Shock horror! Young online stars risk life and limb – sometimes literally– to lure fans and advertisers
China’s enormous online community is proving to be a gold mine for young amateur video producers
Many young people in China have gained fame and fortune – sometimes tens of thousands of yuan a month – sharing short, eye-catching videos on mobile platforms, news portal Tencent.com reports.
Their videos nearly always contain surprising content – some of it thrilling, or gory, or just plain offbeat – that has instant mass appeal among the mainland’s young but enormous internet community.
The most popular of the online celebrities are often approached by companies offering lucrative advertising contracts.
One of the biggest success stories so far, a construction worker who goes by the alias Xiao Wei, is famous for performing gym exercises on the construction site or in his dorm.
Xiao Wei will position up to three mobile phones at different angles to film stunning bodyweight moves on construction site scaffolding.