{"id":24876,"date":"2024-12-18T00:49:54","date_gmt":"2024-12-17T16:49:54","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/varsity.com.cuhk.edu.hk\/?p=24876"},"modified":"2024-12-27T00:55:48","modified_gmt":"2024-12-26T16:55:48","slug":"faking-to-be-rich","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/varsity.com.cuhk.edu.hk\/index.php\/2024\/12\/faking-to-be-rich\/","title":{"rendered":"Faking to be Rich"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

Young Chinese fake to be rich by self-branding on social media<\/strong>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

By Celina Lu<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Posing as an elegant lady leading a luxurious lifestyle, online content creator Xiao Shu has a taste of living like a princess for one day \u2013 an experience of a lifetime by hiring a team of make-up artists and photographers to do a photo shoot in fancy places, albeit wearing a counterfeit designer dress and carrying a fake luxury handbag.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The service package covers photo taking at a Michelin restaurant called Yihenyue by Seven Villas, an infinity swimming pool, a golf course, and Conrad Hangzhou.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Xiao filmed the whole experience and made a video which was then shared on her own social media accounts on various popular social media platforms in China, including TikTok, Xiaohongshu (the Little Red Book), and Bilibili.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cI want to start an online business by creating video content myself. I wrote a story about boys taking pictures of luxurious lifestyles for social media posts when I worked for GQ magazine. I find faking to be rich is an interesting topic, so I tried it myself and made a record of it,\u201d the 28-year-old woman says.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"\"
Xiao Shu takes photos in a golf course. (Photo courtesy of Xiao Shu)<\/em><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

Xiao spent RMB \u00a52,488 (US $349.37) for a 12-hour shooting session and she was guaranteed to have nine photos finished.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cI\u2019m not used to wearing gorgeous clothes and posing for photos for hours. The experience made me feel that I was pretty and happy at that moment. I also felt a little bit awkward, as I was not used to that,\u201d Xiao adds.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The video about the experience earned her 22,000 likes on Xiaohongshu, 432,000 likes on TikTok, and 2,242 likes on Bilibili.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"\"
Xiao Shu takes photos in a Michelin restaurant. (Photo courtesy of Xiao Shu)<\/em><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

Out of curiosity, fund investigator Zhou Qian also signed up for a service package like Xiao. She had her first photo taking session at the Guangzhou Elegant Hotel. She posted the photos she took on Xiaohongshu.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cI have seen videos of other girls doing this on TikTok before, and then I wondered what it was like. I gave it a try on my 28th birthday in a five-star hotel,\u201d Zhou says.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cI booked the photo shoot two weeks earlier and paid RMB \u00a5400 (US $56.18) for a 30-minute photo session. Costumes were provided and I had to do my own make-up,\u201d she says.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cThe service also includes providing a fake Louis Vuitton bag.  The photographer took pictures of me with my mobile phone and told me to pose in various ways. But I actually didn\u2019t feel right because I was faking to be rich,\u201d the 28-year-old woman says.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cAfter half an hour, another customer came. There were about at least 20 girls waiting to take pictures that day,\u201d Zhou shares.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cYoung girls find it appealing to pretend to be rich elites. Many are willing to spend money to fake it for a day. After all, who doesn\u2019t want to become rich and smart,\u201d  she adds.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"\"
Zhou Qian takes photos in Guangzhou Elegant Hotel. (Photo courtesy of Zhou Qian)<\/em><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

Advertisements about the \u201cFake Socialite\u201d photo service can be found on various social media platforms offering the service charging from RMB \u00a5400 (US $55.24) to RMB \u00a52,500 (US $345.22).<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Lucky King is one of the studios posting messages about such \u201cFake Socialite\u201d photo service in Xiaohongshu.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

It charges RMB \u00a51,188 (US $166.90) for an hour of photo session at a five-star hotel the Bvlgari Shanghai and RMB 1,088 (US $152.85) per hour at the Banyan Tree Shanghai.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

95 per cent of their customers are girls and five per cent are boys. They are mostly between 20-35 years old, according to the studio.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"\"
Shooting set up in a five-star hotel in Shanghai. (Photo courtesy of Lucky King)<\/em><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

\u201cIn recent years, senior cadre style or gentle style photography have become increasingly popular on TikTok. Most of the girls who purchased the service are to get a nice set of photos for their birthday and want to maximise the value for the money they can afford to spend,\u201d a staff of the studio says.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Assistant Professor Lin Jian from the School of Journalism and Communication of the Chinese University of Hong Kong points out that photo services of such kind are popular among internet celebrities.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cSome internet celebrities want to create an illusion that they live a luxurious life to impress their fans. Some want to make use of the service to create content for their social media accounts,\u201d Lin says.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cInternet celebrities want to make use of this to boost their fame and number of followers. They might profit from the fame they build in the future. Private companies might approach them to advertise some products or run live online sales,\u201d Lin comments.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Lin also points out that some young people are yearning for a celebrity lifestyle and want to get a taste of it.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cConsumer culture is an important part of contemporary youth culture in China. This kind of photography service is also a kind of consumption behavior. They can have a taste of being at five-star restaurants and hotels,\u201d he says.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cConsumption has actually become a solution for dealing with stress and the urge to be successful. A solution to the fact that it\u2019s hard to find ways to turn us into a so-called \u2018successful\u2019 person,\u201d Lin adds.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Edited by Cynthia Chan<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Sub-edited by Carrie Lock<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Young Chinese fake to be rich by self-branding on social media. By Celina Lu Posing as an elegant lady leading a luxurious lifestyle, online content creator Xiao Shu has a taste of living like a princess for one day \u2013 an experience of a lifetime by hiring a team of make-up artists and photographers to […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":5,"featured_media":24877,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2235,8],"tags":[245,33,668,154],"class_list":["post-24876","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-december-2024-2","category-our-community","tag-china","tag-culture","tag-influencer","tag-social-media"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/varsity.com.cuhk.edu.hk\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/24876","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/varsity.com.cuhk.edu.hk\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/varsity.com.cuhk.edu.hk\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/varsity.com.cuhk.edu.hk\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/5"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/varsity.com.cuhk.edu.hk\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=24876"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"https:\/\/varsity.com.cuhk.edu.hk\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/24876\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":24959,"href":"https:\/\/varsity.com.cuhk.edu.hk\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/24876\/revisions\/24959"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/varsity.com.cuhk.edu.hk\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/24877"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/varsity.com.cuhk.edu.hk\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=24876"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/varsity.com.cuhk.edu.hk\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=24876"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/varsity.com.cuhk.edu.hk\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=24876"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}