Elderly women are making a song and dance about karaoke app
19 January, 2019
Older Chinese women, known universally as dama, have long sought to restore their youth by dancing in public squares. But many have become hooked on a noisier pastime that gets mixed reactions from passersby.
Karaoke app WeSing (Quanmin K-ge, which literally means “for everyone”), has 500 million registered subscribers and 125 million active monthly users. It was developed in 2014 by Tencent Holdings, which also devised the popular instant messaging system WeChat.
WeSing has been embraced by women from Zhujiang new town in Guangzhou to the hippest shopping mall in Shanghai, who like the fact that they can perform anytime without waiting for a dance group.
Recognizing they could very quickly become a form of public nuisance, the developers also came up with the “mini-k” singing box to provide more privacy. Similar to a telephone booth, it can be hired by WeSing subscribers for a minimum outlay of one yuan (about 15 US cents).
But not everyone has had a happy time with the app. A Henan woman surnamed Li admitted she gave away over two million yuan (about US$295,000) in tips to her favorite male singer, QQ.com reported.
Li said she kept giving the singer virtual gifts — “rockets” and “race cars” — which cost 1,000 yuan (US$150) and 100 yuan (US$15) each. Sometimes she spent up to 6,000 yuan (US$885) per day on her habit. In just one year, the woman spent 2.1 million yuan (US$310,000), and was left with a credit card debt of 400,000 yuan (US$9,000).
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