Podcast: China's tech culture
A deep dive into China's tech culture, including China's tech founders, their relationship with the state, and the books that inspire China's tech industry
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In this episode, I speak with Afra Wang, writer and observer of China’s tech culture as well as broader cultural trends in China and the US. Afra is the author of the Concurrent newsletter and has published work in Wired Magazine and Asterisk Magazine.
Follow Afra’s work:
CyberPink podcast (in Chinese)
Wired: “You’ve Never Heard of China’s Greatest Sci-Fi Novel”
Asterisk: “The China Tech Canon”
Transcript
Kyle (00:00)
Welcome to the High Capacity Podcast. I’m your host, Kyle Chan, a fellow at Brookings. I’m thrilled to be joined today by my guest, Afra Wang, an absolutely brilliant writer focused on China’s tech culture and broader cultural trends in China and the US. She’s the author of the amazing Concurrent newsletter and host of the popular CyberPink podcast, which is in Chinese. She’s currently joining from London, where she’s also a fellow with Gov.ai.
Welcome, Afra, and thanks for coming on the show.
Afra (00:31)
Thank you for having me, Kyle.
Kyle (00:33)
I want to start by asking a big question: what is Chinese tech culture? In Silicon Valley, we hear about hoodies, tech bros, and billionaire founders with big egos who love to move fast and break things. In China, from an American perspective, we hear a bit about the 996 work culture (996工作制)—working from 9 a.m. to 9 p.m., six days a week—and this relentless, bring-your-mattress-to-work culture. But beyond that, what is Chinese tech culture actually like? Is there even such a thing? How does it compare to Silicon Valley? Are there tech bros (科技男) in China? Let’s start there.
Afra (01:05)
Yes, there are a lot of tech bros in China. If there’s one similarity between Silicon Valley and China, it’s the density of tech bros, although they are “bro-y” in a very different manner. We can talk about that later. This is a great, broad question. When you ask what China’s tech culture is, I can break it down through founder archetypes, generations, and regions. There’s a Shenzhen (深圳) founder versus a Beijing (北京) founder—they have very different personalities and backgrounds.
In general, there are some patterns I can map out. The first one is engineer realism. Honestly, Kyle, your newsletter, High Capacity, is a reflection of this engineer realism, where all sorts of industries converge to produce very tangible products. This “product first, shipping first, philosophy later” virtue is something Chinese tech culture appreciates. There’s intense focus on execution, shipping, iteration, and scalability. Anyone constantly talking about philosophy or posting on social media would be slightly looked down upon by Chinese tech people because they value doing rather than talking. There’s a strong sense of wushi (务实) instead of wuxu (务虚). Wushi means minding the substance, and wuxu means minding the philosophical or intangibles.
Another aspect is the hypercompetitive mindset. I was reading Kai-Fu Lee’s (李开复) 2018 book, AI Superpowers (AI·未来). He used Wang Xing (王兴), Meituan’s (美团) founder, as an example to educate Silicon Valley readers: “Look at people like Wang Xing. They are no less smart than you, yet they are fighting 100 times more brutally.” If Silicon Valley founders are driven by ideals and changing the world, Kai-Fu Lee noted that Chinese founders don’t necessarily have this. If we trace back the history of the internet, pivotal moments are named by wars. For example, the “Hundred Regiments Battle” (Baituan Dazhan / 百团大战). That was the moment when Meituan, Didi (滴滴), and other mobile-first applications were trying to take control of the market and kill each other.
Afra (04:42)
Right now, we’re in another Baituan Dazhan with AI. It’s the Spring Festival (春节), a moment when everyone is on their smartphones sending messages. This is a pivotal time for AI companies to send subsidies and promotional messages during the Spring Festival Gala (春晚) to take control of the market. There’s a mindset in these subsidy wars: “If I dare to lose two arms, I can win over someone who only dares to lose one arm.” It’s a self-sacrificing mindset where they are willing to double down, burn resources, and sacrifice short-term interests to gain long-term longevity. It’s really brutal if you read the history and watch the current competition.
Another interesting aspect is how path-dependent Chinese tech culture is on the gaokao (高考), the Chinese college entrance examination. Just as a Silicon Valley founder is essentially replicating the college application “telling your story well” culture, the Chinese tech culture runs on a science experimental class (理科实验班) culture combined with extreme meritocracy.
Afra (06:30)
The gaokao is essentially a resource allocation system. People excelling in this system—those who get into the top 1%—spend the rest of their lives trying to replicate their success. They try to extract the magic potion that let them win the gaokao and drink it over and over again when facing obstacles while expanding their companies. That DNA really pushes the founder forward. One interesting feature is that many Chinese tech companies are extremely good at winning benchmarks and excelling on different AI leaderboards. This is such a gaokao mentality.
Afra (07:27)
The gaokao has a very clear reward and scoring system. If you follow this clarity of what gets rewarded and what doesn’t, you can win. People tend to apply this clearly defined metric to everything in their life. That’s why a lot of Chinese tech people are blamed for lacking humanities sensibilities, philosophical frameworks, or just being criticized as poor public speakers. When I listened to Yan Junjie (闫俊杰), the MiniMax founder, on Luo Yonghao’s (罗永浩) podcast—a three-hour podcast, much like Lex Fridman’s—it was painful. He mumbled a lot and didn’t know how to draw an interesting framework to describe the situation MiniMax was going through. He lacks the emotional depth to tell a beautiful founder’s story. He just sounds like anyone from my semi-elite public high school’s experimental class.
Afra (09:04)
Next is the generational divide. I would argue that China has four different generations with very distinct cultures because they are products of their time. In the Chinese movie ecosystem, directors are categorized into generations—Jia Zhangke (贾樟柯) is the fifth generation, Bi Gan (毕赣) is the sixth, Zhang Yimou (张艺谋) is the third. Each generation has a distinct feature and theme. This is a very applicable framework for tech founders as well.
Afra (09:56)
The first is the Ren Zhengfei (任正非) generation. They spent their formative years during the Cultural Revolution (文化大革命) when China started to reform and open up (改革开放). In the 90s, they dared to “go into the sea” (xiahai / 下海). Xiahai was previously a derogatory term, but Ren Zhengfei represents the generation willing to strip away socialist idealism and become capitalists. He founded Huawei (华为) in 1987 after leaving the People’s Liberation Army (解放军). This generation viewed business as warfare and experienced real poverty and struggle, like famine and the Anti-Rightist Campaign (反右运动). Huawei’s corporate discipline is semi-military style, often referring to the “Huawei Army” (华为军团) or the “wolf culture” (狼性文化). Ren Zhengfei’s worldview, shaped similarly to Xi Jinping’s (习近平), draws on Maoist vocabulary—viewing things as struggles, revolutions, and fights. However, Ren Zhengfei is also deeply westernized at his core. Huawei is actually more internationalized than Tencent (腾讯) in many aspects, like the number of foreigners they hire and operating based on IBM’s organizational system.
Afra (13:05)
The next is the Jack Ma (马云) generation. They matured in the early 2000s when China entered the WTO and global capital flooded in. Jack Ma built Alibaba (阿里巴巴) during the honeymoon phase between the US and China. There was a beautiful synergy between globalization, an economically booming China, and a booming internet culture. Jack Ma absorbed a lot of Silicon Valley optimism, even while remaining deeply attached to Hangzhou (杭州) and drawing on local traditions. He performed like a rock star on stage, talking about grand ideas and limitless growth, much like Silicon Valley founders. His generation represents the most romantic, globalized, and innovative period of Chinese internet history. People like Jack Ma, Pony Ma (马化腾) from Tencent, Robin Li (李彦宏) from Baidu (百度), Zhou Hongyi (周鸿祎) from Qihoo 360 (奇虎360), and Lei Jun (雷军) from Xiaomi (小米) emerged from this generation. They brought an openness to the world and built China’s digital infrastructure.
Afra (15:00)
Moving towards the 2010s, the Zhang Yiming (张一鸣) generation emerged. This was the decade of the mobile internet, when the majority of Chinese people experienced the internet for the first time via smartphones. The Zhang Yiming generation saw the huge opportunity of 1.4 billion people accessing the internet. ByteDance (字节跳动) is emblematic of this generation. They are incredibly good at refining recommendation algorithms and building mobile apps. Wang Xing at Meituan and Cheng Wei (程维) at Didi are from the same generation. They are practical; they stopped worshipping or directly copying Silicon Valley blueprints. Facing a vast Chinese mobile market where Western experiences weren’t replicable, they figured out methodologies that Silicon Valley eventually started to borrow.
Afra (17:10)
Now we’re in the fourth generation—the AI and robotics generation of the 2020s. They were forged in the crucible of US-China technology rivalry. Growing up with the reality of pushbacks and sanctions that began around 2018, they realized they had to grow out of China’s own tech strengths and advantages. They are doing the most impressive things right now in semiconductors, AI, autonomous systems, and new energy. Think of Yu Kai (余凯) from Horizon Robotics (地平线), Yang Zhilin (杨植麟) from Moonshot AI (月之暗面), Chen Tianshi (陈天石) from Cambricon (寒武纪—the Nvidia of China), SenseTime (商汤科技), Zhipu AI (智谱AI), Wang Xingxing (王兴兴) from Unitree Robotics (宇树科技), DJI (大疆), and Bambu Lab (拓竹). They are smaller, “wolfpack-ish” leaders in niche industries, especially hard tech. Many of them, like Yang Zhilin, who was educated at Carnegie Mellon, are bilingual and highly internationalized, yet they choose to return to China to start their companies. They have more confidence in themselves and a stronger domestic tech ecosystem to build unique companies combining the best of both worlds.
To summarize briefly: we know BAT (Baidu, Alibaba, Tencent / 百度、阿里巴巴、腾讯), but there’s a newer acronym called TMD—Toutiao (头条 - ByteDance), Meituan, and Didi. These TMD companies represent a generational shift toward being more innovative, AI-focused, and tailored to specific consumer needs.
Kyle (19:36)
That is fantastic. I could just type up what you said, print it out, and it would be a really awesome piece right there. It’s so interesting to see the story of China’s tech development through these generations of founders—to see the evolution in their focus, especially the shift towards hard tech and technical founders who were at the top of their class.
I was wondering if you could talk about their position in society. Are Chinese tech founders worshipped like they are in the US, the way people look up to Elon Musk or Sam Altman? And how do they navigate domestic and international politics, balancing the need to be patriotic enough for Beijing while avoiding US sanctions?
Afra (21:17)
The crackdown on Jack Ma changed Chinese tech culture profoundly. Before, celebrity tech figures like Jack Ma would publicly criticize the Chinese banking system and try to cultivate a group of charismatic, “philosopher-king” entrepreneurs through Hupan University (湖畔大学) to change society both technologically and ideologically. After the purge of Jack Ma, that stopped. The state essentially sees the Jack Ma class as a threat, and taming them was a process of shaji jinghou (杀鸡儆猴)—killing the chicken to scare the monkeys. Tech founders learned from this and became much more low-key. They barely tweet or speak up anymore. I constantly go back to the archives of Wang Xing’s Fanfou (饭否) or Zhang Yiming’s Weibo (微博) to remember what it was like when tech founders could lead discussions.
Afra (23:30)
Right now, entrepreneurs and the state have an interesting equilibrium. It’s a constant push and pull where entrepreneurs are told they are useful servants of national development, but they’re also trying to gain global influence. It’s complicated and divided by generations and industries. For example, consumer AI founders are more willing to move their headquarters to Singapore or the US to sever ties with the Chinese state and get Silicon Valley funding. Conversely, founders in semiconductors or robotics find it more beneficial to stay in China, enjoy the supply chain and state subsidies, and be celebrated as national heroes for boosting tech sovereignty. For instance, Wang Xingxing from Unitree Robotics was featured on the Chinese Spring Festival Gala for the third time. He is worshipped as a national hero. It really depends on the industry and generation.
Kyle (25:07)
That’s so interesting. When you align with the national program and don’t stick your neck out too much—maybe by not appearing on every podcast talking about AGI—you can find a sweet spot where you do well without incurring the wrath of the state.
I want to pivot to a piece you wrote recently that really took off: the “China Tech Canon” for Asterisk Magazine. Could you explain what the China tech canon is? What books influence China’s tech community? Does it overlap with the Silicon Valley canon, and how does it feed into their different worldviews and attitudes toward technology?
Afra (26:33)
That’s a great question. Part of my obsession is understanding the different cognitive frameworks operating in Silicon Valley versus China. Last year, I read articles about the Silicon Valley canon initiated by people like Patrick Collison. When I looked at the book list, I realized many of them were actually China tech canons as well—books recommended by Lei Jun, Zhang Xiaolong (张小龙—the father of WeChat / 微信), and Wang Xing. If people are so fond of understanding the ideas driving Silicon Valley founders, what is the Chinese counterpart?
Afra (27:50)
The first story that comes to mind is about Lei Jun. He frequently tells the media that he started dreaming of becoming a founder as a college student at Wuhan University (武汉大学) in 1987 after reading a book called Fire in the Valley (硅谷之火). It’s about the 1970s homebrew hacker culture that took over Silicon Valley and birthed companies like Microsoft, Apple, and IBM. As a 21-year-old, he fell into an excited insomnia, running around the school playground because the book fueled his imagination of what he could build. Lei Jun is famously known for mimicking Steve Jobs by wearing black turtlenecks, earning the nickname “Lei Busi” (雷布斯)—a combination of his name and Steve Jobs’ Chinese name, Qiao Busi (乔布斯).
Afra (30:00)
Stories like this are everywhere among Chinese founders. Many fell in love with technology and entrepreneurship because they were inspired by Silicon Valley. There is a huge overlap because Chinese founders voraciously consume Silicon Valley’s “holy bibles.” For example, Wang Xing loves Peter Thiel’s Zero to One. He constantly asks his employees Thiel’s contrarian question: “What important truth do very few people agree with you on?” Wang Xing’s drive to make Meituan a gigantic super-app is rooted in Thiel’s belief in monopoly over competition. Zhang Xiaolong loves Kevin Kelly’s Out of Control, a 90s book arguing that technology has its own will and trajectory. He required all WeChat product managers to read it. Ben Horowitz’s The Hard Thing About Hard Things, Ray Dalio’s Principles, James Collins’ Built to Last, and The Lean Startup are widely read in China. Zero to One sold more copies in China than in the West. Elon Musk’s 2013 biography sold phenomenally well. In 2014, Beijing subway Line 4—the route taken by many tech workers—was plastered with ads for Musk’s book, The Iron Man of Silicon Valley (硅谷钢铁侠). That was right when China started its serious endeavor into EVs, back when BYD (比亚迪) was still viewed as a joke. Reading that book inspired many to jump into the nascent EV industry to become China’s Iron Man.
Afra (35:10)
However, there is an asymmetry. While Chinese founders consume Silicon Valley texts, Silicon Valley doesn’t do the reverse, creating a cognitive gap. I would argue there are other canons less visible to Silicon Valley, which I categorize as the “Red Canon” (红色经典) and “Gray Canon” (灰色经典).
The Red Canon includes Maoist texts. Aside from parroting Silicon Valley ideals, Chinese founders often use pragmatic, Maoist strategies as tactical manuals. There’s a culture of reading Mao’s classic essays from the founding period of the Communist Party. Mao is sometimes seen as the greatest entrepreneur in Chinese history, forging a party and its spirit much like building a company culture. Earlier founders like Ren Zhengfei constantly use Maoist language. Furthermore, conquering the rural, trickle-down market (xiachen shichang / 下沉市场), as Pinduoduo (拼多多) did, is seen through the Maoist strategy of “encircling the cities from the rural areas” (农村包围城市). It’s about massive grassroots mobilization.
Afra (40:00)
Next is the Gray Canon. Chinese tech founders frequently mention reading Confucian (儒家), Daoist (道家), or Legalist (法家) classics when experiencing spiritual crises or dilemmas. They turn to ancient Asian texts, like Wang Yangming’s (王阳明) Philosophy of the Heart (心学) or the Dao De Jing (道德经), for strength and self-help. In the West, Gary Tan might advise founders to read Carl Jung or go to therapy. In China, while mental health is emphasized, many turn to texts like the Analects of Confucius (论语)—a brilliant guide on dignity, sense-making, and values. Just as Silicon Valley founders reference ancient Greek or Roman philosophy, Chinese founders return to their ancient philosophers to understand statecraft, bureaucracy, honor, and society.
Afra (44:00)
Lastly, there are mythological and sci-fi readings. Just as Silicon Valley founders are obsessed with Tolkien and Asimov, Chinese tech founders love Jin Yong (金庸) and Liu Cixin (刘慈欣). Jack Ma is a massive fan of Jin Yong’s wuxia (武侠 - martial arts) novels. In the early 2000s, he created a tech conference called “Swordsmanship Competition by the West Lake” (西湖论剑). Jack Ma repeatedly said that without Jin Yong, Alibaba wouldn’t exist. He sees the tech world as a jianghu (江湖 - martial arts world). Alibaba employees use nicknames, and Jack Ma’s nickname, Feng Qingyang (风清扬), is taken from a legendary swordsman in a Jin Yong novel. He even named his office “Peach Blossom Island” (桃花岛) after a location owned by a brilliant, righteous, yet arrogant master, Huang Yaoshi (黄药师), in the novels.
Another essential text is Liu Cixin’s The Three-Body Problem (三体). It’s so influential that management theories are named after concepts from the book, like the “Dark Forest Theory” (黑暗森林法则) or the “chain of suspicion” (猜疑链). It provides a perfect cultural reference pool to describe strategic business scenarios. Together, Jin Yong and Liu Cixin give Chinese technologists an imaginative toolkit, making the ecosystem more vibrant and humanistic.
Kyle (50:14)
It’s super interesting how these texts form the foundation for a common language and approach to tackling both pragmatic business strategies and deeper introspection.
Related to this, I was wondering if you could talk about another text you wrote about for Wired magazine: Morning Star of Lingao (临高启明). It’s a fascinating, crowdsourced sci-fi novel online with millions of words contributed. In a nutshell, a group of time travelers goes back to the Ming dynasty (明朝) to help China industrialize before the West. What is the significance of this text, and what does it say about Chinese attitudes toward technology and industry?
Afra (51:46)
That piece was a historical probe. I wanted to take the audience back to around 2006 to 2010 to understand the fabric of Chinese internet discussions back then. Unlike today, people predominantly talked about politics. Morning Star of Lingao was an experiment in political imagination. I recently interviewed one of the core writers, Ma Qianzu (马前卒). He participated in this collective science fiction writing because he was dissatisfied with China’s hard and soft power at the time, as well as its leadership. He believed that if you created a vacuum world and let people who understood the highest form of productive forces rule, you could build a better political structure and ideal society. Ma Qianzu was a civil engineer, and he injected his worldview into the story. The writers—many of whom literally built modern China’s infrastructure—believed that building things and industrialization have the ultimate righteousness.
Afra (54:40)
These writers, who were hardcore Marxists, formed a loosely connected intellectual group called the “Industrial Party” (工业党), a term coined by the nationalist scholar Wang Xiaodong (王小东). This was in opposition to the “Sentimental Party” (情怀党), who sounded more like today’s leftist intellectuals promoting degrowth ideologies—arguing that rapid development should pause to address the harms it caused. The Industrial Party organized intellectual rebuttals against them.
Kyle (56:17)
Just to clarify, they were not a political party, but rather a group of people, right?
Afra (56:21)
No, they were just a group—like “Silicon Valley AI Twitter.” There’s only one effective political party in China, as we all know. The core ideal of the Industrial Party, which relates to your piece on “industrial maximalism,” is that the greatest source of strength and strategic asset a nation can have is its industrial capacity. Industry isn’t just factories; it’s the tacit, embodied knowledge embedded in the organizational system. Wang Xiaodong famously said, “Let the American people sing and dance for us. Our country’s greatest strength lies in how much copper you melt and how much iron you forge.”
We are now living in a world where that prophecy came true. China has built a comprehensive industrial system, producing nearly all of the United Nations’ listed manufacturing categories. Industrial maximalists believe this complete supply chain is China’s equivalent to America’s dollar hegemony or the Middle East’s energy reserves. Lingao crystallizes this collective unconsciousness and worship of national manufacturing strength.
Kyle (1:00:18)
I’ve been toying with the phrase “the revenge of the real world.” It wasn’t so long ago that Marc Andreessen said “software is eating the world.” And he was right—we saw the rise of American tech giants and digital platforms acting almost like nation-states. But now, with supply chain vulnerabilities, trade wars, critical minerals, and semiconductor export controls, the real world has come back with a vengeance. The Industrial Party would argue this is where China will thrive because they invested in capabilities that the US let wither away. It fuels anxieties in the West about trade and job loss, but this idea is so dominant now.
Afra (1:01:47)
Yes, I totally agree. There’s a status game in China where working in manufacturing, semiconductors, or robotics garners more respect from the state. When Xi Jinping invites tech founders for talks, the hardware people like Ren Zhengfei sit in the middle, while the software and AI people like Pony Ma sit at the edge.
I vividly remember speaking to my cousin’s husband in Xi’an (西安) last year. He works for a prestigious state-owned steel company. When I mentioned AI, he shrugged it off as a gimmick compared to the massive scale of steel processing he handles. He viewed AI as something for the “fancy little circles” in Beijing and Shanghai, while the real heroes are the pillars of Chinese industrial power. Hardware workers are genuinely worshipped.
Kyle (1:04:21)
That’s super interesting. It brings us full circle back to Marxist materialism—material power as the ultimate foundation.
Afra (1:04:29)
Exactly. For example, Zhang Yiming and ByteDance might be driving the best video generation technologies right now, but they aren’t deeply respected by the broader Chinese tech circle or trusted by the state. ByteDance is sometimes seen as a distraction, and Zhang Yiming is rarely invited to meaningful party conferences.
It’s an interesting asymmetry. Silicon Valley used to focus only on its software counterparts and overlooked China’s hardware strengths. But now, seeing the push to reindustrialize America, Silicon Valley is trying to catch up. Reading pieces from a16z’s “American Dynamism” feels like they are trying to reverse engineer China’s advantages in areas like BYD’s electronic stack, grid capacity, and solar cell manufacturing. They are feeling the revenge of reality and starting to catch up.
Kyle (1:06:38)
Right. It’s like a hall of mirrors. Chinese tech entrepreneurs admired Silicon Valley greats, and now Silicon Valley is borrowing pages from the playbooks of Chinese tech companies.
We could talk for hours, Afra. You are one of my favorite writers on these topics, and it’s a huge honor to have you on the podcast. How can listeners follow your work?
Afra (1:07:31)
The go-to place is my Substack newsletter, Concurrent. I named it that because I see China and Silicon Valley as two innovation engines concurrently creating interesting futures. I also freelance for some publications, and you can follow me on Twitter at @Afrazhaowang.
Kyle (1:08:08)
I will definitely include links in the show notes. I highly recommend Concurrent and will link to the pieces we mentioned. Thank you so much, Afra, for an amazing conversation.
Afra (1:08:22)
Of course, Kyle. I’m also a big fan of your newsletter, High Capacity. You pick up on the overlapping Chinese tech realities with a lot of clarity and authenticity. It’s easy to fall into clickbaity “China is winning everything” tropes or hawkish tropes, but you maintain an authentic voice without being lured into either camp. I really respect that.
Kyle (1:09:11)
Thank you. That’s very nice of you to say. We’ll wrap up here. If you liked this episode, please rate and subscribe on YouTube, Spotify, or Apple Podcasts. You can find episode transcripts and more information on the High Capacity newsletter at high-capacity.com. I’m your host, Kyle Chan. Thanks for joining, and see you next time.