A Resurrection from the Banned Cringe Social Media Queen: Long Live Guonfucius through House of Fandom and Prosumption

Chinese social media is highly entrepreneurial, especially for microcelebrities and influencers who generate billions of sales per night via streaming and e-commerce media (Chen & Cheung, 2020; Cunningham et al., 2019). They often work in teams or collaborate with agencies (MCNs–multichannel networks) in line with the business model and design of social media platforms supported by well-developed payment systems after the deregulation of the banking sector (Chen, 2021a). In the case of streaming media, e-commerce functions are built in where real-time links of merchandise, coupons, and digital gifts support performers’ live streaming. This has prepared a solid infrastructure for influencers and content creators to engage with the creative economy, where prosumption or prosumerism is a defining feature of such cultural production (Chen, 2021b). One signature feature of one of the largest streaming social media in China, Douyin, known as TikTok overseas, is to have a live PK (player kill) function adopted from video games, through which streamers and influencers can compete for fame and money (Chen et al., 2023). This has given rise to the self-presentation of unconventional content creators who use gendered performance, including queer and queer-friendly influencers. It can be understood as real-time crowdfunding to showcase the financial prowess through what is called a House or Family (Jia), and the followers and contributors “homies”(Jiaren-men). Using these affective terms, influencers aim to reify projected affections and mediated parasocial relationships, in order to, at the same time, nudge social selling, a concept …