What is 996icu?

This repository is part of a labor rights movement among workers in Chinese technology companies. It centers on two related work schedule protests: "995" (working 9am to 9pm, five days a week) and "996" (working 9am to 9pm, six days a week). The name "ICU" is a dark play on the health consequences of these grueling hours: overwork sending people to the intensive care unit. The README is written in Chinese and makes a direct legal argument. It quotes three articles from Chinese labor law stating that employees may not legally work more than eight hours per day or forty-four hours per week under standard conditions, that employers cannot unilaterally extend working hours beyond what the law permits, and that even with agreements, daily overtime is capped at one hour normally and three hours only under special circumstances, with a monthly ceiling of thirty-six overtime hours. The repository is a companion to the better-known 996.ICU project, which drew international attention in 2019 when thousands of Chinese developers added their names in protest of illegal overtime culture at technology companies. This 995ICU variant specifically promotes the 9-to-9, five-day schedule as the tolerable outer boundary: still long, but at least compliant with existing law and providing a day off each week. There is very little code here. The project is primarily a statement: a public, version-controlled document citing the law and calling out workplace violations. The repository README closes with the phrases that became slogans of the movement: working 995 makes you sick, irregular overtime leaves your family in tears.