Working hard or hardly working? People are divided on China’s latest tech controversy

The latest controversy in China’s tech industry centers on the intense work culture that often forces people to be on duty from 9:00 am to 9:00 pm, six days a week.

Dubbed “996” by tech staffers, the grueling schedule stands accused of being bad for people’s health and their social lives.

But China’s tech industry workers are divided on whether this really is a societal issue or just an overblown war of words.

Original photo credit: RawPixel, modified by Tech in Asia

Andrew Chen, a general partner at venture capital firm Andreessen Horowitz and former executive with ride-hailer Uber’s China wing, points out that the culture is nothing new. As he tweeted this weekend: “When we were building Uber China and competing with Didi, we talked about their ‘996’ culture all the time – 9 am to 9pm, 6 days per week. It’s a scary thing to compete against.”

Dan Grover, a former employee at Tencent’s WeChat office, paints a picture of long office hours peppered with naps, runs, and lots of eating:

Nan Duan at Riot Games, replying in Grover’s Twitter thread, concurs with the scenes of inefficiency:

Alex MacGregor at Oppo sees similarly lax working practices, and believes that the “996 hype is so overblown”:

Warnings from Japan

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