Many users feel that Zhihu has lost its way. Once a haven for in-depth content and attracting a dedicated following, the platform now faces criticisms of diluted content, excessive commercialization, and user churn. Let's examine Zhihu's journey, from its promising beginnings to its current state.
The Birth of Zhihu: An Exclusive Knowledge Community
Imitating Quora
In 2010, Zhou Yuan, inspired by the American platform Quora's philosophy of democratizing knowledge, decided to create a similar platform in China. He founded Zhihu with Huang Jixin and others.
Invitation-Only Beginnings
Zhihu initially operated on an invitation-only basis. The first 200 users were carefully selected from various fields, creating a high-profile and reputable community. Even notable figures like Pony Ma participated, answering questions and enhancing the platform's appeal.
Hunger Marketing and a Friendly Atmosphere
This exclusivity acted as a form of "hunger marketing," piquing the interest of the broader internet community. The concentrated, like-minded early users fostered a friendly atmosphere and facilitated productive discussions. While not as massive as other platforms like Tieba, Zhihu offered users a more focused and rewarding experience, with easier access to relevant information and satisfactory answers.
Opening the Floodgates and the Rise of Popular Content
Embracing the Mobile Era
In 2013, with the rise of smartphones, Zhihu seized an opportunity to expand as other platforms struggled to adapt to mobile devices. The platform opened user registration, moving away from its invitation-only model.
Marketing Efforts
Huang Jixin even appeared on the dating show "If You Are the One" to promote Zhihu, resulting in a surge in Baidu search interest.
Exponential Growth and Shifting Content
The number of registered users exploded from 400,000 to 4 million within nine months. New features like daily newspapers and long-form writing were introduced. As the user base expanded, content began to evolve, shifting away from strictly hardcore and in-depth topics towards more accessible and engaging material. Creators began to cater to a broader audience, prioritizing understandability and entertainment value.
The Golden Age of Content
By 2015, Zhihu boasted 70 million users, with over 44 million questions and 240 million responses. This period saw the emergence of viral quotes and insightful discussions. From 2013 to 2015, the platform truly flourished.
The Commercialization Conundrum and the Anxiety Economy
The Push for Monetization
With a massive user base, the desire to monetize Zhihu became inevitable. The platform, marketing itself as a knowledge platform, naturally looked toward knowledge payment as a revenue stream.
Creating Anxiety
However, convincing users to pay for knowledge proved challenging. To drive subscriptions, Zhihu began creating an "anxiety economy" by highlighting the challenges and high barriers to entry in various industries. This strategy created a sense of career crisis among users. The platform also emphasized the gap between elite knowledge and public perception, subtly encouraging users to purchase courses.
The Rise of Questionable Content
This approach led to the proliferation of content designed to exploit anxieties. Creators started fabricating stories and success narratives, further diluting the quality of information on the platform.
The Departure of Key Users
In 2016, Zhihu launched Zhihu Live and direct call features, achieving over one million paying users in the first year. However, big contributors who previously contributed with no to little payment opportunities found it increasingly difficult to profit from their content. As these key figures attempted to leverage other platforms to generate revenue, Zhihu imposed restrictions, eventually leading to a mass exodus of prominent content creators, spearheaded by the "Devil's Father."
Transformation Towards Entertainment and Fiction
The Shift Away from Knowledge
After failing to capture key demographics Zhihu started to morph from a purely knowledge-based platform into one focused on entertainment and fragmented content. While they attempted new platforms such as Bidukuai, which was similar to Douyin, those efforts never gained traction.
Embracing Short Fiction
In 2019, Zhihu pivoted toward serialized short stories, particularly those with palace intrigue themes. "Why is the user Meng Wa in the harem? Concubines must compete for favor" became a viral sensation. Zhihu explicitly encouraged the creation of fictional content in question-and-answer format.
Irrational Questions and Homogenized Content
This led to a flood of increasingly irrational questions that served primarily as vehicles for fictional narratives. In 2022, the traffic allocation mechanism was adjusted to prioritize content with high engagement, further incentivizing creators to produce sensational and formulaic short videos and stories.
Advertising and the Decline of Knowledge Payment
While Zhihu achieved profitability through paid memberships and advertising, the focus on knowledge payment dwindled, accounting for only a small fraction of total revenue. This further led to massive churns.
The Current State and Future Outlook
While Zhihu boasts a massive user base and has found success in the short story genre, the platform's original identity and purpose have been significantly compromised. For users seeking dedicated Q&A content, encountering novels everywhere proves frustrating. For fiction readers, there's no centralized module that can be easily retrieved.
Zhihu's pursuit of profit led to the collapse of its carefully constructed tower of reason and knowledge. While it's difficult to definitively judge whether these changes are inherently wrong, the platform's current trajectory raises concerns about its long-term viability and relevance.