Most online celebrities can't tell jokes, they can't sing, they can't act, and they're probably not exactly a conscientious worker. Fame fades quickly in the digital age. So, what's the endgame for these internet luminaries?
For those who rely on their looks, the fall can be particularly hard. Luo Xiaoyi, more widely known as Nansheng Guniang (鍗楃瑱濮戝), was hailed as the "goddess" of Chinese otaku men after her photos in costume from the Republic of China period were reposted on online forums and popular fan site Douban.com.
With that fame came invitations to real-life events, but soon people found that her unprocessed appearance looked nothing like her photos. She went from "goddess" to "the master of Photoshop" seemingly overnight.
She still posts her pictures on her Weibo account, but most of the comments below are "I know it's fake."
"Once someone's true face is revealed and turns out to be different from what we believe, we lose interest in them," says Qian Yu, a computer engineer and former fan of Nansheng Guniang. He now runs an "online goddess" forum at Baidu Tieba that collects personal information and gossip about fashion bloggers and models. The forum has over 700 active users, mostly male, all hoping to find a natural "goddess" who has never had plastic surgery. "Fans don't like the feeling of being cheated, but they hate cowards more," says Qian.
Though not always the most astute literature critics, the online world will not tolerate things like plagiarism. Tangqi, an online romance writer, lost over 50,000 followers on Weibo since July 2015, after her most popular novel was accused of plagiarism. She supposedly copied and published her works from Dafeng Guaguo, who wrote explicit homosexual fiction鈥攚hich has also made her hesitant to sue. Tangqi simply turned the relationships heterosexual and made a mint.
"The writing style, storyline, and plots from Dafeng Guaguo are almost the same; the only difference is鈥he male and female characters," one former reader told TWOC, adding that he has withdrawn from the QQ group of Tangqi's fans and started a online boycott of an upcoming TV series based on Tangqi's novel with over 3,000 like-minded others.
Tangqi apologized for "imitating" the other writer's style and insisted that she did not plagiarize, but she continued to bleed followers.
Pang Mailang (搴為害閮), a rags to online riches story for his viral song "My Skating Shoes", captured hearts with his unconventional singing and a style that gave him the appearance of a starving artist. However, a feature, "Troubled Pang Mailang", by Renwu, a Chinese monthly magazine, depicted his seemingly troubled mental status as a narcissistic personality.
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