Huang Wei ( zh, c=黄薇, p=Huáng Wēi, born 7 September 1985), commonly known by her stage name Viya ( zh, c=薇娅, p=Wēiyà) is a Chinese

social media personality A social media influencer, or simply influencer (also known as an online influencer), is a person who builds a grassroots online presence through engaging content such as photos, videos, and updates. This is done by using direct audience intera ...

known for using

livestreams Livestreaming, live-streaming, or live streaming is the streaming of video or audio in real time or near real time. While often referred to simply as ''streaming'', the real-time nature of livestreaming differentiates it from other non- live ...

Taobao Taobao is a Chinese online shopping platform. It is headquartered in Hangzhou and is owned by Alibaba. According to Alexa rank, it was the eighth most-visited website globally in 2021. Taobao.com was registered on April 21, 2003 by Alibaba Cl ...

Live to sell various items as a form of

influencer marketing Influencer marketing (also known as influence marketing) is a form of social media marketing involving endorsements and product placement from influencers, individuals and organizations who have a purported expert level of knowledge or so ...

. Her prowess at selling items, including many high-priced ones, has gained her the moniker "queen of livestreaming". In December 2021, she was fined $210 million for tax evasion as part of a greater crackdown on entertainers and investors, the biggest fine for a livestreamer in China.

Career

Being born in a retailer family in

Anhui Anhui is an inland Provinces of China, province located in East China. Its provincial capital and largest city is Hefei. The province is located across the basins of the Yangtze and Huai rivers, bordering Jiangsu and Zhejiang to the east, Jiang ...

province, Huang opened her first store, located in Beijing, at the age of 18 and worked in the "front" selling apparel and modeling while her boyfriend (now husband) Dong Haifeng took care of back-end and inventory operations. She performed on Anhui TV's talent show "Super Idol" and became a member of a music group for some time before going back to the shopping business and opening more stores in

Xi'an Xi'an is the list of capitals in China, capital of the Chinese province of Shaanxi. A sub-provincial city on the Guanzhong plain, the city is the third-most populous city in Western China after Chongqing and Chengdu, as well as the most populou ...

. By 2012, though, they migrated from brick-and-mortar to e-commerce and signed up for

's livestreaming program in 2016 as one of the first channels. On Taobao, she gained a reputation for being able to sell any product or service, with news that she had sold a rocket launch service for ($6m) in 2020 sold over ($1.3 billion) of inventory on

Singles' Day Singles' Day () or Double 11 () is an unofficial Chinese holiday for people who are not in a relationship. The date, 11 November (11/11), was chosen because the numeral 1 resembles a bare stick (), Chinese Internet slang for an unmarried man. ...

in 2021, which led to her being dubbed the "queen of livestreaming". In December 2021, as part of a broader crackdown on Internet celebrities and entertainment personalities in China, she was fined 1.34 billion yuan ($210 million) for misreported income in 2019 and 2020 that led to an underpayment of 640 million yuan ($100 million) in taxes, the biggest fine given to a livestreamer in the country, and her social media accounts were taken down.

References

{{reflist Living people People from Lujiang County Chinese people convicted of tax crimes Chinese Internet celebrities Year of birth missing (living people)