WeChat's "Shake" app is offline: Zhang Xiaolong's masterpiece disappears without a trace

WeChat first added the "Shake" function in version 4.3 launched in September 2012, but now the "Shake" function is gradually being phased out. So what does the exit of WeChat's "Shake" function mean? Is there still a chance for stranger social networking?

Recently, a piece of news about the removal of WeChat's shake function has been flooding social media platforms. Lei Technology opened his WeChat with mixed feelings, just as he was about to reminisce about his lost youth, but found that the "shake" function was still retained in WeChat iOS 8.0.48.

Seeing that the "Shake" function might go offline at any time, Xiao Lei decided to shake his phone again. The experience was still familiar. After waiting for a few seconds, he shook the phone to contact a stranger thousands of kilometers away.

Image source: Lei Technology

Although the "Shake" function is still available in the iOS version before the deadline, Apple users should not be too happy, because it is only a matter of time before the iOS version removes the "Shake" function. Some iOS users' WeChat no longer sees the "Shake" function, and WeChat is testing its grayscale removal (you can open your phone to check). In WeChat Android 8.0.47, the "Shake" function has completely disappeared, replaced by the newly launched "Listen" function, which Xiao Lei has confirmed on WeChat of many colleagues.

The "Listen" function retains the song recognition function of "Shake", and adds options such as live music, fan circles, audio, and personal settings. Users can also get the right to listen to VIP songs for free by watching advertisements.

Image source: Lei Technology

WeChat first added the "Shake" function in version 4.3 in September 2012, and it has been online for more than 11 years. As one of the important functions of WeChat in its early days, "Shake" and "Red Packet" have made great contributions to WeChat's gradual development into a national social application. Today, "Shake" is gradually being taken offline without even an official announcement. Such a low-key loneliness is just like the LBS dating track on the Internet.

1. Zhang Xiaolong’s masterpiece, WeChat’s “Shake” function is disappearing

I don’t know how many people still remember that WeChat once had a “People Nearby” feature. This feature was first launched in 2011. The page would display other users who were close to you. Through this feature, users could chat with strangers nearby.

Stranger social networking based on geographic location is actually the so-called LBS concept, which stands for Location Based Services in English.

In our daily lives, we have actually been surrounded by this service for a long time, including Meituan providing nearby food, shared bicycles providing nearby bicycle locations, etc., which are all services provided based on LBS.

"People Nearby" has opened up a whole new way of socializing on WeChat. In 2012, the number of monthly active users of WeChat soared to 158 million.

"Shake" is an extension of "People Nearby". Socializing with strangers is no longer limited to geographical location, but the innovation of "shaking the phone at the same time" has been shaped into a starting point for making friends full of fate. "Shake" not only allows users to experience the fun of socializing with strangers through extremely simple operation, but also allows users to stay on WeChat for a long time, increasing user stickiness, which can be said to kill two birds with one stone.

Zhang Xiaolong, the "Father of WeChat", once attached great importance to the "Shake" function. When users use this function, they hear the sound of an AK47 machine gun loading. This easter egg was also inspired by Zhang Xiaolong himself. In 2011, when WeChat was not yet popular all over the country, Zhang Xiaolong gave a speech at his alma mater, Huazhong University of Science and Technology. According to the 136th issue of "Blog China", he shared a lot of design concepts for the "Shake" function in his speech and called on the audience to shake together to add friends.

At that time, Zhang Xiaolong said that "Shake" was more like a social experience, and he hoped to find more ways for young people to socialize with others. In the beta version before the release of "Shake", when users "shake", a naked David statue will appear on the screen, which was later replaced. The sound has always been "the sound of a rifle being loaded". Zhang Xiaolong said at the time: "This sound sounds very exciting and cool. It is very easy to make the function of shaking the phone to find people, but you have to make everyone addicted to this function as soon as they use it, which is very difficult."

Everyone knows what happened later. WeChat became a national application, and new businesses such as official accounts, WeChat Pay, mini-programs, enterprise WeChat, and video accounts grew on WeChat, supporting half of Tencent. Today, more than 10 years later, WeChat is still the app with the highest DAU, and it has formed a perfect balance between user experience and commercialization. Therefore, it is not an exaggeration to say that it is the most successful mobile Internet product in the world, and Zhang Xiaolong, the "Father of WeChat", has also been successfully deified.

Later, Shake also evolved into many functional values ​​beyond social interaction. In 2015, CCTV Spring Festival Gala cooperated with WeChat "Shake" for the first time. In just a few hours of live broadcast, this function created a total of 11 billion interactions. It is no exaggeration to say that when "Shake" is deeply integrated with the Spring Festival Gala stage, "shaking for red envelopes", "shaking for greeting cards", "shaking for blessings" and other behaviors are no longer just functional uses, but changes to the lifestyle of Chinese people.

The "Shake" function popularized by WeChat has become a must-have interactive action for many Internet applications. Even today, you can still find different ways to play with the "Shake" function in many popular applications, such as advertising pages, game pages, etc. (However, some apps have violated the user experience and made the "Shake" ads notorious, and Lei Technology has reported on this).

At this point, although the "Shake" function has been taken offline, the special behavior of "Shake" has been deeply engraved in users' memories and has become a new lifestyle in the mobile Internet era.

2. WeChat’s “Shake” function is gone, how are Momo and Tantan doing?

WeChat’s “Shake” function has quietly come to an end, and other LBS social products are no longer popular.

On March 14, 2024, Zhiwen Group (NASDAQ: MOMO), the parent company of Momo and Tantan, released its fourth quarter and full-year financial report for 2023. The financial report shows that Zhiwen Group's annual revenue in 2023 is about 12.002 billion yuan, a year-on-year decrease of 5.5% from 12.704 billion yuan in 2022; the net profit attributable to the parent is 1.958 billion yuan, an increase of 49.9% from 1.484 billion yuan in 2022.

At first glance, Zhiwen Group's net profit is still growing, but the monthly active data of its social products is further declining. In December 2023, Tantan had 13.7 million monthly active users, compared with 18.4 million in the same period of 2022, a relative decrease of 4.7 million. In terms of paying users, Tantan had 1.2 million paying users, a year-on-year decrease of 500,000; Momo had 7.4 million paying users, a year-on-year decrease of 400,000.

In the era of the rise of mobile Internet, LBS became the biggest variable that distinguished mobile Internet from PC Internet. In particular, mobile social applications, such as MiLiao, Feidou, WeChat, Momo, etc., were all built based on LBS. Zhiwen Group, formerly known as "Momo Technology", has grown rapidly with its unique functions such as dating, message board, friend dynamics, self-destructing reading, entertainment games, etc., and has won the favor of a large number of users. Later, it further expanded its industry map through live broadcast business.

When Momo spent 4.4 billion yuan to successfully acquire Tantan in 2018, the new combination of Momo and Tantan covered almost all stranger social markets. The strong combination of the industry leader and the second largest player did give the capital market ample room for imagination in the short term. The stock price reached a high of 50.86 yuan per share that year, but with the strengthening of industry supervision and the decline of the dividend period, the stock price fell to a low of 3.11 yuan per share.

From a technical perspective, LBS was indeed a novelty ten years ago. But today, location services have become a basic function in social applications and are no longer fresh. User needs have also changed from trying new things and leisure to making friends with strong purpose, such as love, blind dates, game partners, etc. These niche dating tracks also have a large number of social vertical applications, which will share users to a certain extent, and have more advantages in verticality than the pan-social Momo and Tantan.

Image source: Analysys

In addition to the lack of novelty, although Momo and Tantan have created new additions such as "social + live broadcast" and "social + games" based on a single social function, the increasing difficulty of monetization has always been a huge mountain weighing on their heads. The "China Social Information Marketing White Paper 2023" released by ByteDance shows that against the background of the overall recovery of the social information marketing market, the amount of advertising and advertising investment in stranger social applications will both decline in 2022.

It can be seen that simple social products can hardly meet the needs of advertisers. Perhaps only transformation and seeking new growth can eliminate the decline of LBS social products.

3. Humans are always alone, but socializing with strangers still has a lot to offer

The exit of WeChat's "Shake" app does not mean that stranger social networking has been abandoned by the times. In Lei Technology's view, there are still sub-segments worth exploring in the social networking arena.

Image source: Analysys

As can be seen from the above figure, the user portraits of stranger social networking are mostly middle- and high-end consumers in first- and second-tier cities, and the proportion of users in the sinking market is not high. When the high-end gameplay of stranger social networking encounters bottlenecks, it may be a good choice to actively explore the sinking market. Just like Pinduoduo in the e-commerce industry and Kuaishou in the short video industry, the sinking market has brought them unexpected gains.

Image source: Analysys

The same is true for stranger social networking. As of December 2022, the number of active users of sinking social networking reached 50.872 million, an increase of 63.2% over the same period last year. The overall user scale is still growing. This is mainly due to the continued growth in the demand for marriage and love among single people. In response to the new social needs of young people in small towns, leading social applications may consider deploying sinking market applications and building a richer product matrix to seek new monetization opportunities.

Final Thoughts

The "Shake" function has made great contributions to the growth of WeChat users. Although few people use this function in the later period, "Shake" is definitely an indelible innovative function in mobile social applications. After all, it has affected the Chinese people's lifestyle to a certain extent.

It is worth noting that WeChat's use of LBS will not be shaken by the disappearance of the "Shake" function. In the "Nearby" column of the discovery page, we can still see many food, travel, and entertainment services provided based on location. WeChat will definitely combine LBS to create more functions to enhance user experience in the future.

If WeChat canceled the "Shake" function in order to accumulate strength to explore new directions such as video accounts, then the remaining players in the field will face the increasingly sluggish stock market. The decline in the original market size plus the impact of other vertical social applications, how will Momo and Tantan promote LBS social networking, and can they create a new combination of "social +?" In the future, Lei Technology will closely follow the industry trends and bring you the latest reports.

Source public account: Lei Technology (ID: leitech), focusing on technology and life.