Don’t swallow vlogger ploys of over

Illustration: Xia Qing/GT

In the hyper-internet era, hosts are racking their brains about how to attract more attention and maintain their popularity. Drinking alcohol while live-streaming has recently been going viral on several apps in China. Live-streamers drink a large amount of alcohol to gain attention. Being noticed and profits go hand in hand - but it's dangerous. Some consume an entire bottle of white Chinese spirits within minutes. It has been reported that several Chinese vloggers of mukbang, an online audio-visiual broadcast in which a host consumes large portions of food while interacting with the audience, have died. While the reasons for their deaths are not public, some experts and netizens speculate that overeating must be one of them. The detrimental effects of over-drinking sharply outweigh that of overeating. Some live-streamers broadcast four or five such over-drinking shows per week. This is dangerous - exchanging one's life for money.