Jìng-Yáng (or Jian-Yang) is an app developer living in Erlich Bachman's Hacker Hostel and business incubator, Aviato. Erlich has taken a special interest in him, despite the pair’s occasional problems communicating. He is a recurring character.[1] He is the only incubator resident who isn't involved with Pied Piper.
Background
A resident in Erlich's incubator. He is a Mandarin speaking Chinese male seen to be in his late teens to mid-twenties. He has a quiet demeanor and has difficulty understanding and speaking the English language. This aggravates Erlich when he explains house rules to Jìng-Yáng such as not burning household trash, how to recycle, and the need to clear fish carcasses from the kitchen sink. Often he is seen opening the front door to Erlich's house for guests to come in or irritating Erlich for comedic effect.
During his stay at Erlich's Hack Hostel, Jìng-Yáng developed an app that is able to locate the least crowded playgrounds so parents can bring their kids to these desirable locations. However it was flawed since pedophiles could also use the app to prey on children. Erlich suggested and had Jian Yang pivot the app to locate nearby smokers instead and named it "Smokation", a play on the words 'Smoker" and "Location". Smokation was met favourably at Raviga after it was pitched to Laurie Bream. Unfortunately, Jìng-Yáng was found smoking within the Raviga premises after his pitch since his app was soon to receive seed funding and he only smokes for celebratory purposes.
Not much is known of Jìng-Yáng's background, or how he came into meeting Erlich Bachman. During his time living with Bachman he served primarily as a personal assistant until Erlich no longer required his services and tried to evict him. Inadvertently Erlich revealed California's squatters rights, barring him from eviction and granting him free housing for up to a year.
Relationships
Erlich Bachman
Though initially an employe of Bachman, primarily as a household assistant, Jian-Yang's relationship progressively devolved after his attempted eviction. Jian-Yang now regularly attempts to sabotage Bachman in attempts to prank phone call him for unknown reasons other than to fool Bachman.
Unknown Guests
Jian-Yang seems to have, or at one point had, a variety of Asian-American guests who periodically sleep over at Bachman's estate. They thus far have only made one appearance and none have been named as of yet.
Memorable Quotes
"I can call my uncle in Beijing. He's very corrupt."
"These are from you mom."
"Hi, my name is Erlich Bachman, and I am a lying fuck!"
"We went to Taco Bell, Erlich, he started crying in Taco Bell. He tried to blame the taco sauce."
"Yes. Japanese people are racists, they are horrible."
"Octopus, it's a water animal."