While many assumed it was developed for elderly users seeking to hold on to their independence, it was actually created by a team of Gen Z developers who said in interviews they were inspired by their own experiences of isolating urban life. One-person households are expected to swell to as many as 200 million in the country by 2030.
These demographic changes aren’t unique to modern China, but they’re definitely not the kind of publicity Beijing wants right now. The platform was quietly removed from Chinese app stores last week.
In a culture where frank mentions of dying are seen as taboo and inauspicious, the creators also said on micro-blogging site Weibo that they were planning on rebranding. The new international name, Demumu, is a Labubu-fied riff on the word “death.” It didn’t catch on as expected, and the developers are now crowdsourcing a new idea via social media.
A GREAT CONCEPT
Despite striking a nerve in Beijing and around the world, the product’s concept is annoyingly good. I’m jealous I didn’t think of it.
As Big Tech and startups race to come up with the next hit AI application, the most common complaint I hear from actual humans is that many of these tools are solutions hunting for a problem. I don’t need a model to summarise a two-line message from a friend, and having software interpose itself in basic intimacy can feel more intrusive than helpful.
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