Some people make a fortune by selling short videos of misery, but you are still kept in the dark

With the progress and development of the times, the way of "selling misery" is also constantly changing. From begging on the street to spreading quickly through "storytelling" with the help of streaming media, the accelerated speed of information dissemination has enabled similar incidents to attract the attention of a wider range of people and bring greater impact. Taking advantage of the kindness of others to make profits for oneself is a despicable thing. The author of the following article introduces some problems of selling misery on the Internet. Let's take a look.

Playing the victim to gain sympathy has existed since ancient times, but with the progress and development of the times, the way of "playing the victim" is constantly changing. From begging on the street to spreading quickly through "storytelling" with the help of streaming media, the accelerated speed of information dissemination has enabled similar incidents to attract the attention of a wider range of people and bring greater impact.

For a long time, taking advantage of other people's kindness to make profits for oneself has been a despicable thing. However, due to low costs and high returns, in the era of short videos, the related industrial chain has flourished again, and is showing a trend of intensifying.

1. “Selling misery” has become the password for traffic

Friends who have been browsing Weibo or Douyin recently may have seen this video: a little girl, no more than three or four years old, is carrying a bamboo basket half her height, which is full of vegetables, and is staggering along the village road.

Image source: TikTok

This video quickly attracted the attention of many netizens and spread rapidly on short video platforms such as Douyin. Many netizens expressed their sympathy for the little girl, thinking that since she had to help with housework at such a young age, her family conditions must be very poor.

Based on the speculation of "poor family background", many netizens began to ask the author of the video about the little girl's home address and location, hoping to send some New Year's goods and clothes to her. Some netizens even said frankly that they hope to sponsor the little girl's tuition so that she can go to school with peace of mind when she reaches school age without worrying about financial problems.

As the video spread and public opinion fermented, the video quickly topped the Weibo headlines and Zhihu hot searches, attracting even wider discussion and attention. Supported by the popularity that swept across the Internet, netizens quickly learned the girl's home address through the original video author. Some netizens looked up the contact information of local government departments through the Internet and asked the staff about the girl's family situation.

The government staff, with a puzzled look on their faces, went to the girl's home and asked if she had encountered any difficulties in life recently, and whether the government could provide some help. In fact, under the guidance of the poverty alleviation policy, as long as the conditions are met, the corresponding poor families can not only receive monthly living subsidies and material rations, but also the tuition and living expenses of the school-age children in the family will be borne by the relevant state departments.

When asked by the staff, the little girl's relatives were also puzzled, and then told the staff that their family income was not low, about 200,000 or 300,000 yuan a year, and they were not facing any difficulties in their current life. The little girl carried the bamboo basket because she saw her sister carrying it, so she also asked to be carried, so the family gave the little girl a bamboo basket and a vegetable. Although it seemed full, it was just an illusion caused by the large leaves of the vegetable. In fact, it was very light.

Image source: TikTok

Soon, the response of the little girl's relatives was uploaded to TikTok. After a group of netizens found out that they had been "tricked", they pointed the finger at the original author of the video. The girl's parents were also very angry about this and said that they would hold the video shooter responsible for "spreading rumors". Under the pressure of netizens and the girl's parents, the original video has been deleted.

Although this farce has not ended, it is a good ending for netizens who care about the girl's living conditions, at least they know that the little girl is not in trouble and does not need assistance. However, many netizens expressed indignation, accusing the original author of using children to "attract attention" and earn traffic and profits, and that the other party should be held accountable.

In fact, similar things are common on platforms such as Douyin and Kuaishou, and basically they can attract a lot of attention and sympathy from people. These attentions do bring some income to the video authors. "Selling misery" has become the "password" for quickly obtaining huge traffic on video platforms. As long as it attracts attention, it will quickly gain exposure to the entire network.

In the Internet age, traffic means income, and whether it is selling goods or taking advertisements, you can easily earn a lot of money. It is understandable that there are indeed many families and individuals who live in hardship. If the good intentions of netizens can be put into practice and help families and individuals in need, then it is indeed a good thing. One click or one forwarding may change their fate.

If "selling misery" becomes a tool for people with ulterior motives to make money, the result may be counterproductive. If the operator only takes a portion of the profits, then it is not bad, at least most of the income still falls into the hands of the beneficiaries. However, from actual cases, in many cases, the account operators take most of the profits, leaving only a small amount of income for the beneficiaries.

2. Making up stories to “sell misery” has become an industry chain

In fact, "selling misery" has long formed a complete industrial chain, from finding "poor families" to appear on camera, to making up more attractive stories that can arouse the sympathy of netizens based on the situation of the poor families, to professional anchor training and sales chains. There are quite a few MCN agencies entrenched in domestic towns and third- and fourth-tier cities.

Image source: TikTok

Earlier, a UP on Bilibili, under the advice of his fans, followed clues to find the hometowns of several Douyin "difficult families". The first target was a poor family whose son broke his legs and could not move, and could only rely on his 70-year-old father to do farm work to support the family. Because there was no specific address, the UP owner used clues accidentally revealed in the picture, and finally determined the other party's approximate location after a lot of searching, but still could not find the specific address.

After seeking help from the local government department, the staff in charge of reception also took it very seriously (the UP host filmed it in secret), and he happened to be a staff member of the local Poverty Alleviation Office. After listening to the UP host's description, he said that there were no families with similar situations among the registered poor households in the local area, and that the Poverty Alleviation Office has always provided living allowances to poor households.

Helplessly, the UP could only continue to search for the family according to the clues. After spending half a day, he finally found the "difficult family" in the live broadcast. What happened next was perhaps unexpected. An old lady received the UP and his group very cordially (without knowing the purpose of the UP). When asked whether her son broke his leg and could not work, the old lady also gave a positive answer.

She also took the UP and their group to visit the live broadcast room. As for the old grandfather who appeared on the screen, he was working in the fields and had not returned yet. During a chat with the old grandmother, the UP host learned that the opportunity for them to start the live broadcast was that a friend of her son came to her and said that he could easily supplement the family income by working at home, but because her son was unable to move, his father had to appear on the screen instead.

At the same time, the old lady also said that she had been persuading her son not to do live streaming and let her father rest more. The old man in his sixties not only has to work in the fields during the day, but also needs to do live streaming until the early morning. His physical condition is visibly haggard, and 90% of his income goes to the MCN, and their family only gets 10% of the income. This drop in the bucket not only cannot change the family's living conditions, but even causes problems with the old man's health.

Faced with such an answer, the UP host and his team were also very troubled. In the end, they could only decline the other party's request to stay, put down the milk and other gifts, and left the house. Later, the UP host and his team also synchronized the relevant information to the local poverty alleviation office, believing that it could be of some help.

Obviously, this is a very classic example of using real needy families as tools to exploit the sympathy of netizens to make profits. Although MCN provided help in live broadcasting and traffic, it also took away 90% of the income. Moreover, because the live broadcast effect was not optimistic, the disadvantages outweighed the advantages.

If this is just an isolated case, I think most netizens, like me, would not believe it. We have seen too many MCN agencies, from insurance fraud by Shuidichou to "selling misery" on live broadcasts, taking advantage of sympathy to make profits, and even taking both ends. We really cannot have any extravagant expectations of these profit-oriented people.

Image source: Sina Finance

In the comment area, many netizens believe that these accounts should be banned, but if similar videos and live broadcasts are banned, people who really need help will not get attention. So what should we do? In my opinion, platforms such as Douyin may be able to solve this problem by cooperating with relevant government departments, such as connecting to the Poverty Alleviation Office and other systems.

After accessing the system, entities that need help from netizens can be authenticated by local departments and recorded in the system. After obtaining feedback that the situation is true, they can be granted permissions to upload and broadcast relevant content. They can even connect to the bank accounts of entities in need to allow willing netizens to make donations.

Of course, this idea obviously has many difficulties and problems that need to be solved. Moreover, for short video and live broadcast platforms, there is currently no motivation to improve the supervision and review mechanism of relevant content. They will only take action after public opinion has become a big deal.

Therefore, my advice to everyone is not to make donations casually without confirming the other party’s difficult situation and the authenticity of the situation. You can provide them with certain help by contacting local relevant departments, etc., to avoid being exploited by people with ulterior motives and letting your love become the basis for MCN organizations to “enjoy a good life”.

Author: Lei Technology Internet Group; Editor: TSknight

Source public account: Lei Technology