Jiafei

About

Jiafei refers to a TikTok trend of Chinese bot accounts that reposted videos from Douyin of attractive Asian women and tried to sell products through absurd advertisements. The iconic Jiafei image was said to be the faces of K-Pop stars Wang Feifei and Meng Jia photoshopped together, but it was revealed in October 2023 that the original picture is from a Chinese model named Dai. Jiafei became a symbol of Stan Twitter discourse and prompted multiple parody accounts that exploited sound effects and satirical concepts like kidnapping through IP addresses. Jiafei is referenced alongside other memes like Skinny Girl Walking Sideways, Super Idol 的笑容 and the Badussy War.

Origin

Bot Accounts

In May 2021, TikTok became saturated with Chinese bot accounts migrating from Douyin. Said bots would repost videos that advertised household products with popular sounds from Douyin. The captions of these videos would ask viewers to click IP-grabbing links in their bios to buy the products. Additionally, the accounts would randomly like comments and mass-like TikTokers' videos.

Most if not all of these original bot accounts have since been removed or suspended by TikTok. One early example still-accessible was posted on June 26th, 2021 by the TikTok^[1] account hunt.wang, earning roughly 22,100 plays in one year (shown below).

Origin of Jiafei Name and Profile Picture

Many of the bot accounts had usernames with the name "Jiafei" which was originally used to refer to the two Chinese, K-Pop stars Meng Jia and Weng FeiFei of the group 'MISS A' (미쓰에이). The use of "JeiFei" to reference both women in one name dates back to 2019 and 2020, before being appropriated by the bots. This was explained in a video from TikToker^[5] vivianmandarin21 on January 10th, 2022, that received roughly 2.7 million plays and 387,800 likes in six months (shown below).

On October 16th, 2023, a model from Beijing, China, revealed that she was the person used in the Jiafei memes. She posted a video on Douyin, the mainland version of TikTok, that the meme uses one of her selfies taken in December 2020. She also shared two more photos from the session (shown below).

**

on October 26th, the TikTok^[2] account @jiafei.dai shared an English-captioned version of the original video (shown below, left), in which Dai says she only found out about the memes in June 2023, after a friend told her. The post amassed over 971,000 plays and 97,000 likes in two weeks.

Spread

Parody Accounts

The Jeifei bot accounts became well-known on TikTok in mid-2021 due to their frequent appearances of users' "For You" pages and the absurdity of their sounds, visuals, poor English and poor video quality. This, in turn, inspired Jeifei parody accounts to surface in mid-2021.

For instance, on July 3rd, 2021, TikToker^[2] jiafei7 posted its first parody video. TikToker jiafei7 continued posting parodies in July 2021, being one of the first on the platform and going viral for the first time for a video^[3] uploaded on July 14th 2021, earning roughly 39,600 plays in one year (shown below, left). Other parody accounts went more viral in September 2021. For instance, on September 9th, 2021, TikToker^[4] jiafei.queen posted a video that received roughly 2.9 million plays and 314,100 likes in ten months (shown below, right).

Jiafei Scream

A TikTok wherein a woman is cooking with an umbrella and screams as fire bursts from the pan onto her face went viral in mid-2021 from Jeifei accounts that shared it. An early example was uploaded on May 11th, 2021 by the TikTok^[6] account advertisment79, earning roughly 7,600 plays and over 800 likes in 12 months (shown below, left). The scream emitted by the woman became known as the "Jiafei Scream" and was remixed into more sounds continuing into 2021. For instance, on September 15th, 2021, TikToker^[7] jiafeingsproducts remixed the scream into a sped-up version, earning roughly 196,800 plays and 10,400 likes in ten months (shown below, right).

"Skinny Girl Walking Sideways" as Jeifei

In October 2021, the Skinny Girl Walking Sideways trend emerged due to a TikToker^[8] and Douyin user named mnmnooxx00. As creators on the platform started to parody the absurd videos of the woman unnecessarily walking sideways between things, creators started to reference both memes in the same content.

For instance, on December 21st, 2021, TikToker^[9] jiefeifam posted a video like this that earned roughly 49,300 plays and 1,400 likes in seven months (shown below, left). In 2022, videos of this nature received more engagement. For instance, on January 4th, 2022, TikToker^[10] matt.aep2 posted a Jeifei edit with a mnmnooxx00 video that earned roughly 54,700 plays and 3,500 likes in six months (shown below, right).

Jeifei Kidnapping

In the comment sections of early Jeifei videos, TikTokers humorously speculated that the bot accounts were kidnapping people by stealing their IP addresses when people clicked on the links in their bios. Because of this, satirical Jiafei accounts also started "kidnapping." One early example was uploaded on November 10th, 2021 by TikToker^[11] jiafei7, which received roughly 34,800 plays and 1,400 likes in eight months (shown below, left). The concept continued to be referenced going into 2022. For instance, on January 4th, 2022, TikToker^[12] jiefeis..sexy..products posted a video that had a girl being pulled from a window, earning roughly 41,500 plays and 1,900 likes in six months (shown below, right).

Various Examples

Search Interest

External References