title: [Book Sharing] WeChat Legend Allen Zhang
published: false
date: 2022-06-25 00:00:00 UTC
tags:
canonical_url: http://www.evanlin.com/reading-wechat/
---
[](http://moo.im/a/59fPRY "WeChat Legend Allen Zhang")
WeChat Legend Allen Zhang: How an introverted and lonely engineer made Jack Ma feel uneasy and changed the lives of 1 billion people.
Author: Liu Zhize Publisher: Dash Culture
published: 2019/09/09
Language: Traditional Chinese
ISBN: 9789579654302
#### Book Purchase Recommendation Website:
- [Readmoo Online Book Purchase](http://moo.im/a/59fPRY)
# Preface:
This is the thirteenth book I've read this year. This should be the second book I've bought about "Tencent" (the previous one was [Tencent Biography](https://www.evanlin.com/reading-tencent/)), and I have to say that Tencent's development is truly a model for the development of communication software in the internet. This book mainly focuses on discussing "WeChat", which is the main person in charge of the development of the most important communication software in recent years that has influenced all Chinese people (and even the whole world) - Allen Zhang's story.
Allen Zhang is a product manager and manager who started in technology. He is even the developer of the well-known freeware - Foxmail. This book allows us to understand how he gradually became a product manager and even a product manager from a developer. It allows each of us to better understand the psychological philosophy of the product developer who developed such concise communication software.
# Content Summary:
Allen Zhang is the Senior Vice President of Tencent Technology. As a software engineer,
he speaks more idealistically and artistically than Jack Ma, and his tone is sharper than Pony Ma's.
But what we often see online are Jack Ma and Pony Ma's quotes.
Allen Zhang's style is extremely mysterious and low-key, rarely appearing in the media, only silently speaking on his own blog.
For him, Pony Ma made an exception to let him work in the afternoon, set up a separate branch in Guangzhou, and gave him a salary higher than his own...
All just to prevent Jack Ma from poaching him.
The author of this book, Liu Zhize, is a media person and best-selling author who has interviewed thousands of elites from all walks of life.
He starts from Allen Zhang's university life, describing how this introverted and lonely engineer created the WeChat legend.
◎ He developed Foxmail, which gained 2 million users, but didn't make a penny from it.
At that time, Allen Zhang only knew how to write code and only wanted to write code, refusing commercialization (advertising).
Maintaining the website alone exhausted him, and he was exhausted. In addition, the company he worked for went bankrupt, so he had to sell it.
He almost sold it to Lei Jun of Xiaomi for only 160,000 RMB.
But, later Foxmail made him earn 12 million RMB! What happened in between?
◎ Turning the QQ Mail in the trash heap into gold
Because the company he worked for closed down, Allen Zhang was transferred to Tencent by Tencent founder Pony Ma.
He reorganized the QQ Mail that no one maintained. This time,
Allen Zhang successfully transformed and made QQ users instantly exceed 10 million. How did he do it?
Because he said: "A top product manager must have a moron-level user in their heart."
Allen Zhang promoted the "Thousand Hundred Ten" movement internally, which turned around QQ and also turned around Tencent.
◎ WeChat was born, the overlord descended - loneliness, poor social skills, allowed Allen Zhang to create "WeChat"
Facebook took 5 and a half years to reach 100 million users, but WeChat only took 433 days to do it.
Allen Zhang insisted that WeChat is a lifestyle (but was ridiculed by team members at first).
He designed "People Nearby" so that strangers of both sexes could immediately say hello and make friends.
He launched the public account platform so that everyone could be their own media and speak for themselves.
A payment function of WeChat's red envelope grabbing during the Chinese New Year made the always arrogant Jack Ma start to feel uneasy.
Thus, the phone is no longer just a tool for communication. Just shake it, scan it,
you can call a car, order takeout, and even send senior citizen pictures, changing the way you and I live.
# Chapter Outline
Chapter 1: The Empty, Lonely, and Cold Software Engineer
Chapter 2: Developing Foxmail, but Not Earning a Penny
Chapter 3: Heroes Don't Dream, They Just Walk Steadily
Chapter 4: Tencent's Internet Product Thinking - From Heavy to Light
Chapter 5: Turning the QQ Mail in the Trash Heap into Gold
Chapter 6: WeChat was born - the overlord descended
Chapter 7: A Red Envelope Dominates the Entire Internet
Chapter 8: The Big Business of "Mini Programs"
Chapter 9: The Future of WeChat - From Minimalism to Omnipotence
Chapter 10: WeChat's Product Thinking, Hoping Users "Use and Leave"
Chapter 11: WeChat's Excellence Comes from Allen Zhang's Obsession
Chapter 12: The Lonely Shadow Behind WeChat
Chen Xiaolong, who graduated from Huazhong University of Science and Technology, also had many opinions of his own during his student days. He was initially assigned to microwave optics (which sounds very mysterious), but because he was very interested in software development, he heard a friend encourage him: "If you don't like it, why bother? Do what you like," so he resolutely started learning C language. In his student days, he already had the characteristics of an engineering student, with a strong mind and a desire not to be lonely. Here is a quote from him:
"For so many years, I'm still making communication software. This makes me believe in a destiny ---
Every child who is not good at communication has a strong inner power to help others communicate."
The job search process was also very interesting. At first, he was assigned (I don't quite understand why it was assigned) to work in a government agency. Because the government agency had a "suffocating feeling from head to toe." So he decided to resign and work for an internet tool company. At first, he was immersed in the pursuit of "the beauty of code."
## The Development of FOXMAIL
In July 1997, Allen Zhang himself developed the eye-catching "[Foxmail](https://zh.wikipedia.org/zh-tw/Foxmail)" a powerful client-side email software. That is, you can use a small floppy disk to bring your email receiving software to any computer to receive and send emails. Here are a few features:
- Lightweight and stable files.
- Can support multiple mailbox services
And in that year, it became the email software used by many government agencies, and it was also selected as one of the top ten most important software tools in 1998. At this time, Allen Zhang was still a freeware developer (open and free for everyone to use, no fees), and he was still working in a software company during his daily life.
## The Acquisition Storm of Kingsoft Software to Joining Tencent
At this time, Kingsoft Software, led by Lei Jun, discussed the process of acquiring Foxmail. However, they believed the engineers in their own company who said they could develop the same software within three months. They could not continue to discuss this acquisition process. (Author's note: So in many cases, acquiring a software is not just about the traffic and code of the software itself. More importantly, it is the cooperation opportunities and development ideas of the developer. It is not difficult to develop many software, but to polish it into a user-friendly interface that everyone likes. What is needed is good judgment and fine code maintenance. This is not something that can be done in three months.)
At this time, Foxmail had more than two million users, and someone suggested that Allen Zhang add advertisements to increase revenue, but he refused. Later, in 1999, it was acquired by "Boda Software" for 12 million RMB, and he officially joined Boda as Vice President. Allen Zhang also matched the relevant conditions: Allen Zhang joined Boda Software, Foxmail had to continue to develop, and Foxmail had to remain free. Until 2005, before being acquired by Tencent, Allen Zhang experienced the transition from a software engineer to a vice president. He could not develop software himself, but he could lead the development layout of the entire company.
At this time, Allen Zhang, as the Vice President of Boda, also had several amazing actions:
- Keeping the standalone version of Foxmail free and making it more user-friendly
- Developing the Foxmail Server version of the network charging service
But due to the financial situation of Boda Software, it was finally acquired by the then-growing giant - Tencent.
## The Bole Pony Ma
At that time, the most well-known software of Tencent was QQ, and at that time, QQ and MSN were fighting for market share in mainland China. Due to the combination of MSN and office software, QQ was considered a non-professional communication software. At this time, it was very important to build the weakest QQ Mail, which is why Tencent wanted to acquire Boda's Foxmail. Then there was Allen Zhang's ability, he needed him to build the new QQ Mail. At that time, Pony Ma himself was unwilling to use QQ Mail.
When he was just acquired by Tencent, Allen Zhang didn't know why Tencent wanted to acquire Boda Software. At this time, Pony Ma immediately invited Allen Zhang to a dinner, and at the beginning of the meeting, he immediately praised Foxmail: "The user experience of Foxmail is particularly good. We also made it ourselves, and found that we couldn't do it well." Such a sentence immediately resolved the embarrassment and affirmed Allen Zhang's strength.
Because Allen Zhang didn't want to work in the Shenzhen headquarters, Pony Ma even set up a Guangzhou R&D center for this, and ordered Allen Zhang to be in charge, to rebuild QQ Mail. But the first year of QQ Mail suffered a major blow: Due to MSN Hotmail's continuous attack, QQ Mail was forced to continuously follow and chase features. The final product was a very large, heavy, and very difficult-to-use software. Allen Zhang summarized it in two sentences:
"A very mediocre team, using a mediocre method, made a mediocre software."
"Failure is not terrible, what is terrible is the attitude towards failure."
### Senior in the Workplace - Xiong Minghua
When he first took over the Guangzhou R&D department, there were inevitably some problems of large companies. After the first version of QQ Mail failed, Xiong Minghua, who was then the CTO of Tencent, took over the Guangzhou R&D department and helped solve the related problems. At that time, Xiong Minghua had switched from Microsoft and had many correct concepts of foreign software companies, and also solved the problems of Tencent's development chaos and the lack of centralized management of bugs. And he also helped Allen Zhang solve the problems of social interaction and cross-departmental issues in the Guangzhou R&D department.
## QQ Mail's Overhaul and Agile Development
Later, it was decided to overhaul QQ Mail, and Allen Zhang promoted it through agile development.
- Establish a small development team
- Quickly develop the first streamlined version
- Invite every PM to personally go to the front line to answer user questions and understand users.
- The product itself does not need a manual, treat the other party as a moron user, and they can get started.
Finally, QQ Mail was loved by many people and also became Tencent's own internal email software.
## WeChat - Minimalism Under Competition
With the popularity of mobile phones, there is a need for an iOS/Android version of chat communication software. Allen Zhang saw this opportunity and wrote a letter to Pony Ma in the middle of the night to ask for advice on developing the next generation of QQ (later WeChat). What he didn't know was that at the same time, people from three departments were asking for the same thing. Pony Ma also adhered to the Chinese wolf nature (praise meaning) and let the three teams compete with each other to select the best product to launch. But the other two departments had their own baggage (if they did too well with mobile phone chat, the amount of mobile phone messages would decrease, and the telecom operators would be angry), which also allowed Allen Zhang, who had no baggage, to create the "WeChat" of message communication through minimalism, ease of use, and speed.
## The Growth of WeChat and the Return to Design Philosophy
The second half of the book discusses the design experience of "public accounts" and "red envelopes", and shares the process of how they were designed and became popular in the context of the time. And in the second half, it also mentions Allen Zhang's design philosophy for "WeChat", his reading list, and his interview philosophy.
# Thoughts
During the reading of this book, it will make people feel like watching a story and can deeply understand how "the father of WeChat" - Allen Zhang went from his student days to a freeware developer, to the person in charge of Tencent's Guangdong R&D center. And it also briefly describes the reasons for the development of WeChat, how WeChat broke out from QQ and stood out in the mobile device-based chat software. You can understand the background of WeChat's development at that time, and how to develop a minimalist feature as the main axis. And through many functional applications - "public accounts" (that is, LINE's official account), "mini programs" (that is, LINE's MINI App). To share how these tools and applications have influenced the related markets of communication and advertising in China in recent years.
The creation process of "WeChat" is quite interesting. At first, there was a company product highlight - "QQ". And at the same time as developing mobile phone communication software, there were also two or three departments participating in the competition. (The wolf nature of China) In this case, Allen Zhang decided to rebuild and return to the original intention of Foxmail. By starting with a streamlined and easy-to-use user interface, making communication easier and simpler. And create a perfect mobile phone application launch. Fast and accurate.
Next, the application of "senior citizen pictures" and "red envelopes" pushed WeChat to its peak. How tens of millions of people (or even hundreds of millions of people) immediately made such applications common. And "QR Code (QR Code)" is an even more important promoter, entering each user's mobile phone immediately through camera scanning.
Allen Zhang has a very good persistence, which is the obsession with the product itself. Many functions requested by senior executives were blocked by him "wait until I leave before adding this function". And because of Allen Zhang's persistence, WeChat can maintain the current streamlined and user-friendly user experience. And he also shared that when designing new functions, the skeleton (that is, the basic functional framework) is definitely more important than the muscles.
Finally, the whole book also shares some of Allen Zhang's favorite books, so that we can better understand how the technical brain under the minimalist design framework is cultivated. It also shares some of Allen Zhang's frequently used words. So that we can understand such a person more deeply. It is recommended that every person who starts from technology, wants to lead products or even lead the entire development team can read this book.
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