By Gu Yekai, People’s Daily
The online audio-and-video industry, represented by short videos, is seeing new scenarios and business forms emerging. It enriches people’s everyday life and profoundly changes the way of cultural production, communication, and consumption.
According to a report on the development of the industry recently released, the number of internet audio-and-video users in China reached 1.04 billion as of December 2022, and the available market size of the country’s online audio-and-video industry exceeded 700 billion yuan (about $101.8 billion) last year.
In particular, the industry’s growth mainly came from the short video sector, which now has 1.012 billion users and has become the most prominent internet audio-and-video application category.
Li Jun, general manager of the Chengdu branch of Migu, a digital content subsidiary of Chinese communication giant China Mobile, told People’s Daily that the short video sector has a vast user base and strong capability to attract new users.
Short videos’ innovative formats and diverse content strengthen users’ interaction and participation and stimulate their creativity and desire to express themselves. In contrast, the in-depth integration of temporary video platforms and other applications has built a cross-field content distribution and communication network that provides users complete access to the sector, Li explained.
Zhang Chenliang, director of the media center of the Chinese National Geography magazine, is a video blogger that owns 23 million online followers.
Compared with photos and articles, short videos come with various elements such as images, voice-over, music, and film editing, which create richer content and help disseminate popular science, Zhang said.
According to him, this year marks the 12th year since he joined science popularization and the 3rd year after he switched from graphics and contexts to short video communication.
Livestreaming makes another essential part of the online audio-and-video industry. The report said that with 751 million users, live streaming services are the second largest internet audio-and-video application category after the short video. Live streaming is deeply integrated with entertainment, education, commerce, and other fields today.
Zhifang village in Hebi, central China’s Henan province, has become a renowned tourist attraction thanks to the exquisite wall paintings made by young artist Shang Qinjie. Now, with the assistance of online audio and video platforms, the village has gone viral on the Internet, making rural tourism even more prosperous.
Apart from spreading information, the online audio-and-video industry can also create new business scenarios and forms in work and life.
“Take consumer services as an example. We support offline business scenarios through short videos and live streaming to meet users’ demands. This enables merchants in different regions and sizes to expand online business on our platform,” said Li Ran, a general manager of the consumer service department of Douyin, the Chinese version of TikTok.
Yu Bing has over ten years of experience in the bookselling industry. She had run multiple offline bookstores in Harbin, northeast China’s Heilongjiang province.
According to Yu, many physical bookstores are in a difficult situation today.
“It’s not because the business form of bookstores is outdated, but that they need to upgrade and restructure themselves following the changes in the form of knowledge dissemination. The online audio-and-video industry exactly offers a new opportunity,” Yu said.
The woman is now a short video creator that recommends books from a bookseller’s perspective and shares her book publishing knowledge. This makes her more confident in the offline bookstore business. This year, she is planning to open a new bookstore.
New business scenarios and forms enabled by the online audio-and-video industry play a more prominent role in people’s work and life.
According to the report, 42.7 percent of users made at least a purchase while watching online videos or live streaming in the recent six months, 27 percentage points higher than that in 2020.
Li Jun believes that the online audio-and-video industry is getting diversified with more market segments. He explained that its content covers not only entertainment and social interaction but also news, knowledge, and consumer services, which further empowers entrepreneurship, employment, and the development of the real economy.
Quality content is still the most crucial part of the sustainable development of the online audio-and-video industry. Over recent years, short videos have played an essential role in knowledge dissemination.
According to a recent report published by Douyin, the view counts of reading-related videos on the platform surged 65.17 percent year-on-year in 2022, and the number of such videos added to users’ favorite lists saw a jump of 276.14 percent. Besides, 279.44 percent more reading-related videos longer than five minutes were posted on the short video platform last year.
