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TikTok isn’t just useful for videos on robotic tape storage, Radiohead songs on step motors, and regretful congressmen. It’s also a place where businesses can go viral by marketing their industrial products.
Because of that, I now know that a company called Donghua Jinlong Chemical makes food-grade glycine which, as the company reminds us in its TikTok marketing video, is “suitable as a flavor enhancer, sweetener, and nutritional supplement.” Not only that, but it’s “also used in pickles, sweet sauces, soy sauce, vinegar, and juices to improve taste.” And, bonus, it’s “a well-established brand in a large factory.”
If that doesn’t get you ready to get some Donghua Jinlong food-grade glycine, I’m not sure there’s anything I can do for you.
Okay, The Verge didn’t just turn into a mouthpiece for Donghua Jinlong. If you’ve seen any confusing food-grade glycine evangelizing on TikTok lately, it’s a harmless meme borne out of an industrial manufacturer of a food additive posting a marketing video that might have lingered quietly in dusty obscurity on any other platform. Here’s its origin:
Thanks to TikTok’s ever-probing recommendation algorithm that occasionally tosses curve balls out to see if you’ll bite, an innocent attempt at promoting a manufacturer’s products has turned into Donghua jokes imagining the future study of internet memes:
Mock standup routines complete with Donghua Jinlong-hating hecklers:
Stitches faking creator beef and offering a surprising primer on the companies involved in glycine manufacture:
An AI voice clone of celebrity astrophysicist Neil DeGrasse Tyson discussing Donghua Jinlong’s work:
Faux wellness videos:
And, of course, videos explaining the meme:
