive the next decade.

Competition within the auto industry will become even more cutthroat in the years ahead, Xpeng CEO He Xiaopeng said in a letter to his company's staff last month.

"The period from 2025 to 2027 marks the elimination round in the automotive industry," He wrote in an internal letter obtained by The Wall Street Journal.

"Competition in 2025 will be fiercer than ever," He added.

In 2024, Xpeng delivered 190,068 vehicles, a 34% increase from the 141,601 vehicles delivered in 2023, per a company filing. The company's vice-chairman and president, Brian Gu, said in March that Xpeng is on track to "achieve profitability at some point in 2025."

Tesla, the world's largest EV maker, delivered 1.79 million vehicles in 2024, a 1% decrease from the 1.81 million vehicles delivered in 2023.

Xpeng did not respond to a request for comment from Business Insider.

He made similar statements on the auto industry's outlook last year. In November, the Xpeng founder-CEO said in an interview with Singaporean newspaper The Straits Times that most Chinese carmakers won't survive past the next decade.

"From 300 start-ups, only 100 of them survived. Today, there are fewer than 50 companies that still exist, and only 40 of them are actually selling cars every year," He told the outlet.

"I personally think that there will only be seven major car companies that will exist in the coming 10 years," he added, without specifying who he thought the surviving companies would be.

In March, He told Singaporean broadcaster CNA that the Chinese EV industry will see a "knockout tournament" in the next three to four years, followed by an "all-star competition" in the next seven to eight years.

To be sure, He isn't the only auto executive who expects intense competition in the industry.

In October, Mercedes-Benz CEO Ola Källenius told attendees at the Berlin Global Dialogue conference that Western automakers are fighting an existential battle against their Chinese counterparts.

"It's strange. It's a Darwinistic-like price war, market purification. And many of those players that are around now. Many of those are not going to be around five years from now," Källenius said.

• Google is joining tech companies like Amazon and Meta in donating to Donald Trump's inauguration.
• The search giant said it is giving $1 million, more than triple what it gave Trump in 2017.
• In September, Trump threatened to prosecute Google if he was elected president.

Google said it is donating $1 million to President-elect Donald Trump's coming inauguration.

"Google is pleased to support the 2025 inauguration, with a livestream on YouTube and a direct link on our homepage. We're also donating to the inaugural committee," the company's global head of government affairs and public policy, Karan Bhatia, told CNBC.

Google's contribution, which will help fund the celebratory events after Trump takes office, is more than triple what it gave in 2017. The search giant donated $285,000 to Trump's first inauguration, per Federal Election Commission filings.

Back in September, Trump said in a Truth Social post that he would prosecute Google "at the maximum levels" if he won the election.

In his post, Trump accused Google of "illegally" using its system to display only "bad stories" about him while surfacing positive reports about his rival, Vice President Kamala Harris.

Google and Trump's transition team did not immediately respond to requests for comment from Business Insider.

Trump's second inauguration, on January 20, has seen donations pour in from multiple companies and business leaders.

The president-elect has received contributions from tech companies like Amazon, Meta, Microsoft, and Uber. Like Google, all four companies have donated $1 million each.

That's on top of the personal donations made by tech executives like OpenAI CEO Sam Altman and Uber CEO Dara Khosrowshahi. Both Altman and Khosrowshahi donated $1 million each as well.

"One of the big differences between the first term, in the first term, everybody was fighting me. In this term, everybody wants to be my friend," Trump said at a press conference in December.

"I don't know, my personality changed or something," he added.

Since winning the election in November, Trump has raised more than $200 million in donations, of which at least $150 million will go toward the inauguration, The New York Times reported on Saturday.

Trump raised $106.8 million for his first inauguration in 2017, per the FEC.

• Wildfires are burning across Los Angeles County.
• Hundreds of thousands of people are under evacuation orders or warnings.
• Insured losses could top $20 billion, JPMorgan analysts estimated — the most-ever in California.

The Los Angeles area is battling a series of massive wildfires that continue to rip through its picturesque mountains and hillsides — creating a hellscape of burned-out neighborhoods and upended livelihoods that could ultimately be the most costly fire disaster in California history.

Authorities on Friday night expanded the evacuation zone related to the largest blaze, the Palisades Fire, east toward Santa Monica, less than 1.5 miles from the iconic Santa Monica Pier. The zone now encompasses the famous Getty Center, home of the Getty Museum.

Officials have now ordered over 153,000 residents to evacuate and warned another 166,000 to be ready to leave if the fires continue to spread. About 38,000 acres have burned. Officials have reported 13 deaths related to the fire as of Saturday.

At a press conference on Friday evening, officials managing the Eaton fire, which now spans over 14,000 acres and is one of the largest and deadliest, said they did not expect the blaze to spread significantly over the weekend due to more moderate wind conditions. However, officials said they are anticipating another high-wind event early next week. It was strong Santa Ana gusts of up to 90 miles per hour that first whipped the fires into a frenzy earlier this week.

JPMorgan analysts said the blazes tearing through the region could lead to over $20 billion in insured losses — and about $50 billion in total economic losses. That would make these conflagrations "significantly more severe" than the Camp Fires that struck the state in 2018 and racked up $10 billion in insured losses, the current record.

Los Angeles District Attorney Nathan Hochman described the scene in LA as apocalyptic, as thick bands of smoke surrounded the city. Los Angeles County is home to about 10 million people.

"Not since the 1990s, when Los Angeles was hit with the fires, the flood, the earthquake, and the riots, have I seen such disaster occur here in our city," Hochman said at a briefing, referring to the Northridge Earthquake and the disturbances in the wake of the Rodney King verdict.

Erroneous emergency alerts telling residents to evacuate areas unaffected by the fires further heightened panic in the region. Kevin McGowan, the director of the Los Angeles County Office of Emergency Management, apologized for the messages at Friday's conference.

"There is an extreme amount of frustration, anger, fear, with regards to the erroneous messages that have been being sent out through the wireless emergency alert system. I can't express enough how sorry I am for this experience," he said.

He reassured residents that resolving the issue is his "top priority" and that he has technical specialists working to identify the root cause. "I implore everyone to not disable the messages on your phone," he said.

Late Thursday, the Federal Aviation Administration warned civilians against flying unauthorized drones in areas undergoing firefighting efforts, after a firefighting plane sustained wing damage from a civilian drone and had to be grounded.

Satellite images of the LA fires showed the destruction left in their wake.

Starlink, Elon Musk's SpaceX subsidiary that provides satellite internet service, said Thursday that people in the Los Angeles area can use the company's network to text loved ones, contact 911, and receive emergency alerts.

Gov. Gavin Newsom on Saturday announced that he's doubling the number of California National Guard personnel on the ground to 1,680 members.

"The men and women of the California National Guard are working day and night to help Los Angeles residents during their greatest time of need," he said in a statement.

Here's a look at the latest happenings in the main fires spreading throughout the area:

Palisades Fire

The Palisades Fire in the Pacific Palisades area north of Santa Monica was the first fire to strike the region on Tuesday morning. It has spread to over 21,500 acres, according to the California Department of Forestry and Fire Protection. Around 11% of the fire is contained, it says.

Five people have died in the Palisades fire, according to the medical examiner's office.

Los Angeles City's Fire Chief Kristin Crowley said at a press briefing earlier this week that the Palisades Fire had damaged or destroyed over 5,300 structures.

Crowley would not confirm reports that the fire started in a resident's garden, saying the origin is still under investigation.

Some celebrities have lost homes in the blaze, including Paris Hilton and Billy Crystal.

On Thursday, a drone hit the wing of one of two Super Scooper planes fighting the wildfires, Los Angeles County Fire Chief Anthony Marrone said at a Friday press conference. He said the plane was under urgent repairs and set to be flying again by Monday. "If you fly a drone at one of these brush fires all aerial operations will be shut down," he said.

Eaton Fire

The second-largest fire in Los Angeles County is the Eaton Fire, which started on Tuesday evening in the Pasadena-Altadena area at the foothills of the Angeles National Forest.

Eight people have died in the Eaton fire, Los Angeles County Sheriff Commander Tania E. Plunkett said at a press conference on Saturday afternoon.

The blaze has spread to over 14,100 acres, Marrone said at the Saturday conference, adding that over 7,000 structures have been damaged or destroyed and 15% of the fire is contained.

The cause of the fire remains "unknown," Marrone previously said.

Hurst Fire

The Hurst Fire, which began late on Tuesday night in the northern part of the San Fernando Valley, spread to 799 acres and is 76% contained, per Cal Fire.

In an X post on Thursday afternoon, Los Angeles Mayor Karen Bass said the mandatory evacuation order for the Hurst Fire had been lifted.

Kenneth Fire

On Thursday, a small brush fire erupted at the Victory Trailhead near the border of Los Angeles and Ventura counties. Marrone said that the fire had been stopped. It burned just over 1,000 acres, but no structures were reported damaged. It is 80% contained, per Cal Fire.

A mandatory evacuation order was issued for several neighborhoods near the fire.

LAPD said it had detained a possible arson suspect but could not confirm any connection to the fire.

An evacuation notice intended for residents impacted by the Kenneth Fire was mistakenly sent out across LA County due to a "technical error," County Supervisor Janice Hahn said in an X post.

Sunset Fire and others

The Sunset Fire broke out in the Runyon Canyon area of the Hollywood Hills on Wednesday evening, quickly spreading to scorch over 40 acres and threaten major LA landmarks.

As of Thursday morning, firefighters were able to stop the fire's forward progress, Crowley said.

All evacuation orders related to the Sunset Fire were lifted as of 7:30 a.m. Thursday, she added.

A large structure fire consumed two large homes in the Studio City area but firefighters were able to stop its forward growth at just one acre and prevent another brushfire, Crowley said.

Yet another fire, the Lidia Fire, started Wednesday afternoon in Acton near the Antelope Valley, about 20 miles northeast of the San Fernando Valley. It consumed 395 acres but is now 100% contained, according to CalFire.

The Woodley Fire, which began Wednesday morning in the southern part of the San Fernando Valley, has been suppressed and there are no current threats, Crowley said.

Patrols were monitoring the area for any flare-ups, she added.

Events canceled and landmarks closed as smoke chokes LA

Major and minor events alike have been canceled or postponed across the Los Angeles area as the city battles the fires.

The 30th Annual Critics Choice Awards, set for Sunday night, were rescheduled for January 26. A National Hockey League game between the Los Angeles Kings and the Calgary Flames, scheduled for Wednesday night at Crypto.com arena, was postponed. The LA Lakers rescheduled Thursday night's game.

Music venues across the city were also canceling or postponing their shows, including The Troubadour, The Wiltern, The Echo, the Kia Forum, Walt Disney Concert Hall, and others.

Flights into and out of LAX, Hollywood Burbank Airport, Ontario International Airport, and Santa Ana's John Wayne Airport were also experiencing delays and cancellations. LAX, however, remains open.

The fires are also shuttering tourist destinations in and around Los Angeles, which attracts nearly 50 million visitors a year.

The fires forced some Los Angeles-area landmarks to close, including the Hollywood sign, the Los Angeles Zoo, the Broad Museum, the Norton Simon Museum, the Getty Villa and Getty Center, Universal Studios Hollywood and Universal CityWalk, and the Griffith Observatory.

Airbnb told CNN that it would be allowing refunds for bookings in areas affected by the wildfires, following a viral social media post from a customer who said the company refused to offer her a refund.

California already struggled with an insurance crisis

The devastating fires this week will likely only worsen California's ongoing insurance crisis, where many homebuyers already struggle to get approved for loans, home insurance, and fire insurance — even in areas outside the typical risk zones.

In recent years, some insurance companies, like State Farm, have stopped accepting new home insurance policies in the state entirely, as wildfire risks have only increased.

Experts told Business Insider that prices are likely to continue rising for those who can still get insurance.

"I've seen numbers go up 200%, 300%, even 500% in a year," Nick Ramirez, the owner of a California insurance agency, told BI.

And as the fires' estimated damages already climb into the billions of dollars, some homeowners will have to rebuild without the help of insurance payouts.

• Elon Musk said on Wednesday that saving $2 trillion would be a "best-case outcome" for DOGE.
• Musk said DOGE had a "good shot" at saving $1 trillion, which would still be an "epic outcome."
• The Tesla chief had previously suggested his commission would save at least $2 trillion.

Elon Musk cast doubt on his previous promise that Donald Trump's "Department of Government Efficiency" would save the government $2 trillion.

"I think we'll try for $2 trillion. I think that's, like, the best-case outcome," Musk told the political strategist Mark Penn during a Wednesday-evening chat on X.

In October, Musk argued that DOGE would save the government at least $2 trillion. Some federal budget experts questioned the possibility of making such significant cuts, especially given that Trump has promised not to touch programs like Social Security and Medicare.

"But I do think that you kind of have to have some overage," Musk told Penn. He added that he thought the commission had a "good shot" at saving $1 trillion.

He continued: "If we can drop the budget deficit from $2 trillion to $1 trillion and free up the economy to have additional growth such that the output of goods and services keeps pace with the increase in the money supply, then there will be no inflation. So that, I think, would be an epic outcome."

Musk did not specify in October which cuts he planned to make to achieve that target, which would involve slashing government spending by nearly a third; the federal government spent $6.75 trillion in the 2024 fiscal year.

Musk told Penn on Wednesday that he still thought the government was "a very target-rich environment for saving money."

"It's like being in a room full of targets," he added. "Like, you could close your eyes, and you can't miss."

Republican lawmakers have moved quickly to support DOGE's efforts. Sen. Joni Ernst of Iowa and Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene of Georgia are set to lead their chambers' work with the panel.

The Tesla CEO's influence has soared since Trump's victory. In recent weeks Musk helped kill sweeping legislation to fund the federal government, briefly increasing the risk of a shutdown.

Trump has waved off concerns about Musk's political moves in Europe. The Tesla CEO has repeatedly criticized British Prime Minister Keir Starmer and called for the Reform UK leader Nigel Farage, a Trump ally, to step aside. Musk also endorsed Germany's far-right AfD party ahead of elections next month; top leaders have pushed back.

"You mean where he likes people that tended to be conservative? I don't know the people," Trump told reporters during a wide-ranging press conference on Tuesday. "I can say Elon's doing a good job. Very smart guy."

Musk and Trump's transition team did not immediately respond to requests for comment from Business Insider.

Trump is set to be sworn into office on January 20.

• Accenture CEO Julie Sweet said she looks for candidates who love to learn new things.
• Sweet said in a podcast interview that she would ask people what they have learned recently.
• The former lawyer said it didn't matter even if people just said they learned how to bake a cake.

Accenture CEO Julie Sweet said there's one key question she poses to people who want to work for her.

"There's one question that we ask everyone, regardless of you're a consultant or you're working in technology or whatever you do," Sweet said in an interview with Norges Bank Investment Management CEO Nicolai Tangen on his "In Good Company" podcast, which aired Wednesday.

"We say, 'What have you learned in the last six months?'" she added.

Asking this question, Sweet told Tangen, is a practical way for her to determine if candidates are interested in learning new things.

"If someone can't answer that question, and by the way, we don't care if it's 'I learned to bake a cake,' if they can't answer that question, then we know that they're not a learner," Sweet said.

This wouldn't be the first time Sweet has talked about her expectations for new hires at Accenture. The consulting firm said on its website that it employs around 799,000 employees and operates in more than 200 cities.

The former lawyer said in a 2019 interview with The New York Times that she looks for candidates who demonstrate two main traits.

"The first is curiosity. The new normal is continuous learning, and we look for people who demonstrate lots of different interests and really demonstrate curiosity," Sweet told The Times.

"The second piece is leadership. I don't care what level you are, there is the need to offer straight talk when you're working with clients. You have to have the courage to deliver tough messages," she added.

Representatives for Sweet at Accenture did not respond to a request for comment from Business Insider.

Sweet isn't the only C-suite executive who places a premium on learning.

JPMorgan CEO Jamie Dimon said that students should devote their time to learning and reading, and less time on social-media platforms like TikTok and Facebook.

Dimon was speaking at the Georgetown Psaros Center for Financial Markets and Policy's annual Financial Markets Quality Conference in September when he was asked if he had any advice for the students in attendance.

"My advice to students: Learn, learn, learn, learn, learn, learn, learn. If you're Democrat, read the Republican opinion, the good ones. If you're Republican, read the Democrat ones," Dimon said.

"Read history books. You can't make it up. Nelson Mandela, Abe Lincoln, Sam Walton. You only learn by reading and talking to other people. There's no other way," he continued.

• The International Longshoremen's Association (ILA) and the US Maritime Alliance have struck a deal.
• This deal averted a potential strike involving thousands of dockworkers.
• The strike would have crippled shipping lines along the East and Gulf Coasts.

The International Longshoremen's Association and the US Maritime Alliance said Wednesday they had agreed on a new six-year master contract.

The two sides said in a joint statement that this will allow them to avoid any work stoppages on January 15.

"This agreement protects current ILA jobs and establishes a framework for implementing technologies that will create more jobs while modernizing East and Gulf coast ports — making them safer and more efficient, and creating the capacity they need to keep our supply chains strong," the joint statement read, adding that the deal was a "win-win agreement."

The ILA and USMX said they would get their members to review and approve the agreement before it is released publicly. For now, both sides will continue to operate under their current contract until the terms of the new agreement are ratified via a vote.

The strike would have potentially paralyzed shipping lines along the East and Gulf Coasts.

Details of the agreement were not made public, but the joint statement said dockworkers received some protections against having their jobs replaced by automation, which was one of the union's key concerns.

The ILA had the support of President-elect Donald Trump, who said in a Truth Social post in December that the amount of money saved by automation on US docks was "nowhere near the distress, hurt, and harm it causes for American Workers, in this case, our Longshoremen."

Members of the ILA previously went on strike in October for three days. The strike ended when the union secured higher pay, while other contract negotiations continued, and members returned to work. That agreement provided a 62% pay increase over the next six years.

• Jensen Huang says he would be "delighted" to meet with President-elect Donald Trump at Mar-a-Lago.
• The Nvidia CEO said he has yet to receive an invitation.
• Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg and Amazon founder Jeff Bezos have visited Trump at his Palm Beach resort.

Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang says he has yet to meet with President-elect Donald Trump following the latter's victory in November's presidential election.

Huang was giving an interview to Bloomberg's Ed Ludlow on Tuesday when he was asked if he'd been invited to visit Mar-a-Lago, Trump's Palm Beach resort.

"Not yet but I would be delighted to go see him and congratulate him and do everything we can to help this administration succeed," Huang told Ludlow.

A Nvidia spokesperson declined to comment on Huang's remarks.

The Trump transition team did not respond to a request for comment from Business Insider.

In November, Trump said he plans to impose an additional 10% import tariff on Chinese goods entering the US. He previously said in February that he would introduce tariffs of more than 60% on China.

Huang told investors at Nvidia's earnings call in November that the chip giant will "comply with any regulation that comes along fully."

China is an important market for Nvidia, making up nearly 17% of the company's total revenue in the year to the end of January 2024.

Several tech billionaires, ranging from Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg to Amazon founder Jeff Bezos, have already made trips to Mar-a-Lago to meet with the president-elect.

Trump has enjoyed a warm reception from business leaders as he prepares to take office for the second time.

The president-elect has raised at least $200 million in donations since winning the election, The New York Times reported on Saturday, citing people involved with the fundraising.

At least $150 million of the funds will go toward Trump's upcoming inauguration, far outpacing the $106.8 million he received for his first inauguration in 2017. The rest of the donations will help fund Trump's political activities and future presidential library.

"One of the big differences between the first term, in the first term, everybody was fighting me. In this term, everybody wants to be my friend," Trump said at a news conference last month.

"I don't know, my personality changed or something," Trump added.

• Mark Zuckerberg wore a Greubel Forsey Hand Made 1 watch in a Facebook video he posted on Tuesday.
• The Meta CEO was announcing the end of the company's fact-checking partnerships in the US.
• Zuckerberg has also worn watches from the other Swiss brands De Bethune and Patek Philippe.

Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg sported a new luxury timepiece while announcing the end of his company's fact-checking partnerships in the US on Tuesday.

Zuckerberg's watch, a Greubel Forsey Hand Made 1, costs more than $900,000 and is assembled entirely by hand. Greubel Forsey says on its website that it makes only two or three models of the Hand Made 1 every year.

"Hey, everyone. I want to talk about something important today, because it's time to get back to our roots around free expression on Facebook and Instagram," Zuckerberg said while wearing the Hand Made 1 on his left wrist in a video he posted on Facebook.

When asked about the video, Greubel Forsey CEO Michel Nydegger told Bloomberg that Zuckerberg's choice of timepiece showed a "true appreciation for the most traditional approach to fine watchmaking today."

According to Greubel Forsey's website, the "Hand Made 1" has 281 parts, most of which are made in-house by the watchmaker.

Meta and Greubel Forsey didn't respond to requests for comment from Business Insider.

This isn't the first time Zuckerberg has publicly demonstrated his interest in luxury timepieces.

In September, Zuckerberg wore a rose gold De Bethune DB25 Starry Varius during an interview with the business podcast "Acquired." The watch costs about $90,000, according to listings by the watch retailers The 1916 Company and The Hour Glass.

Zuckerberg was also seen wearing the Patek Philippe Grand Complications In-Line Perpetual Calendar 5236P-001 when he posted a selfie with his wife, Priscilla Chan. The watch costs $141,400, according to Patek Philippe's website.

Zuckerberg has expressed some interest in timepieces to other business leaders. At Anant Ambani's pre-wedding party in March, he showed his admiration for Ambani's Richard Mille watch.

"You know, I never really wanted to get a watch. But after seeing that, I was like, watches are cool," Zuckerberg told Ambani, according to a video circulated on social media.

Joseph Rosenfeld, an image consultant in New York, told BI in September that Zuckerberg's "love for premium watches and subtle luxury" suggested a shift in the Meta CEO's style and identity.

"He's stepping into a role where his appearance reflects his position as a tech innovator," Rosenfeld said.

Zuckerberg's penchant for expensive watches appears to be one facet of a wider image transformation.

For one, the Meta chief has ditched his gray t-shirts and hoodies, opting for shearling jackets and gold chains instead.

But watches aside, what Zuckerberg announced on Tuesday is set to have far-reaching ramifications on Meta's approach toward content moderation.

Meta said it was replacing its fact-checking partners with a crowdsourced moderation tool like the community notes used by X, formerly Twitter.

"We've seen this approach work on X — where they empower their community to decide when posts are potentially misleading and need more context, and people across a diverse range of perspectives decide what sort of context is helpful for other users to see," Meta's chief global affairs officer, Joel Kaplan, wrote in a blog post.

"We think this could be a better way of achieving our original intention of providing people with information about what they're seeing — and one that's less prone to bias," Kaplan added.

• Dell is ditching its old naming system for PC products.
• The company is dividing its PC line-up into three categories: Dell, Dell Pro, and Dell Pro Max.
• Dell executives said Apple didn't own the words "pro" and "max" when asked about the similar names.

Tech giant Dell has announced a new naming system for its PC line-up.

But that sparked some questions from people who attended a media briefing on Monday, who pointed out that Dell's new naming system seemed similar to a key competitor's.

Dell told reporters ahead of this year's Consumer Electronics Show that it was dividing its PC products into three categories: Dell, Dell Pro, and Dell Pro Max.

This replaces Dell's current system which features names like Inspiron, OptiPlex, and XPS. The company said at the briefing that the new names won't apply to its gaming brand, Alienware.

"Your branding sounds a lot like Apple. Aren't you just following them?" one audience member said at the briefing, Bloomberg's Brody Ford reported on Monday.

Ever since the iPhone 11 was introduced in 2019, Apple has used the "Pro" and "Pro Max" labels for the iPhone's higher-tiered variants. The naming system is also used for some of Apple's other products as well, like the iPad Pro tablet, and the AirPods Pro earphones.

Apple doesn't own the words "pro" and "max," Dell's executives said at the briefing.

The company's COO Jeff Clarke said that the naming decision was based on research Dell did with "tens of thousands of customers," per Bloomberg.

The new naming system will "make it easier for our customers to do business with us," said Dell founder and CEO, Michael Dell.

Dell and Apple did not respond to Business Insider's requests for comment.

To be sure, Apple isn't the only tech company who has used words like "pro" in its product names. For instance, Microsoft has its Surface Pro tablets as well as its AI subscription offering, Copilot Pro.

Rival HP made a similar move to simplify their product naming system last year. The company said in May that it was using the prefix "Omni" for its consumer laptops and desktops, and the prefixes "Elite" and "Pro" for its commercial offerings.

Although Dell is best known for its computer business, the company has increasingly turned its attention toward its flourishing AI business. The company said in June that it was partnering with chip giant Nvidia to build an AI factory for Elon Musk's AI startup, xAI.

In November, Dell said its Infrastructure Solution Groups, which includes sales of AI servers, earned $11.4 billion in revenues for the third quarter of 2024, a 34% year-on-year increase.

Dell's shares were up by over 57% last year.