China may be an economic and military superpower, but that hasn’t translated into cultural influence. There’s no mainland Chinese equivalent of global pop culture behemoths like India’s Bollywood, South Korea’s K-Pop, or Mexico’s telenovelas—all of which have risen, along with Japan’s exports, to challenge American cultural hegemony in recent years.

While China’s economic rise and its emergence as a film market has undoubtedly transformed Hollywood’s production and marketing practices, China’s own film exports have been less successful. (It turns out American audiences aren’t that interested in watching Matt Damon in a Chinese nationalist parable featuring aliens.)

TikTok, on the other hand, truly is a cultural behemoth—the seventh most downloaded app of the decade and increasingly where new trends in pop music, fashion, and comedy emerge into the zeitgeist. So why isn’t the fact that millions of young people around the world are glued to a Chinese app more of a benefit for China?