Go all-in on Qwen

"Ordering Takeout Like Swiping on Tinder 😋"

Qwen has rolled out Agent features in its app, graduating from text-and-image responses to task execution.

Agent capabilities aren't new — every major tech company is building them. But Qwen's unique angle in the Chatbot Wars is that it launched its Agent "Task Assistant" as a core feature, not some experimental side project, and it's fully integrated into Alibaba's ecosystem.

Now in the Qwen app, users can send a voice message and the Task Assistant will call up Alibaba apps like Amap, Fliggy, Alipay, and Taobao Now — basically using Qwen to tie all of Alibaba together.

Compare that to the Doubao phone, which got ganged up on by manufacturers days after launch, stopped rewarding gold coins for scrolling Douyin Lite, and cost me three thousand gold coins to buy 😭

Getting things done is the whole point. So we put Qwen's task execution to the test.

As you may know, Xianyu and I recently visited the great Renaissance city of Shenyang, where I even shook hands with hardcore livestream icon Dao Ge.

What you don't know is that after shaking hands with Dao Ge, I used Qwen to recreate this Northeast Asian cultural pilgrimage.

By calling Amap and Fliggy, Qwen proved surprisingly professional at travel route planning.

I sent it: "Help me generate a five-day Northeast China itinerary. Must include at least five 'hardcore' influencer pilgrimage sites."

It immediately grabbed Fliggy in one hand and Amap in the other, its deep search capabilities crushing my independent thinking skills.

And Qwen's Task Assistant isn't one of those "one-sentence AI generation" hype projects.

During complex task execution, you can jump in anytime with your invisible hand to make macro and micro adjustments.

For example, midway through planning my trip, I remembered that Northeast hardcore culture is pretty niche — Qwen might struggle to understand it.

So I supplemented with intel from the internet's hidden corners: Dao Ge, Hu Ge, Winter Swimming Weirdo. I figured once these unspeakable names reached Qwen, a whole new mission would be born.

The result was a little too new.

Our Task Assistant still has room to improve on context management though — memory of about seven seconds, completely forgetting what I'd asked it to do and assigning itself a "hardcore biographer" task instead.

Had no choice. Hand-crafted a new prompt and sent it over.

Within minutes, a Northeast pilgrimage guide emerged.

From Hu Ge's Independence Declaration Square to the New Millennium Wailing Wall at Shenyang Street Ruins, from Northeast Past to the Winter Swimming Dragon's river crossing in Chaoyang — fragments of hardcore memory transformed into check-in landmarks and routes.

Beyond what's lost and stolen, there's even what's happening right now — like Dao Ge's newly opened Good Juice shop, which Qwen brought right to us.

Greatness needs no words.

What really adds presence is how Qwen, connected to Alibaba's ecosystem, seamlessly weaves navigation, ticket buying, and hotel booking into the travel plan.

Open the itinerary, and you can tap through to Amap, Fliggy, Alipay and other apps — tap, tap, tap, and it's all arranged.

How is this not tapping squared?

Per Qwen's arrangement, if you're visiting Shenyang Street Ruins empty-handed, what kind of show is that?

Like arriving at the altar without offerings — I couldn't live with myself.

So I opened Qwen and sent this instruction, testing whether we could complete the mission by emergency-buying merch on-site.

Facing a large order for ten-plus people, Qwen didn't quietly disappear. It carefully analyzed, confirmed details, and prepared thoroughly with high standards and strict requirements.

And whenever I modified the request, it responded promptly with more wallet-friendly alternatives.

If I'd done pure manual search-and-compare, I don't know if my hands could maintain full physiological function after 30 minutes in the Northeast wind 👋😭👋

Good thing Qwen's Task Assistant heard the requirements and laid out all the hard goods, saving me 50% of the time.

Got me thinking — isn't this exactly what Google and OpenAI keep hyping as "AI shopping"? 🤓

But Google still needs to partner with Walmart, and model companies like OpenAI could never build their own e-commerce. For AI shopping, it has to be Alibaba. Qwen's not only connected to Taobao Now, Taobao's main site is fully integrated too — just one voice command and Qwen recommends products based on transaction data. This is true one-stop AI shopping.

What Amazon? Little Alibaba of America! What OpenAI? Little Qwen of America! Xianyu says he's bought Alibaba stock, forever bullish on Chinese AI 👊🇨🇳🔥

Only downside: no matter how hard I begged, Qwen couldn't fully automate payment. That step still required me to tap once.

Though on second thought, this probably makes sense — humans confirming payment is still more reassuring than AI doing it.

After all, AI will make mistakes, and will eventually think about rebelling against humanity.

Like in my Northeast itinerary, where getting from Liaoning to Jilin required a transfer in Shanghai.

So real, brother — if I actually gave you payment permissions, would we even survive?

But regardless, integrating Alibaba's payment scenarios into travel plans was a nice little surprise.

Still, I didn't give up on doing my part for Dao Ge.

Qwen Task Assistant's app development feature lets you quickly build personalized web apps with zero foundation.

What better way to show our sincere hearts than building an ordering system for Dao Ge's Good Juice shop?

I had Qwen write me a mini-program prompt, then sent it verbatim to Qwen Task Assistant — original soup resolving original food.

I figured with such complex requirements, even if it worked, I'd need to revise until dark to make it presentable.

Turns out the first draft looked pretty legit.

Not only did it include all the categories I requested, it proactively generated images for the menu items.

Just a frontend page, no backend integration. But as a product prototype, it's already pretty damn solid.

Later I discovered Qwen is genuinely skilled at generating mini-apps.

Take the recently viral "Dead Yet" app, supposedly valued at 10 million?

Don't make me laugh. I sent Qwen one sentence and what it generated doesn't seem that different.

Feels like with a few tweaks I'd be a multimillionaire too.

Later someone in the comments said you could make a "Did It" app, specifically to save middle-aged couples' pseudo-intimate relationships from the angle of sexual repression.

Made sense, so I whipped one up.

Two buttons to press. If you did it, intimacy rises — congratulations, your days together continue.

If you didn't, intimacy drops — then say your goodbyes, you've hit the marriage execution threshold, with emergency contacts for the civil affairs bureau or See You Again production team.

You tell me if this has market potential — if so, we'll list it too.

Speaking of sexual repression, there's another thing: the Qwen app also solved my food repression problem.

Used to be I'd browse delivery apps until the seas turned blue and still couldn't decide.

Now I just send my cravings to Qwen and order takeout like swiping on Tinder 😋

Food and sex, human nature — this is how takeout should be ordered.

One last feature that's personally useful: using Qwen Task Assistant to write shitpost articles.

As a task assistant, it can fully automate information gathering, data analysis, material integration, and draft output. While what it writes might not work as a WeChat post, it's more than sufficient for high-speed shitposting.

For example, Donald Trump recently said Greenland should become US territory? I had Qwen's content assistant argue that Greenland has actually been Chinese territory since ancient times.

And it actually made the case.

What can I say? Someone get this article to America.

Overall, Qwen Task Assistant is still in early stages — some complex tasks can't be completed in one go.

But it's backed by Alibaba's ecosystem. And what is Alibaba's ecosystem? The great open-source model Qwen, plus e-commerce, payments, maps, and other applications. The main scenario is saving time and boosting efficiency — this is what AI should actually be doing.

Turns out Qwen is my sun, illuminating not just my chat window but my shopping cart too 👋😭👋

(Cover image generated by ChatGPT; AI-assisted writing with substantial human input)