Experts on platforms and merchants Lianmai acting and selling defective products suggest timely amendments to the advertising law
Clarify the legal status of all parties involved in the "live streaming"
Our reporter Pu Xiaolei
The female merchant said with a cry that her product had been mislinked, and now the price is wrong, but the system crashed and cannot be corrected. The husband yelled at her when he knew, "You sold things for 39 yuan? A divorce!"
After confirming that the link could not be withdrawn, the online celebrity anchor who was connected to the merchant called on the fans in the live room: "She can't get off the car now, everyone buy it!"
The wife had to cut the price to sell the goods for the sake of sales, but was insulted by her husband; the anchor paid for the low price discount to the fans, and made up the difference out of her own pocket... Since last year, such scenes have appeared in some online celebrity live broadcast rooms of Kuaishou, and Gradually, more and more anchors follow suit.
In response to this phenomenon, Kuaishou e-commerce recently released an violating user announcement that some anchors used malicious bargaining, quarrels, insults, acting and other methods to induce fans to buy goods from inferior e-commerce gangs during PK or connecting wheat. It has seriously affected the user's shopping experience and perception experience, and harmed the interests of consumers. Based on this, Kuaishou punished some anchors to stop live broadcasting for 14 days.
“Malicious bargaining, quarrels, insults, acting, etc., seriously violate social public order and good customs; inducing fans to buy goods from inferior e-commerce groups is an act of fraudulent consumers. The chaos in live streaming sales cannot be completely left to the platform Autonomous, the market supervision department should increase supervision and punishment, and further optimize the e-commerce business environment." said Liu Junhai, a professor at Renmin University of China Law School.
Yao Zhiwei, executive director of the Center for Smart Rule of Law of Guangdong University of Finance and Economics, said that since the rules of the Advertising Law are designed for traditional advertising forms, it is difficult to apply to the new marketing form of "live delivery with goods". In this regard, it is recommended that relevant departments take the lead. Introduce management measures, and then revise the advertising law at an appropriate time to accurately define the legal status of all parties involved in the “live streaming of goods”, so as to provide stronger legal protection for the law enforcement of the regulatory authorities and the protection of consumers' rights.
Acting in partnership to induce fans to buy low-quality goods
Recently, the reporter watched a live video of a certain online celebrity anchor Lianmai e-commerce selling goods.
"You have two pairs of shoes for 138 yuan, we said before the live broadcast, you just sell it, and I lose it!" An internet celebrity anchor said to a female seller of Lianmai.
"I really can't sell this price, I will lower the price on the original basis, 138 yuan a pair will work?" The seller grievedly said to Lianmai's anchor.
"My script has been reported. Do you want to do it like this? You just listen to me and sell it!" the internet celebrity anchor threatened.
In the end, female sellers can only send out links in tears and sell goods at low prices.
For this way of acting and selling goods, some netizens in the live broadcast room do not buy it. From time to time, they can see comments on acting skills such as "Where did you hire an actor" and "I didn't perform well".
These online celebrity anchors even sell inferior e-commerce products with wheat, all have similar scripts and routines: spend money on rankings, anchors connect e-commerce, merchants sell miserably, online celebrities anchors "reasonable", anchors force sellers to change prices, After the bloody storm, the seller arrogantly compromised.
Although there are voices of doubts about acting and products in the comment area, there are not a few people who buy them. However, there are many inferior products and fakes among these rushed products.
"The online marketing behavior of the online celebrity anchor Lianmai inferior e-commerce is actually'selling in a way.' The anchor receives the money and cooperation costs for the list. The e-commerce company sells inferior goods at a high price, and fans become consumers who are routinely sold. , This is already a sales fraud, ranging from'refunding one compensation to three', and serious, it constitutes a crime of fraud." said Zhu Wei, deputy director of the Communication Law Research Center of China University of Political Science and Law.
“For products with labels such as time-limited, limited-price, etc., many onlookers after seeing them are shopping impulsively, failing to make scientific and rational consumption. However, this is not the reason why anchors and low-quality e-commerce can cheat consumers. If the rights and interests of consumers are harmed, they can be safeguarded in accordance with the Consumer Rights Protection Law." Liu Junhai said.
Cannot rely solely on the platform's "three cups of self-punishment" governance
On July 24, Kuaishou e-commerce official account "Kaishou Xiaodian" released the third announcement, informing the list of 28 violating anchors and 128 low-quality e-commerce gangs.
The reporter noticed that after many days of rectification, some online celebrity anchors in Kuaishou have obviously become cautious when selling goods. It is rare to see the phenomenon of using acting, insulting and other methods to sell wheat.
A staff member of a live video streaming platform told reporters that the platform punishes anchors mainly based on the degree of their mistakes. The act of selling inferior goods through acting is basically a punishment for banning live broadcasts. Most of the time Within two weeks, “because the ban is indeed not enough, but the platform must impose a penalty. This punishment method is really not too heavy. You can upload short videos during the ban, and you can still broadcast it after the ban is lifted.”
As this staff member said, for these Internet celebrity anchors, this punishment method does not have much impact. The reporter noticed that during the banned live broadcast, some anchors will announce their "trumpet" in the message area of their short video, and ask fans to watch the live broadcast on another account.
Liu Junhai believes that platforms are obliged to take measures to control the phenomenon of inducing fans to buy inferior e-commerce gang products through malicious bargaining, quarrels, insults, acting, etc., and facts have proved that this is also effective. However, the solution of similar problems cannot only rely on the "three cups of self-penalty" on the e-commerce platform, but also requires market supervision departments to increase supervision.
"The internet celebrity anchors will receive gifts from the e-commerce company during the process of connecting the microphones. And the money is divided proportionally between the anchors and the platform. The e-commerce companies expand the sales of their products through the connection of the microphones. This is achieved. In order to achieve the win-win situation of anchors, e-commerce, and platforms, individual platforms will "turn one eye and close one eye" on this issue. Therefore, market supervision departments should actively increase law enforcement efforts to allow illegal Online platforms, Internet celebrity anchors and low-quality e-commerce'pay tuition'." Liu Junhai said.
Clarify corresponding responsibilities according to the specific behavior of the anchor
The marketing chaos in the live webcast has attracted the attention of regulatory authorities.
On July 29, the State Administration for Market Regulation issued the “Guiding Opinions of the State Administration for Market Regulation on Strengthening the Supervision of Webcast Marketing Activities (Draft for Comment)” to solicit public opinions.
When mentioning the purpose of drafting, the draft for comments pointed out that the current rapid development of web live marketing has played a positive role in activating the consumer market and boosting economic growth. However, there are also problems with the implementation of online platform responsibilities, commodity operators selling counterfeit and shoddy goods, Network anchors false propaganda and other issues.
Zhu Wei noticed that the draft for comments made provisions on clarifying the legal responsibilities of relevant entities, strictly regulating online live broadcast marketing behaviors, and investigating and punishing illegal live broadcast marketing activities in accordance with the law. After the opinions are officially implemented, they will solve the problem of "PK Lianmai selling inferior products". The question provides a clear basis.
"It has been five years since the last revision of the Advertising Law. In the past few years, the development of e-commerce has been changing rapidly, and there have been many phenomena that require clarification of the law. Therefore, after the implementation of the guidelines, we can accumulate relevant Experience, start the revision of the advertising law in a timely manner. This provides a clear legal basis for solving the chaos of online live marketing such as'PK Lianmai selling inferior goods'." Zhu Wei said.
Liu Junhai believes that although the Advertising Law does not provide for the conduct of Lianmai sales, in fact, the anchors sold by Lianmai e-commerce have become advertising spokespersons, and the live content has constituted a commercial advertisement. It is recommended that when revising the advertising law, the corresponding legal responsibilities should be clarified based on the specific behavior of the network anchor.