Photo: VCG

　　The Xinhua News Agency, on its official WeChat account, published a piece on Sunday introducing OpenClaw — along with a risk warning.

　　The move by the state-run news agency came as the buzzword "raising crayfish" gained Chinese netizens" attention on Sunday, with related topics being some of the most discussed on Chinese social media platform Sina Weibo, the Global Times learned.

　　Commenting on the move, ratsxp, an X user with more than 17,000 followers, wrote that "China"s enthusiasm for technology, and even its belief in it, runs deeper than anywhere else in the world."

　　"Raising crayfish" refers to the OpenClaw autonomous artificial intelligence (AI) agent, due to its logo resembling a crayfish. The agent integrates multi-channel communication capabilities with large-language models (LLMs) to build customized AI assistants equipped with persistent memory and proactive task execution. It can also be deployed locally in private environments.

　　Unlike traditional conversational AI systems such as ChatGPT, OpenClaw is positioned to "get things done" rather than simply "chat." However, this functional orientation means it must obtain extensive system permissions to manipulate local files and applications.

　　The topic "DeepSeek suggests average users adopt a wait-and-see tactic before installing OpenClaw" was also one of the trending topics on Sina Weibo on Sunday.

　　Kevin Lin, a tech enthusiast who managed to install OpenClaw recently, told the Global Times on Sunday that the installation of OpenClaw has brought surprises to his work and life.

　　OpenClaw has connected several instant messaging apps and management tools, "so that even if I don"t have a laptop with me, I can still let AI do things I wanted to do," Lin said.