![]() ![]() ![]() It consists of an examination of the regulation rationale based on official announcements and private media articles and a normative assessment of the overall impacts and legitimacy of the regulation. We then provide a policy analysis regarding the regulation. The analysis involves the authors’ close observations of fan behavior and consumption on social media during the shows, corroborated by previous studies. We first introduce the background and examine the motivation behind fan consumption in the shows. This article explores fan consumption in Chinese fostered idol reality shows with a focus on fundraising activities and evaluates the recent government regulation of these shows. The regulation directly impacted fostered idol reality shows and related fan activities in various ways. 2, 2021, the NRTA of China announced the suspension of fostered idol reality shows and officially took action against China’s “chaotic” fan culture. In August 2021, the National Radio and Television Administration (NRTA) of China announced that it would impose “stricter regulation on online reality shows.” On Sept. Southern Weekly has also discussed how the “toxic” entertainment industry negatively influenced consumers, especially minors, both financially and mentally (Chen et al. It argued that fans are the primary victims of fanatic voting activities and that younger audience members are misled to behave irrationally by the voting mechanisms (Xing 2020). People’s Daily, an official newspaper of the Central Committee of the Chinese Communist Party, has published articles online criticizing the suspicious and irrational fundraising activities in the shows. These numbers represented huge economic profits for the show’s producers and the sponsoring merchandise.ĭespite the significant economic value generated by fostered idol shows, both state-owned and private media have expressed negative attitudes towards the shows and the behavior of their audiences, mainly devoted fans. In April 2021, the funds raised by the fans of the Top 11 contestants of the show Chuang 2021 reached $23.6 million USD, and the total number of votes received by debuting contestants in the final episode exceeded 170 million (Yang 2021). ![]() Organized fundraising evolved to become a prominent part of fan consumption in fostered idol shows. Fan groups organize fundraising activities on platforms such as Taoba/OWhat and spend the funds on phone cards for more video platform accounts, premium memberships, and sponsored products. Under the stimulation of the voting mechanism, individual consumption gradually evolved into collective consumption. Therefore, the tremendous amounts of votes received by the contestants demonstrate not only the popularity of such shows but also the incredible consumption power of their audience, especially fans. As free votes are limited, many members of the audience get extra votes by purchasing premium memberships on the video platforms or sponsoring merchandise (often dairy drinks) with QR codes of votes attached to the packages. The audience of fostered idol shows determines which contestants get to debut mainly through online voting. As the model of fostered idols became increasingly popular in China, many reality talent shows featuring fostered idols thrived, the popular ones including Idol Producer, Youth with You, and Produce 101 China. Their fans can witness and contribute to their professional progress and career success. Compared to traditional entertainment celebrities who appear under the spotlight as mature stars, fostered idols are stars in the making. The term “fostered idols,” or yangchengxi ouxiang in Chinese, refers to entertainment celebrities who began their career as “blank slates” (Zhao and Wu 2020). Less ambiguous, however, is that the regulation would have improved overall social welfare more if it was a gentle nudge rather than a hard ban. After a normative analysis, we conclude that the extent to which the regulation can be justified in the framework of welfarist consequentialism remains unclear. The market, legal, and social issues could have all motivated the regulation. We argue that fans’ seemingly irrational consumption behavior can be understood generally in the models of personal identity formation and consumer devotion. Drawing from existing literature, public and private media articles, and the authors’ observations of online fan communities, this study explores the incentives for fan consumption in the shows as well as the rationale and impacts of the regulation. However, in 2021, the Chinese government suspended this type of show as part of an intervention in idol fan culture. In recent years, fostered idol reality shows in China demonstrated the incredible consumption power of fans. ![]()
0 Comments
Leave a Reply. |