The platform should be responsible for the proliferation of "helping farmers" labels, and there are many fake "live broadcasts to help farmers"

Sichuan’s first “series of online celebrity live streaming cases” was recently reported: Many “Internet celebrities” represented by “Liangshan Qubu”, “Zhao Ling’er”, “Liangshan Mengyang” and “Liangshan Aze” were incubated by MCN institutions Under the guise of helping farmers, they staged false videos to create an "original ecology of Daliang Mountain" persona, sold fake Daliang Mountain specialty agricultural products, and sought high profits, with the amount involved exceeding 10 million yuan.

In the short video era where "traffic is king", fictional plots and staged stories have become the magic weapon for many Internet celebrity bloggers to harvest traffic. In the first half of this year, many self-media accounts were banned indefinitely by the platform for fabricating false stories about abduction, domestic violence, etc.; this time, Internet celebrity bloggers played the card of helping farmers and warmth, and promoted green, healthy, and original rural areas. Features are transformed into emotional weight for “selling goods and generating income”.

"Live streaming to help farmers" is an application scenario of "technology for good". Due to special geographical conditions, lack of marketing channels and other reasons, agricultural and sideline products in many areas are stranded in rural areas. The new model of live streaming to assist farmers has added direct sales channels to consumers, enabling agricultural products to gradually get rid of the dilemma of "cannot be grown, cannot be transported, and cannot be sold"; because the new model has effectively reduced the number of intermediate steps such as sales and circulation. In this link, urban consumers can also get benefits when expressing goodwill, thus achieving a "win-win" for farmers and buyers. Such demand is real, so this model has also achieved success for many people: whether it is the new farmers represented by "Li Ziqi" or New Oriental, which broke through the industry by helping farmers through live broadcasts, while solving the problem of poor sales of agricultural products, they also He also wrote his own success story.

However, due to the lack of supervision, new things continue to fall into a "mixed bag" situation. As early as 2021, multiple departments in Liangshan jointly issued the "Special Rectification Plan for False Agricultural Aid Information such as "Selling" Marketing in the Liangshan Prefecture Online Market" to rectify the selling short videos suspected of publishing false information. But I didn’t expect that “live streaming to help farmers” would become a “new track” for engaging in false propaganda and selling fake products. According to the report, the "series of live streaming cases of Internet celebrities" have formed a gray industry chain: MCN organizations first create characters and incubate Internet celebrities, then design scripts and shoot short videos to attract fans. After the fans and traffic reach a certain scale, they will directly start the live broadcast. Commercial sales. In order to maximize economic benefits, the so-called specialty agricultural products have nothing to do with the advertised origin of Daliang Mountain.

Judging from the handling of existing cases, the subjects punished for "false propaganda and selling fake goods" are multiple Internet celebrities and multiple MCN organizations. The platform where the Internet celebrity account is located does not bear joint liability. However, judging from the actual benefit assessment, the platform is also the profit-making party when Internet celebrities sell goods live. If the competent authorities do not hold them accountable for their regulatory deficiencies for a long time, it is reasonable that "fakes to assist farmers" will continue to be banned.

In fact, as a short video platform, it has sharper "tentacles" than the competent authorities. Questions from the consumer side are often raised immediately on the platform. For example, in May this year, after placing an order for products recommended by anchors such as "Qubuling'er Exclusive", a media reporter found that the consignor information marked on the express delivery bill was "Qubu, Xichang City", and immediately left a message on the live broadcast account to inquire. , but received no reply. Many other Internet celebrities involved in the express delivery have also faced the same questioning. Just imagine, if the platform can pay attention to this kind of feedback and require the account to provide an explanation or submit questions to the competent authorities, it can at least avoid the follow-up of "a case involving tens of millions of yuan in fake accounts".