Business
'TikTok refugees' unexpectedly turn to Chinese alternative as ban looms
TAIPEI, Taiwan — TikTok users concerned about a looming ban are finding solace in a strange place.
Days ahead of a Supreme Court decision that could determine whether the popular short-video app shuts down starting Sunday, a number of users appear to be turning to an app called RedNote — more commonly known to its majority-Chinese audience by its Chinese name, Xiaohongshu.
It’s a surprising choice since Xiaohongshu is Chinese-owned, and such ties are the reason U.S. lawmakers moved to ban TikTok in the U.S., citing privacy and national security concerns.
Also Xiaohongshu is dominated by Chinese language, and its content is subject to censorship by Chinese government officials, something alien to most U.S. users.
But by embracing a Chinese social media and lifestyle app similar to Instagram, some U.S. TikTok users say they are protesting what they believe is the unfair ban of the ubiquitous app.
“I think America is trying to bully China into selling to an American owner. A lot of us just don’t want to give in to them,” said Samantha Manassero, a 39-year-old nurse in L.A. who downloaded Xiaohongshu on Sunday night after watching content creators on TikTok pitch it as a comparable app. “I think some of it is literally just pettiness.”
Last year, Congress passed a bill that requires TikTok’s owner, Bytedance, to sell the app to a U.S.-approved owner or face a nationwide ban. As soon as Wednesday, the Supreme Court is expected to uphold the legality of the ban.
It was unclear whether Xiaohongshu, which was started in 2013, would become a viable alternative to TikTok or if the recent migration to the Chinese platform accounts for a significant share of TikTok’s 170 million U.S. users.
But a surge in new users made Xiaohongshu the top free download on Apple’s App Store this week. No. 2 on the charts was another social media app developed by Bytedance, Lemon8. It’s unclear whether either app will be subjected to the same U.S. government scrutiny as TikTok.
It is also difficult to determine exactly how many U.S. TikTok users have created accounts on Xiaohongshu or how many will stay on it. While many Xiaohongshu regulars have welcomed the influx of Americans identifying themselves as “TikTok refugees,” the app’s interface is largely in Chinese, making it difficult to navigate for non-native speakers.
Chinese apps are subject to stringent censorship on discussions that the Chinese government deems politically sensitive. These topics can range from illegal activities to LGBTQ+ rights to Winnie the Pooh, images of which have been used to mock Chinese President Xi Jinping.
The Chinese version of TikTok, called Douyin, has different content restrictions and is only available for mobile download in China. Bytedance has argued that TikTok, which is used by the rest of the world, is a separate entity from Douyin and not beholden to the Chinese Communist Party.
That did not stop President-elect Donald Trump from proposing a ban of TikTok in 2020, or President Biden from signing it into law in 2024.
The legality of such a ban has been questioned several times. Last month, in an about-face, Trump, who has 14.8 million followers on TikTok, filed a legal brief requesting to stay the ban so he can negotiate a deal once he takes office.
As TikTok faces an uncertain future, Xiaohongshu’s latest arrivals were eager to try out the new app despite its foreign nature.
Manassero, who posts videos about healthcare and power lifting to about 7,000 followers on TikTok, said she already has a much larger audience of 26,000 on Instagram. However, she was motivated to create an account on Xiaohongshu partly out of frustration at the U.S. government’s determination to outlaw TikTok.
“I don’t know what I’m doing, I don’t know what I’m reading, I’m just pressing buttons,” Manassero said in her first video post. The next morning, her account had received 5,000 views and 3,500 new followers. By Tuesday, the hashtag “Tiktok refugee” had received more than 90 million views and 2 million comments.
TikTokers sought each other out with introductions, follow requests and shared tips on how to navigate the app’s Chinese functions. On Monday, more than 190,000 viewers joined a live chat named “TikTok Refugees Club,” and held discussions in English about what a TikTok ban would mean and future plans for social media content. In the comments, users greeted new arrivals and lamented they could not understand each other.
“Maybe you can learn how to speak Chinese,” one user wrote in English.
“Where’s the translator?” another viewer asked in Chinese.
On Tuesday, the Wall Street Journal reported that Chinese officials had discussed the possibility of selling TikTok to a trusted non-Chinese party such as Elon Musk, who already owns social media platform X. However, analysts said that Bytedance is unlikely to agree to a sale of the underlying algorithm that powers the app, meaning the platform under a new owner could still look drastically different.
Manassero and other TikTokers expressed distaste at the prospect of migrating to U.S. tech platforms such as Instagram or X that could benefit from an influx of users if TikTok shuts down.
“We don’t want to turn around and make a bunch of billionaires even more rich,” she said. “I would honestly rather the app get shut down than be owned by Elon Musk.”
Though she is still trying to figure out how to use Xiaohongshu and message people back, Manassero said she would likely stay on the Chinese lifestyle app regardless of whether the TikTok ban goes through.
“The response has been so friendly and nice. It’s good energy,” she said. “This feels like the early TikTok days: a little more organic, so it’s fun.”

Business
Paramount and YouTube TV extend deadline for a new carriage deal

Paramount Global and Google’s YouTube TV agreed to a short-term contract extension late Thursday, keeping CBS and other networks available as the two media companies worked to negotiate a new distribution agreement.
The eleventh-hour reprieve spared about 8 million YouTube TV customers from losing access to nearly two dozen networks, including BET, Comedy Central, Nickelodeon and TV Land. Broadcast stations KCBS-TV Channel 2 and KCAL-TV Channel 9 in Los Angeles also would have been dropped.
“We’ve reached a short term extension as we work toward a deal with Paramount to keep their content on YouTube TV,” YouTube said in a statement directed at users. “We appreciate your patience as we continued to negotiate on your behalf. We also value Paramount’s partnership and willingness to work towards an agreement.”
Clashes between programmers and distributors have become increasingly common in recent years. Pay-TV providers are motivated to control costs in an effort to attract and retain subscribers who have an abundance of viewing options.
At the same time, Paramount and other traditional Hollywood programmers are struggling to maintain their financial footing amid ratings declines and cable customer defections. They can ill afford cuts to one of their most important revenue streams: pay-TV distribution fees.
The current dispute centers on the fees Google must pay for the rights to carry Paramount channels.
“We’re fighting for an agreement that avoids passing along additional costs and offers you more flexibility in how you watch your favorite sports and shows,” YouTube said earlier this week in a blog post.
The negotiations come at a troubled time for New York-based Paramount.
CBS is separately sparring with Sony Pictures Television to retain distribution rights for Sony’s hugely popular game shows “Jeopardy!” and “Wheel of Fortune.” The company also is trying to fend off a $20-billion lawsuit filed by President Trump over edits made to a “60 Minutes” interview of former Vice President Kamala Harris last fall.
Paramount’s controlling shareholder Shari Redstone struck a deal last summer to sell the company her family has controlled for decades to David Ellison’s Skydance Media. The $8-billion deal has encountered turbulence at the Federal Communications Commission. The agency must sign off on the transfer of the CBS television licenses to Ellison for the deal to go forward.
Paramount’s cable channels, including Nickelodeon and MTV, have lost millions of subscribers amid a migration to video-on-demand streaming services such as Netflix. In August, Paramount took a $6-billion write-down to account for the declining value of its cable television portfolio and so it entered the negotiations with Google with a weaker hand.
“We have made a series of fair offers to continue our long-standing relationship with Google’s YouTube TV, providing subscribers access to the full array of Paramount’s entertainment, news and sports programming,” Paramount said Wednesday in a statement.
YouTube TV, which launched eight years ago, is hoping to sharpen its edge.
The service has quickly grown into a major player in television, appealing to younger viewers and sports fans. It has successfully plucked subscribers from the legacy cable- and satellite-TV providers.
YouTube TV is now the fourth-largest multichannel distributor in the U.S., behind Charter’s Spectrum, Comcast Xfinity and DirecTV, based in El Segundo.
The service made a big bet on sports when it took over the NFL’s “Sunday Ticket” offering in 2023 after that package became too expensive for DirecTV, the longtime rights-holder. However, the nearly $2-billion-a-year price for the Sunday afternoon NFL games drove up the cost of operating YouTube TV, prompting Google to scrutinize other contract costs.
YouTube TV’s fees also are on the rise.
Last month, the service hiked its charge to customers to $82.99 a month, up from $72.99 a month.
The company said it would offer YouTube TV customers an $8 credit a month “if we can’t reach an agreement and [Paramount] content is unavailable for an extended period of time,” Google said in a blog post.
Business
The Restaurant That Started Panda Express

This orange chicken has not been waiting for you on the steam table. It has not been bouncing and sweating in the darkness of a clamshell container while you wheel your luggage to the gate.
At Panda Inn, the Pasadena restaurant that started Panda Express, the orange chicken is made to order, strewed with whole dried chiles, scallions and a few threads of orange zest. It arrives craggy and glistening on a blue stoneware plate.
Is it good? Trick question! It is sticky, and it is familiar. It is relentlessly crunchy, with a flatly precise and habit-forming ratio of sweetness to acidity to heat. It is better, though not dramatically different from the one that waits on the steam table — always there, always waiting — but sometimes presentation can be everything.
Orange chicken, all dressed up, reminds me of when my parents set out cloth napkins and silverware while unpacking boxes of takeout, transferring everything to serving plates (yes, even pizza). I used to find this absolutely unhinged, but now I see it as a tender gesture that underscored the luxury of their taking the night off from cooking — they did it so rarely.
When the Cherng family opened Panda Inn in 1973, it was a popular Chinese restaurant that catered to the neighborhood. Early menus from the 1970s and ’80s included a bone-in tangerine-peel chicken, sizzling beef hot plates and a “Chinese Pasta” section of noodle dishes.
It was a nice, sit-down restaurant that also did a bit of takeout and catering. It appealed to local families, but also local developers, who asked the owners to come up with a restaurant concept for the expansion of the Glendale Galleria mall. That restaurant was Panda Express.
Panda Express developed its orange chicken in 1987 and, depending on whom you ask, the dish was either the natural evolution of tangerine-peel chicken or a lightning invention of Andy Kao, a chef for the chain. Either way, it helped to embed a sweet, crowd-pleasing idea of American Chinese cuisine into the global culinary consciousness, now deployed through 2,500 or so fast-food counters.
It also propelled the family’s small business into a privately held empire: Along with Panda Express, the group owns Uncle Tetsu, Hibachi-San and more, and the Cherng family has a net worth of more than $3 billion.
At the end of last year, the company completed a major renovation to the Panda Inn in Pasadena, with a red carpet that leads into a sprawling, glamorous, wood-paneled dining room. The ceilings are high and vaulted. There are lush pots of violet orchids at the host stand and bar.
The vibe would seem clubby if Panda Inn weren’t warm and welcoming, always peppered with shouty families celebrating birthdays and special occasions. On my most recent visit, an impeccably well-dressed man in his 70s enjoyed a multicourse meal on his own, while the two men next to me chatted in Armenian over beers, kung pao chicken and sushi.
Why is sushi on the menu? Because people love sushi, and because honey walnut shrimp was begging to be converted into a sloppy but delightful roll, but also because the restaurant’s founder and first chef, Ming-Tsai Cherng, lived and worked for some years in Yokohama’s Chinatown.
Why Taiwanese popcorn chicken and stone bowls of Taiwanese braised beef on rice? Because in the 1950s, Mr. Cherng worked as a chef at the Grand Hotel in Taipei, Taiwan.
You’re not thinking about all this as you sit down for a big meal at one of the round tables for 12, spinning the lazy susan with glee until the dish you want most is finally in front of you. But Panda Inn in Pasadena isn’t just a place for Panda Express superfans to come and pay their respects; it’s a devoted corporate flagship — a grand, Disneyfied spin through the family’s story that reframes this restaurant as proof of the American dream.
On the newly designed menu, there’s a photo of Ming-Tsai Cherng, born in Yangzhou, wearing a cook’s shirt and tossing food in a wok. Below, in a story about the immigrant family’s journey, Panda Inn describes itself as “a restaurant that embodies the pursuit of a better life for all.”
Such a frictionless story of the American dream seems fanciful if you so much as glance at the news, but it also doesn’t have much to do with why the dining room is consistently packed.
Even though Panda Express was never my go-to, the orange chicken will occasionally stand in for the fried and glazed thing that I genuinely long for, but can never have again: the sweet-and-sour pork at a restaurant called Peking Inn that once existed in suburban London.
For my ninth birthday, I asked my parents to make me that sweet-and-sour pork, along with the sweet corn and chicken egg-drop soup. We had just moved 300 miles away, to France, and I was still angry and depressed about it, but I didn’t know how to say all that.
Instead, I dared them to try and make me happy. I dared them to recreate a dish from my favorite Chinese restaurant (impossible!), one whose vast pleasures and disappointments are still hard-wired into my brain.
Those particulars are different for everyone, but they fill out the story behind Panda Inn’s greatest hits, embedded like core memories. On any given night, there’s an order of orange chicken on nearly every table — a dish that isn’t just tangled up in its own corporate mythologies, but tangled up in our own.
Business
Their grandfather came to America and opened a nursery. A century later, it's closing

For the better part of a century, generations of the Nakai family have kept the shelves at Hawthorne Nursery stocked with seeds and fertilizers, the lot outside full of fruit trees, potted plants and succulents.
The job, for the past many years, has fallen to Kei Nakai, 70, and his brother, David. But they will be the last. When the brothers retire at the end of the month, the 97-year-old nursery and, with it almost a century of family and local history, will go too.
“It’s time,” Nakai said.
Kei Nakai is shown in the garden center at Hawthorne Nursery.
(Juliana Yamada / Los Angeles Times)
The nursery dates to 1927, when it was started by Kei and David’s grandfather, Minegusu Nakai, who had emigrated from Japan to Vancouver, Canada, in 1898 and moved to Hawthorne after marrying. Today, it is one of the few remaining plant nurseries in the Los Angeles area that were opened by Japanese Americans before the U.S. entered World War II at the end of 1941. Shortly after, 120,000 people of Japanese ancestry living in the U.S., many of them citizens, were forced into incarceration camps under President Franklin D. Roosevelt’s Executive Order 9066. Taking what they could carry, they sold or left behind their homes, possessions and businesses.
To avoid being imprisoned in a camp, the Nakai family fled to work on a sugar beet farm in Colorado, according to the Los Angeles Conservancy. Another nursery owner in Gardena leased the property while they were gone and when they returned at the end of the war they purchased more land to expand the nursery into what it is today.
Kei Nakai says he’ll miss the most his parents’ home — a skinny, green two-story building that adjoins the nursery on Grevillea Avenue.
He pointed out his childhood bedroom window and said he wants to take a pane of glass and part of the old molding to make a commemorative frame before it’s bulldozed when they sell. He said he hopes the land is turned into something nice.

A scale from 1927 is among the items at Hawthorne Nursery in Hawthorne. There is so much “old stuff” everywhere, owner Kei Nakai says.
(Juliana Yamada / Los Angeles Times)
There is so much “old stuff” everywhere, he said, it’s hard to decide what to keep and what to toss. Antique items are part of what’s left on display across the nursery’s walls: A scale that’s been there since the nursery opened. The ‘50s retro blue sign outside. A letter board above the register that reads, “Beautifying Hawthorne for 97 years. Enjoy the outdoors. Go gardening.”
A weathered train car used for storage — older than the nursery itself, he thinks — might go too, Nakai said. He isn’t sure where it came from or how old it is, though he remembers his father bringing it onto the property at some point. The conservancy expressed some interest it in, but he hasn’t heard anything in a while.
The closure isn’t for a lack of business, Nakai said. He declined to share revenue information but said the business was doing well and there’s been an additional boost since the closure — and sales to clear inventory — was announced.
Early on a recent Monday morning, the nursery was quiet other than an occasional phone call answered by his brother, David, in a back room. It was a far cry from the days during the COVID-19 pandemic, when South Bay residents were stuck at home and came looking for plants to cultivate and distract.
“This place was packed,” Nakai said. “It was never empty.”

Kei Nakai said he has been discussing retirement over the last 15 years and was just waiting for the right time.
(Juliana Yamada / Los Angeles Times)
A man wheeled his baby boy into the store to ask when the doors will shut for good. “I love this place,” he told Nakai.
Kevin Baker, 45, frequented the shop when he first moved to the area from Pacific Palisades four years ago, drawn by the rare or interesting offerings not easily found at other nurseries, he said. He visited weekly, then monthly, then less frequently after his two children were born and his schedule got busier. “I’m glad I got to see it before it closed,” he said.
Nakai said he has been discussing retirement over the last 15 years and was just waiting for the right time. As a kid he worked for his parents in the shop and made 25 cents a day. When he graduated from UCLA in 1976 as an engineer, he said, government layoffs at the end of the Vietnam War meant he’d be jockeying for work right out of college. It made sense for him to take over the business instead.
His own children, now in their 30s, are happy with their own careers and have no interest in taking over, he said.

Memorabilia cover the walls of Hawthorne Nursery. The Nakai family “really did live, breathe and thrive in the plant world,” another nursery owner said.
(Juliana Yamada / Los Angeles Times)
The Nakai family brings a century of knowledge and skill to its horticulture work, said Russell Akiyama, a third- generation owner of the nearby Sunflower Farms Nursery in Torrance. “They really did live, breathe and thrive in the plant world,” he said.
Nakai spent time studying the Dudleya genus, succulents native to the West Coast, and contributed to its taxonomy, or scientific classification. In a presentation recorded in 1992 at the Rancho Santa Ana Botanic Garden, a younger Nakai flips through pictures and describes different species of Dudleya plants.
And David Nakai “could make something grow out of a rock,” Akiyama joked. He recalled once seeing David propagating a flourishing flat of white wisteria, which is particularly hard to grow, and wondered how he’d managed to do it. And the nursery’s passion fruit, which Akiyama called “the best passion fruit you’ve ever tasted,” will live on in Sunflower Farms’ own collection, he said.
As Hawthorne Nursery prepares to close, Akiyama said he takes solace in seeing the influence the Nakai family and other Japanese American nursery owners have had when he drives through neighborhoods in Torrance, Gardena and other cities nearby and sees trees cultivated by the nursery owners decades ago.
“Our landscaping is just as much of a monument to who we are as our buildings,” he said. “There is no full, total goodbye. It’s just an, ‘I’ll see you later.’”
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