The Inside Story of China's Viral 996 Protests

Digitally China

Recently a leaked e-mail from JD.com have been widely spread, being probably the most concrete example of the 996 culture from certain tech companies in China. Among many things, the leaked e-mail indicates that people working less overtime should be fired.

In this episode of Digitally China we are trying to figure out how widely spread 996 is, how it impacts people and what effect the recent backlash in this hotly debated topic will have.

To understand the culture of working overtime in tech and how it is different from other industries, we interviewed contributors of the recently famous 996.ICU project on GitHub, Xu Ming and Xiao Yang.

Topics covered in this episode of Digitally China:

• The background of 996
• How 996 in tech is different compared to other industries
• How widely spread 996 is
• The recent criticism against on 996, going viral on GitHub
• How the Chinese tech industry might change going forward

Hosts: Eva Xiao and Tom Xiong

Guests: Xu Ming and Xiao Yang

Producer: Jacob Lovén

Digitally China is a subjective but independent depiction of the tech scene in China. Audio clips used in the podcast have not been distorted nor taken out of context and are included for commentary and educational purposes and thus shall be considered “Fair Use”. Digitally China is powered by RADII (www.radiichina.com), an independent media platform exploring China from all angles.

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