On August 31, Liu Xing, a public relations officer of Douyin, posted on multiple platforms to refute the rumor that "Douyin suggested boiling slippers," pointing out that this statement was an untrue piece of information that evolved from a staged joke.
Previously, multiple platforms featured posts by influencers claiming that after slippers were exposed to sunlight and deformed, they sought help from Douyin, which suggested putting the slippers into boiling water, resulting in both the slippers and the pot being damaged. Liu Xing stated that Douyin would not provide such a response, and when it comes to the question of "how to handle slippers exposed to sunlight," Douyin would clearly remind users not to believe in unconventional methods like scalding with hot water or boiling.
After official verification, these videos were adapted from a video clip titled "Who said that small shoes can be boiled back." Douyin has contacted the original influencer who posted "Douyin suggested boiling slippers," and the person admitted that it was intentional to guide Douyin to respond with pre-set incorrect content, which was then staged into a meme video for dissemination. Due to its good traffic performance, many other accounts followed up with similar staged productions.
This incident reflects a new type of public opinion risk faced by AI assistant products: deliberately inducing models to produce incorrect outputs, then packaging and spreading them in a staged manner, has become a traffic strategy for some accounts. False content is easily misinterpreted as a real defect of AI products during its spread. How to prevent abusive use while maintaining an open interactive experience has become an unavoidable issue for AI products.
