On August 18, a Frenchman living in Beijing set out to make a live broadcast of an event at the Chinese Royal Gastronomy Museum. Antoine Bunel, 38, fi lmed an overseas stu- dents’ visit as part of the Beijing International Youth Tourism Festival, an initiative aimed at helping young people know more about Beijing and promoting cultural exchanges between China and other countries.
For Bunel, talking with netizens through his cellphone camera is his job. He has been an “online celebrity” for about three years. Bunel came to Beijing with his Chinese girl- friend in 2012. As a computer professional, he found an e-commerce job introducing Chinese goods to European and American markets. In 2014, he set up his own account on Weibo, China’s equivalent of Twitter, and began mak- ing live broadcasts of his cuisine. This helped him win a large number of fans and made him an online celebrity. His Weibo account now has more than 124,000 followers.
Today, Bunel, known by his Chinese name An Naonao, runs his own restaurant. He often appears in television shows on gastronomy. He also helps provide publicity to businesses and government departments through live online broadcasts or offl ine activities. Bunel said he has the contact information of more than 4,000 people in his cellphone address book and WeChat account, another popular socia l net- working platform in China.
In his eyes, the most important thing for a person to be an online celebrity is to have as many friends and resources as possible.
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