The unmaking of Mimeng: the rise and fall of China’s polarising social media empress
- She cooked up ‘poisonous chicken soup for the soul’ and profited from ‘selling anxiety’
- The controversy – and fake story – she created in her quest for ‘clickbait’ ultimately did her in
Her fans hailed her wisdom and followed her teachings. Critics said she cooked up “poisonous chicken soup for the soul” and profited from “selling anxiety”. But in the end, the controversy – and fake story – that Mimeng, China’s social media clickbait queen, concocted finally caught up with her.
Before the “we-media” icon closed her WeChat account with 13 million followers on February 22 – weeks after shutting her Weibo account with 2.6 million followers – she had risen to the pinnacle as an internet phenomenon.
She had grasped well the truism of our times: in an era when anyone can set up an online account and share their thoughts with a wider audience, high clicks translate directly to money.
Advertisers had reportedly paid 750,000 yuan (US$112,000) for ads on Mimeng’s site – one of China’s most popular social media publishing platforms – where she posted her often cutting, sensational stories on love, relationships, marriage and money.
Topping the pieces were “clickbait” headlines like: “How much you have to spend to become a goddess”, “The kind of man who never cheats on you” and “Yes, it’s true, I love money”.
Each of these stories generated more than 100,000 views, a benchmark in the social media world for internet meme status.