Hyperreal Construction by Lifestyle Content Creators from the Perspective of the Society of the Spectacle: A Case Studyof Douyin
Abstract
Short video platforms have become an integral part of everyday life. The way in which the "good life" is visually embellished with online content has become a tangible "cultural spectacle." Based on Guy Debord's work, this study examines lifestyle content creators on Douyin and explores how they construct "hyperreal" representations of everyday life through visual strategies. This study finds that the available "good life" images given to the user on the site are not what real life is about. However, they are only "hyperreal" dreams—especially retouched and optimized snapshots of events meant to be better than the real thing. The study categorizes three groups: rural slow-living content, urban aesthetic content, and daily healing content. It further shows that these images are shaped by examining technology, platform mechanisms, and the culture. These findings suggest that it is a combination of corporate objectives, computer algorithms, and the standards of beauty we have selected for ourselves that produces such images. Apart from giving comfort, though, this may also weaken viewers' awareness of the complexities of real life.
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