Qwen’s 10 Million Milk Teas: How Alibaba’s Massive AI Freebie Campaign Unfolded

Alibaba’s Qwen drove over 10 million orders via a Feb. 6 free-order campaign, but the app slowed and crashed from 10 a.m. to noon as load exceeded capacity; orders had already passed 2 million before noon. 36Kr says initial server capacity was only about one-third of the expected peak, and the subsidy pool was framed as 3 billion yuan; the real signal is not a model leap but a paid test of AI commerce entry and consumer acquisition.

Why it matters: HKR-H lands on the free-milk-tea plus outage hook, while HKR-K lands on concrete scale and capacity numbers. HKR-R also lands because the story speaks to AI distribution, subsidy economics, and infra reliability, but it remains a single-company promo test rather than a market-shi