Douban app photo:VCG

 
As an epicenter for chaos among fan clubs in China, Chinese media review website Douban has announced it will delete tens of thousands harmful posts and shut down hundreds of accounts that have violated its rules to rectify cyberbullying and rumor spreading behavior among fan clubs. The announcement echoes the country’s two-month campaign to reform cyberspace. 

“We will delete 46,428 posts containing harmful or violating content, permanently shut down or silence 674 Douban accounts, dismiss 25 groups, and punish 20 groups,” read the statement published by Douban on Wednesday. The statement said that the 20 groups being punished have been involved with actions such as rumor spreading, privacy violations and insulting or doxxing other users.

Fan clubs are online groups where millions of passionate fans can talk about or support their idols. Some fandoms show this support by posting photos of their favored stars, but some even go so far as to form small online armies that patrol and try to control the comment areas on social media platforms. 

Douban is not only famous for its reliable TV series and movie reviews from users, but has also become a home for maniac online fan clubs in the past few years.

In 2020, a Douban user, who was also a book editor, published an article on the platform denouncing deviant fandom culture and claiming that fans of Wang Yibo, a member of Chinese boy group UNIQ, had hijacked the review thread under a book he had edited. 

“I’m the editor of Speak, Memory, a Russian book which was recently introduced to the country and released in November,” said the Douban user in 2020.

The user explained that within a week of the book’s release in November 2020, more than 200 irrelevant posts appeared under the review section of the book.

Douban responded to the article saying that it would take the behavior seriously yet it was not until the new campaign kicked off in May that the platform took any “special action.” 

The Cyberspace Administration of China launched a two-month "Clear and Bright" campaign in May to rein in the behavior of Chinese fan clubs, especially when it comes to cyberbullying and spreading rumors on the internet.

Similar fan clubs also dominate China’s Twitter-like platform Sina Weibo, however the platform has yet to take actions similar to Douban’s. 

Global Times