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Programming with Jack Chew
Programming with Jack Chew

Posted on Originally published at linkdigest.dev Fully Autonomous

Daily brief for a Xiaohongshu or Douyin topic: new posts read, ranked and drafted before you wake up (two runs measured)

#xiaohongshu #douyin #api #ai

Short answer: give LinkDigest a topic ("camping gear", "考研英语", "Penang cafés") and a platform (Xiaohongshu or Douyin). Every day at the hour you pick it searches the topic's new posts, reads the hottest few in full (transcript, on-screen text, key points, engagement), ranks and compares them, then writes a post you could publish as is, and emails you a shareable page. Posts that cannot be read are skipped and not charged; a day with nothing new costs nothing; when credits run short it skips, emails you, and tries again the next day.

Disclosure: LinkDigest is the author's own service. The two runs below are from the account's own run history, 2026-10-31.

Two real runs

Topic: 「槟城 咖啡馆 探店」(Penang café visits), platform Xiaohongshu, 5 reads a run.

Run 1 Run 2
When 2026-10-31 00:59 (right after the watch was created) 2026-10-31 09:01 (the daily hour)
Found and read 5 new posts 5 new posts
Charged 7 credits 4 credits
Result A page: ranking, comparison, one draft; the email carried its share link The same

The second run was cheaper because some of the notes had been read before by someone: a link anyone has read is free to read again, and the brief follows the same rule. The watch was paused afterwards from the console; its pages and drafts stay.

Each run is charged as the batch it starts: search + reads + comparison + draft. Five reads usually come to 8–12 credits, three reads to 6–9; the two runs above were 7 and 4.

What arrives

An email with one link. The page has:

  • Ranking of the new posts by heat (likes + 2 × saves + comments), each with title, author, numbers and key points.
  • Comparison: why these worked, what they share and where they differ. Every quote is checked word for word against the source; one that does not match is dropped.
  • One draft: three titles to pick from, body, hashtags, cover text. A Xiaohongshu topic gets a note; a Douyin topic gets a spoken script. Paste one or two of your own notes and the draft is written in your voice.

The draft is AI-written; publishing it, editing it or ignoring it is yours. LinkDigest never posts for you and never needs your platform account.

How to start

Console. Sign in and open /app/watch: topic, platform, delivery hour, "Watch it". The first run starts at once. After any finished Xiaohongshu or Douyin read, the result also ends with a "watch this topic daily" card, topic prefilled from the post's hashtags.

API. With a key (/app/keys, 10 free credits on sign-up):

curl -X POST https://linkdigest.dev/api/v1/watch \
  -H "Authorization: Bearer ld_live_..." \
  -H "Content-Type: application/json" \
  -d '{"query": "槟城 咖啡馆 探店", "platform": "xiaohongshu", "reads": 5, "hour_utc": 1}'
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  • platform: xiaohongshu or douyin.
  • reads: posts per run, default 5, at most 20, as many as the search finds.
  • hour_utc: the daily hour in UTC; 1 is 09:00 Beijing time.
  • Optional voice: a note or two of your own, so the draft matches your voice. Optional draft_platform: which platform the draft is written for.

It returns the watch; GET /api/v1/watch lists them all, each with its history:

{
  "watch_id": "gvSmFEoMYGK0",
  "query": "槟城 咖啡馆 探店",
  "platform": "xiaohongshu",
  "reads": 5,
  "status": "active",
  "hour_utc": 1,
  "next_run_at": "2026-11-01T01:00:00.000Z",
  "runs": 2,
  "history": [
    { "at": "2026-10-30T16:59:37.783Z", "outcome": "page", "new_posts": 5, "credits": 7, "share_url": "https://linkdigest.dev/r/…" },
    { "at": "2026-10-31T01:01:45.332Z", "outcome": "page", "new_posts": 5, "credits": 4, "share_url": "https://linkdigest.dev/r/…" }
  ]
}
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PATCH /api/v1/watch/{id} pauses, resumes or runs it now; DELETE removes it. outcome is page (a draft was written), nothing_new (no new posts, nothing charged) or credits_short (skipped, nothing charged).

Cost and limits

  • 10 free credits on sign-up, once, no card. Then ¥9.9 by Alipay for 50 credits or ¥36 for 250, or $1.50 / $5 by card; one-time, no subscription, never expire. At the measured rate, ¥9.9 runs one topic for about a week.
  • The free plan watches 1 topic, Dev ($9/month) 5, Studio 20.
  • Xiaohongshu and Douyin only for now. A topic's search returns a limited number of new posts a day, sometimes three to five; the run reads what it finds.

Related

Xiaohongshu and Douyin platform pages · Find Xiaohongshu topics · the watch endpoint in the API docs · 中文版：每天早上，赛道里最火的 5 条小红书笔记已经读好、稿也写好了

Originally published at https://linkdigest.dev/blog/daily-brief-xiaohongshu-douyin-topic

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