"Opinions on Strengthening the Protection of Minors in the Online Cultural Market" released
Work together to curb the phenomenon of "Internet celebrity children" hype
Recently, there have been more and more accounts on short video and live broadcast platforms that mainly display "cute babies". Many parents have turned their children into "net celebrities" and realized traffic monetization through business cooperation.
Recently, the General Office of the Ministry of Culture and Tourism issued the "Opinions on Strengthening the Protection of Minors in the Online Cultural Market", prohibiting the use of “net celebrity children” for profit and protecting the legitimate rights and interests of minors in cyberspace.
Some "babies" are deformed
On a short video platform, there is an account that focuses on "playing cute babies". The video content is a conversation between a seven or eight-year-old girl and a boy of the same age. It has more than 2 million fans on the platform.
In the video thumbnails of the account, words such as "like a quarrel with a girlfriend", "dominant little president", "girls' minds, don't guess", and "pain of the rich" are not uncommon.
In another short video platform, a 4-year-old and 2-year-old female baby attracted the attention of more than 37 million netizens.
The video account features two sisters as the main actors, showing the funny daily life of "cute baby cheating father" and mother and daughter fighting wits and courage.
In the message area, many netizens said that "the baby is too cute" and "the little expression is in place, I like this kid too much".
On some live broadcast and short video platforms, there are quite a few accounts like this for "Internet celebrity children", with fans ranging from tens of thousands to tens of millions.
Among them, most of them focus on recording the children's daily life.
However, with the increase of homogenous content, many accounts have begun to "different ways", and there have been modes of eating and broadcasting, beauty dressing, and interpretation of plot scripts: eating and broadcasting blogger "Peggy", who was fed by his parents when he was only 3 years old It’s 70 pounds; the little girl who just passed her 5th birthday skillfully picked up foundation and eyeshadow, and introduced how to make-up to the camera; some parents deliberately fed the baby with pungent food, and took the baby’s expression to please the audience... …The immature children are doing actions that are not suitable for their age, and part of the "baby drying" is gradually deformed.
"Small gnawing" is harmful
The child was making trouble at home, and the mother reluctantly said: "How can this holiday be done?" The father then read out a certain brand of TV commercial, and responded: "With this, she just stopped."
A large number of similar advertisements exist in "Internet celebrity children" accounts, which have become the main way for such accounts to realize traffic monetization.
Open the homepages of these accounts, and most of them can see the logos of "Recommended Goods", "Live Broadcasting", and "Look for My Official Cooperation".
Parents who operate children's short video accounts said that they can earn 150,000 yuan a month by relying on their babies.
Industry insiders said that behind the explosion of "Internet celebrity children", there may be a "chain of interest."
Some parent-child accounts are indeed simply sharing daily life. After a sudden explosion of traffic, organizations will take the initiative to sign contracts with them. After signing the contracts, they can get more business opportunities. This has also led some parents to use their children to create accounts. Do business operations.
The reporter also saw on a short video data analysis platform that many popular accounts have signed MCN (Internet celebrity incubator).
Experts said that in order to "cheap the small" for profit, it is actually a "pit baby".
On the one hand, pushing children in front of the camera and "selling cute" according to the script will overdraw their physical energy and expose their privacy, which can easily cause psychological anxiety.
On the other hand, prematurely participating in commercial activities such as live short videos can also cause distortions in values, which can lead to success in thinking and impetuous mentality.
Some experts pointed out that there are many legal risks in hyping "Internet celebrity children".
According to the relevant provisions of the Law on the Protection of Minors, no organization or individual may organize minors to perform activities that endanger their physical and mental health.
The Law on the Protection of Minors that came into effect on June 1 this year has clearly stipulated that webcast service providers shall not provide webcast publisher account registration services for minors under 16 years of age.
Prevent excessive consumption
In response to the undesirable phenomena and problems of using "Internet celebrity children" for profit on some online cultural platforms, the "Opinions on Strengthening the Protection of Minors in the Online Cultural Market" proposes to strictly control the participation of minors in online performances, Adults appearing alone or taken by adults for more than a certain period of time and are approved as live broadcast rooms or short video accounts that use minors to accumulate popularity and profit, or use child models to pose indecent poses, perform sexually suggestive actions, etc. Accounts that flow and bring goods for profit shall be dealt with severely in accordance with the law.
For the platform, it is also necessary to consciously fulfill the main responsibility.
Experts pointed out that online platforms should be strictly controlled. On the one hand, the access conditions and age restrictions for anchors should be strictly implemented. On the other hand, the live broadcast information and video content involving minors should be strictly reviewed, and the accounts of excessive consumption of "Internet celebrity children" should be blocked. And other measures.
A related person in charge of a short video platform said that at present, machine algorithms and manual labeling methods have been used to identify video accounts with children as the protagonist, and strengthen management of such accounts.
It is understood that many of the registrants of "Mengwa" accounts are adults, which makes it difficult for the platform to directly supervise through registered identities.
The key to curbing the hype of "Internet celebrity children" lies in parents.
Sun Yunxiao, chief expert on family education at the China Youth Research Center, believes that parents must take a long-term view, create a safe and clean environment for their children, and not allow their children to enter the adult world prematurely for their own benefit.
Experts said that schools and society should strengthen the guidance and education of parents and supervise them to fulfill their guardianship responsibilities. For those parents who completely regard their children as cash cows, relevant departments should play a role to effectively protect the legitimate rights and interests of minors.
Reporter: Qiao Cai