On social media, users can be whoever they want to be. On platforms like Facebook, Instagram, and Twitter, users can hide behind avatars and pseudonyms and create completely different lives and personas. In short, people are able to catfish.
One Chinese vlogger's catfishing backfired on her pretty publicly.
There was much fear about predators and people being able to hide behind a computer screen and pretend to be anyone they wanted to be.
There was even a whole MTV show called Catfish dedicated to people who get into online relationships with people who turn out to not be who they have presented themselves to be.
This is all thanks to digital technology, like filters that can help change our appearances, often in quite subtle ways.
Snapchat launched their 'lenses' in 2015, and they were super fun to try out.
That was just the beginning. Soon, the social media platform would continue to increase and improve their filter options.
Recently, FaceApp launched a filter that shows what you might look like aged, and it was super creepy and freaky.
They seriously look too real!
This happened to one person who used Snapchat's gender-swapping filter that launched this past spring.
He used the gender-swapping filter to give himself more feminine features and sent a snap to his girlfriend that read, "I have your bf's t-shirt on."
But, yeah, you can how much these filters can really mess with one's reality.
Especially if they pay money and give virtual gifts to you.
This a real life situation that happened.
Qiao Biluo, better known as Your Highness Qiao Biluo on the Chinese Twitch-like streaming site Douyu, is known as a "cute goddess" and has racked up a lot of followers for her looks, 100,000 that is.
She suddenly appeared to look a bit different than her usual youthful, fresh-faced appearance.
Douyu functions sort of the same way as Snapchat — there are various built-in filters users can choose from while using the site.
It's kind of a coincidence that the glitch happened, because just moments before it occurred, her followers were paying her thousands of dollars for her to remove the filter.
It's common in social media spaces like this in China for followers and viewers to give money to wanghong, or online celebrities.
They know that this will provide them better opportunity to be gifted money from "indoorsmen," who can often feel important when they do so.
According to China's Global Times, Qiao Biluo may now be the face of advertisements for beauty cameras, and she announced that she hopes to launch a music album from all of this attention.
This situation definitely brings to light issues of social media and viewer trust.
h/t LADBible and HITC
