Starting from the bottom of the "campus short video entrepreneurship" trap
Liu Xue has been in a cold war with her parents for a month.
All of this started with a live broadcast of "Short Video Campus Entrepreneurship". Under the guidance of the campus entrepreneurial master "Lu Bu", Liu Xue joined an entrepreneurial project called "Traffic King". She once thought that she had found herself direction of life.
But this dream about starting a business came and went quickly. Along with the "master", Liu Xue "spoofed" 6,000 yuan from her mother.
"Traffic King" is just the tip of the iceberg of scams.
Searching for "campus entrepreneurship" on major short video platforms, you can still find a large number of such accounts sharing college students' entrepreneurial projects, with 71.733 million clicks on the topic.
Some college students who are involved in campus entrepreneurship projects want to become Internet celebrities and achieve economic freedom; some hope to use the "traffic king" to subsidize their daily expenses and reduce the burden on their parents; After "grass" the commodity for a long time, it quit.
They all believe in the myth that short videos make wealth.
A reporter from the Beijing News found that such short video accounts, which teach college students how to start a business, take the opportunity to sell "entrepreneurship projects" while grabbing network traffic, attracting college students to pay to join.
The so-called project, in fact, is to continuously attract franchisees to join and develop offline.
Chen Qiang (pseudonym), a policeman who has been investigating related cases for many years, described similar gangs as "inexhaustible rats", "Many cases involving pyramid schemes fail to meet the criminal liability standards, and the chain of evidence cannot be closed. They can be criticized and educated." Driven by huge profits, some people will take the risk even if they know they will be punished.
The dream of wealth on the short video outlet
Liu Xue's dream of wealth began with a live webcast.
On January 6, 2022, on the Douyin short video platform, a live broadcast of campus entrepreneurship hosted by the blogger "Lu Bu" caught her attention.
"It's so easy to make money in college now. I made a total of 1.2 million yuan during college and successfully led hundreds of college students to achieve economic freedom." On the screen, Lu Bu, a young boy in his twenties, is talking about himself passionately. After a tortuous and brilliant entrepreneurial journey, he wore a famous brand, with a pair of black-framed glasses on his thin face and shiny hair.
"A girl studying in a junior college joined the college student entrepreneurial project. After only one year, she became an Internet celebrity with millions of fans, and she liked to mention a convertible BMW..." Lu Bu eloquently described a Another case of college students getting rich. From time to time, they raised their hands and drew back and forth in front of their chests. The brand-name metal watch that was one size larger on the wrist was shaken off with a "crashing" sound.
Liu Xue envied these people who could get rich quick.
She studied in a university in Tianjin, majoring in international business. Among countless occupations, she most envies the Internet celebrity bloggers who dress stylishly and have free time.
The 19-year-old never shy away from spending a lot of time every day shooting short videos: "If you want to make money, go to the Internet, if you want to be famous, you can become a blogger. If you want to make money and be famous, you can become an internet celebrity."
Lu Buzhen, short videos are super interactive, and they are "spiritual food" that everyone can't live without. They can not only harvest traffic, but also realize cash. If you stand right, pigs can fly." Liu Xue picked up a pen and wrote in the notebook, "Be sure to be a flying pig on the tuyere!"
After more than 30 minutes of live broadcast, Liu Xue didn't understand at all what the short video entrepreneurial project Lu Bu was talking about, but her intuition told her that it coincided with her dream.
On the same day, Liu Xue took the initiative to add Lv Bu's WeChat and asked how to start a business with short videos.
"The company will teach you how to operate your own account and how to monetize through short video traffic." Lu Bu was very enthusiastic. He told Liu Xue that a few days ago, he just helped an 18-year-old girl do a live broadcast and gained a lot of fans. .
Liu Xue recalled that after some courtesies, Lu Bu recommended a startup project called "Traffic King" to her, saying that the original price of the membership fee was 9,800 yuan, and now she can become a senior partner with only 5,980 yuan.
After joining the club, the company will provide ready-made video materials and copywriting to help her create a large-scale set of successful young entrepreneurs.
Liu Xue was ready to act immediately.
But the membership fee is not a small amount for her.
In the evening, she asked her mother for 6,000 yuan on the grounds of signing up for an English training class.
The parents on the other end of the phone were not only ignorant of Liu Xue's entrepreneurial plan, but also pleased with their daughter's progress.
Like Liu Xue, Lin Yang, a 20-year-old junior, once thought he had met "Bole".
Lin Yang lived in a poor family in Guizhou since he was a child. His parents made a living by growing vegetables and farming. In order to reduce the burden on the family, Lin Yang went to work in a fast food restaurant near the school every weekend for 80 yuan an hour.
"It's not easy to pass the test from my hometown, and I must work harder than others."
On November 6, 2021, Lin Yang was attracted by Lu Bu's "proud" image in a short video.
He felt that Lu Bu not only understood the actual needs of college students, but also was proficient in the operation of short videos.
"I've seen a lot of bloggers who got rich because of short videos. It's very cool and cool." A few days later, Lin Yang took out the remaining 1,306 yuan and paid a deposit, and spent a week with his classmates and friends around him. Gathered 1,500 yuan and officially joined the college student entrepreneurial project.
He regarded the "traffic king" as a clipper that changed his fate and decided to give it a try.
Entrepreneurs who have never met
After entering the project membership group, Liu Xue got a specific project teaching video.
A reporter from the Beijing News saw from this video that it was a video recorded by Lu Bu's photo to teach members how to create a character.
In the video, he first taught members how to compile a personal introduction: "Everyone can write like this, he came out of the society at a young age, and has made great achievements. There are two short video Internet companies, these are all compiled, the background of the avatar It also has to do with showing off wealth.”
On the last page of the video, it reads, "Internal information, only members can watch, it is strictly forbidden to leak, and the consequences are at your own risk."
Liu Xue said that this teaching video has appeared in many member groups. "The packaging and language of many short video accounts of campus entrepreneurship are exactly the same as what is said in this video."
"The project is to explore the store offline. You don't need to go there in person. The company will provide a unified store video and copy material, and you can use your own account to organize and publish it every day." According to Lu Bu, the so-called "entrepreneurship" is to build a successful business It is set up by young entrepreneurs to publish some business cases of brick-and-mortar stores to attract fans to pay to join their projects. After the completion of the project, they can be divided into 10%.
The day Liu Xue first joined the group, Lu Bu invited a "male guest" to tell the group about his changes after joining the "Traffic King".
In this sharing, the male guest publicized his experience of making money at zero cost by using projects such as cleaning dormitories, recycling old clothes, and opening small printing shops, and claimed that as long as he followed the instructions in the video, his monthly income would be thousands or even more than 10,000. Easy.
Recalling that day, Liu Xue said, "It was like a crazy successful learning sharing lecture."
According to the teaching video, Liu Xue registered new accounts on multiple short video platforms.
Lu Bu told her that "showing off your wealth" is very important in the process of packaging the character design. "Let the audience think that you are very powerful, and they will privately message you and ask you for the secrets and methods of starting a business, so that more than half of the success is achieved." Then, Lu Bu assured her that as long as someone sent a private message, the company would send a special person to conduct one-on-one sales counseling.
A reporter from the Beijing News found that the "Traffic King" project has three levels: members, partners, and senior partners.
Pay 2980 yuan, 4980 yuan, 6980 yuan, 10,000 yuan to join the membership and become members of different levels.
According to the rebate system of "Traffic King", after the offline payment is paid, the upper home can withdraw 10% to 30% of the total cost.
In addition, the senior partner project with a price of 19,800 yuan claims to be able to create a personal exclusive IP, and one transaction can get up to 50% of the commission.
Liu Xue was worried that this franchise model was similar to pyramid schemes, but Lu Bu on the other end of the phone seemed to have already sensed her hesitation, "I won't hurt you, if you get one person, this person can help you with sales. People, one becomes two, two becomes four, office workers can’t make so much money. If it was pyramid schemes, the police would have arrested us long ago. If we don’t even believe in ourselves, how can we make others believe?”
At the other end, Lin Yang also joined another "Traffic King" project group.
One after another, Lin Yang opened personal accounts on three short video platforms. The person he set for himself was: "a 20-year-old junior college student who has been in business for three years and has successfully run a media company with a market value of tens of millions."
When Lin Yang recalled to the Beijing News reporter the days when he stared at the short video profile like a monster, he said, "This is an easy opportunity to make money, and I believed everything he said at the time. "
There are 258 people in his project group, all of whom are college students between the ages of 18 and 22. There are more than a dozen groups like this, and Lu Bu's task is to frequently encourage and spur them in the group.
"After more than 20 years of independent life, I have realized a truth. When people have no money, no one looks down on them. Think about their parents and work hard to raise you, so that you can be successful in the future." Lu Bubu The voices were sent intermittently, and the members who paid the money responded to them one after another, "The boss asks for help, come on together!"
Recalling the "traffic king" partner crowd, Lin Yang sighed "crazy".
In fact, the members of the group had never really met Lu Bu, nor did they know each other's real names.
Pull people
Online "pulling people's heads" has become Liu Xue's "main business".
"First, use a large area of light eyeshadow to cover the entire eye socket, it will enlarge the eyes..." At 9 am, the first professional class in the university had already started, Liu Xue reluctantly got up from the bed and sat cross-legged in the small room. In the bunk space, she followed the video blogger to learn makeup, which was the first step for her to become an Internet celebrity entrepreneurial blogger.
After putting on makeup and the live broadcast started, Liu Xue first took a look at the camera, glanced at the pre-printed draft on the paper, and tried to recall some key words, "Hello everyone, today is my first day of live broadcast, in the future I will I will use this account to share my entrepreneurial story, I hope you can support me a lot, I am your Xiaoxue, I love you!" She sat at the desk and pulled the curtains against the wall to prevent anyone from seeing her outside the window.
After the more than 3-hour live broadcast, Liu Xue began to organize and edit the material of the short video, reply to the private messages sent by fans, and was busy until after one o'clock at night.
Early in the morning, Liu Xue was still too excited to fall asleep. Those vague dreams of wealth, mixed in the dark night, refused to disperse.
Since then, absenteeism has become the norm.
In order to draw more "heads", Liu Xue aimed at the people around her.
Under the leadership of Liu Xue, her roommate Li Xiaoying paid 2,980 yuan to join the "Traffic King" entrepreneurial project. The network personality she created for herself is a college student who has been a female CEO of a media company for three years.
For a long time, girls believed in the path of "traffic king" to make wealth.
Li Xiaoying recalled that one morning, she was woken up by her roommate's phone arguing. She heard a general idea. It was her roommate's parents who asked her to go back to her hometown to find a job immediately after graduating from college, but her classmates didn't want to leave the big city.
"If you want to be free from the control of your parents, you must first be financially independent, otherwise they will make random arrangements." In Li Xiaoying's view, children who can make money on their own can have more right to speak, which also verifies that they have started this business. be sensible.
In March 2022, Liu Xue's personal short video account has nearly 10,000 followers.
For three months of "starting a business", she brought in two roommates to join, and one person was brought in online, with a total franchise fee of 8,940 yuan.
Liu Xue happily counted the commission of less than 900 yuan in her hand, and bought a bottle of Internet celebrity liquid foundation that had been "growing grass" for a long time. She felt that using the money she earned to buy the products she liked could be regarded as "no kung fu". Caring people".
The dream of getting rich is broken
Liu Xue's exuberant entrepreneurial passion has only lasted for less than a month. "A set of operations depends on words." Liu Xue feels that there is no specific product, and the rebate income from developing new members is not stable.
On March 6, she publicly questioned in the membership group.
The next day, a person who claimed to be an entrepreneurial assistant added Liu Xue's WeChat and announced a "punishment decision" to her. "You didn't attract anyone this month. As a punishment, the commission will be gone next month." After this, she suddenly realized - "In fact, these companies have no actual projects and products, just empty shells."
Liu Xue wanted to refund the money.
She felt that she was not only tired, but also did not make any money. She also lost 6,000 yuan, which is not worth it no matter how you look at it.
"As soon as I asked for a refund, I was kicked out of the group. They also said that I should go to the police if I could." Liu Xue said that the other party had warned her many times that the payment was purely voluntary, she gave up on her own and could not be refunded. payment.
Before payment, the two parties had never signed any agreement or contract.
At the same time, Lu Bu kept posting videos of successful entrepreneurship on campus, attracting people to join the club.
Liu Xue gradually discovered that no matter what kind of project, the words and "teaching methods" used by entrepreneurial bosses are the same.
On that day, several roommates who followed Liu Xue's business fell into collective silence.
"Actually, I also suspected those people." "Why didn't we think that the kind of story that the salted fish can turn over in a few days is a myth." He started his business by cheating." In the past, everyone talked about "entrepreneurship" until late at night every day, but this time, the communication ended after only three or two sentences before the lights went out at 9:30.
On the other hand, after half a year, Lin Yang also found clues, and his request for a refund was also rejected and kicked out of the project group.
Yang, who used to be a core member of "Traffic King", confirmed to the Beijing News reporter that most entrepreneurial bloggers use the same routine: after successfully adding students to WeChat, they will publish some "successful cases" through their circle of friends and use some projects. Screenshots of payments made in earned fees convinced students that the project was actually making money.
"Actually, it's all fake, fake screenshots, and only a very small number of people can actually get rewards and rebates."
According to the payment vouchers provided by several college students, the payee of the "Traffic King" project is named Zhejiang Guomeng Media Group Co., Ltd.
A reporter from the Beijing News found that the company was registered in Qiantang District, Hangzhou, and was established on August 13, 2021, in a state of existence.
In January this year, it was listed as an abnormal operation by the Qiantang District Market Supervision and Administration Bureau of Hangzhou City because it could not be contacted through the registered domicile or business place.
On April 7, a staff member of the Market Supervision Bureau of Xiaoshan District, Hangzhou City told the Beijing News reporter that at present, the relevant corporate legal person has been unable to contact, and the specific case is still under investigation.
A reporter from the Beijing News called Zhejiang Guomeng Media Group Co., Ltd. to ask about the models of head-drawing and commissions involved in entrepreneurial projects such as "Flow King".
Its staff said that the projects operated by the company are reasonable and legal secondary distribution, not pyramid schemes.
after being deceived
After discovering that she might be deceived, Liu Xue began to think over and over in her heart, "Why am I being deceived?" She said that she wanted to achieve economic freedom through her own efforts. , maybe it was just heard as a joke.
In April, these college students who had been caught up in entrepreneurial scams spontaneously formed a rights group.
After joining the group, Liu Xue found that there were people all over the country who had the same experience as herself.
"There are thirteen such groups in total, each with two or three hundred members." According to her incomplete statistics, more than 1,000 college students were deceived, and the total amount involved was about 4 million yuan.
The students called the local police station.
On April 11, the staff of the police station told the Beijing News that the case was under processing and was initially identified as an economic dispute, and the college students involved had been educated. The specific details of the case were inconvenient to disclose.
Because of being deceived, the students always pay attention to the information of solving the case. They launched the "College Student Anti-Fraud" super chat on various social platforms, searching for evidence about the case.
Recently, in order to warn other college students, Lin Yang took the lead in producing a series of short videos, exposing the routines of successfully learning "masters" in campus entrepreneurship and posting them on social platforms.
Then, more scams surfaced.
"Traffic King" is just the tip of the iceberg of scams.
Searching for "campus entrepreneurship" on major short video platforms, you can still find a large number of such accounts sharing college students' entrepreneurial projects, with 71.733 million clicks on the topic.
This type of account is usually accompanied by a bright personal resume, such as becoming a partner of a group in three years of university business, helping tens of thousands of college students to achieve economic freedom, etc., and the video content and copywriting are basically similar, mostly for dormitory cleaning projects, old clothes recycling projects , Print shop items.
The reporter privately messaged multiple accounts through the short video platform, all of which were required to add personal WeChat.
A short video blogger named "Xiaokai Xuechang" recommended a start-up project called "Metaverse Pet Shop" to reporters in the chat, saying that earning tens of thousands of dollars every month is not a problem, there is no problem. risk.
According to Chen Qiang (pseudonym), an anti-fraud police officer, the continuous development of offline gimmicks such as online franchise, attracting people, and charging entry fees is a criminal act that seriously undermines the market economic order and endangers social stability.
In fact, there are certain practical difficulties in data retrieval for pyramid selling and fraud crimes that rely on online platforms.
In addition, some persons involved in the case also rent foreign servers, and data retrieval takes a long time and has a long cycle.
In the process of participating in the case handling for many years, Chen Qiang found that there are many members of the network MLM, and the relationship between the members of the organization is loose, and they do not even know each other.
In terms of identifying funds involved, the persons involved usually use third-party payment platforms to conduct transactions, which easily bypasses bank supervision. "After many funds pass through third-party payment platforms, it is difficult to directly identify which funds belong to pyramid schemes."
Chen Qiang used the "inexhaustible mouse" to describe the pyramid scheme fraud gangs on the Internet, "Many cases involving pyramid schemes cannot be closed because the chain of evidence cannot be closed, and the level and number of people do not meet the standard of criminal responsibility. Criticize and educate." Chen Qiang said that driven by huge profits, some people will take risks even if they know they will be punished.
In his view, online MLM has strong fission and regeneration, which increases the pressure on grassroots police to investigate and deal with.
Recently, the account of "Campus Master Lu Bu" has been cancelled, and the new account "Campus Guidance Master Lu Bu" is active again on the short video platform, using similar copywriting and videos to circle fans.
The reporter left a message on Lu Bu's short video account requesting an interview to verify the above information, but has not received a reply as of press time.
Lin Yang continued to report to the regulatory authorities, "There are more than a dozen rights protection groups alone, and some people think that the money can't be recovered. It's fine, but I'm still insisting."
(At the request of the interviewee, Liu Xue, Lin Yang and Li Xiaoying are pseudonyms in the text)
The Beijing News reporter Xian Yunzhen