The irrational destructive power of the "rice noodle" craze

Xiaomi has been controversial since its birth, but fortunately, a large number of "Mi fans" have followed behind it, which has made Xiaomi even more successful. However, with the recovery of rational consumption and the step-by-step pressure from domestic mobile phones, Xiaomi is facing unprecedented difficulties today. And this difficulty is the terrible thing about the irrational destructive power of "Mi fans". This article sorts out the grievances and hatreds between the enthusiastic "Mi fans" and "kerosene", and finds the logic behind these "fans turning haters", which is not just a change of personal subjective factors, but a kind of blind obedience under collective carnival.

Not long ago, I wrote an article about the value of iPhone 6. As a controversial domestic mobile phone, Xiaomi naturally became my reference. After comparing a series of factors, I finally came to the conclusion that it is more cost-effective to buy iPhone. But after reading this article, a stranger gave a simple and clear comment: "When I saw Xiaomi, I knew it was another soft-text dog."

Actually, my article itself is very subjective, but I am definitely not praising Xiaomi. Xiaomi is the object of negation in my article. So the netizen's conclusion confused me. However, when I looked through the netizen's Weibo, I found that he used to be a deep Mi fan, but now he has completely turned into a brain-dead Mi hater. This extreme emotional change is something worth studying.

The love-hate relationship between hot rice noodles and kerosene

I believe everyone is familiar with the term "audiophile", but if you don't have much money, you will definitely not be able to be an enthusiast. A good pair of speakers may cost tens of thousands of yuan, and even amateur photography enthusiasts will invest a lot of money in lenses every year. In short, it is difficult to support your enthusiast-level hobbies without a certain level of financial strength. From this point of view, Xiaomi's phrase "born for enthusiasts" has a very different meaning. In Xiaomi's case, enthusiasts are actually losers, but because Xiaomi is embarrassed to call them losers, it steals the concept.

Sometimes I wonder if the people who were crazy about Meizu back then and the people who are praising Xiaomi now are the same group of people? They are essentially a group of people who think they have independent judgment and pursue some unique values, but in fact they often become the most innocent victims of opinion leaders. It doesn't matter what kind of mobile phone a person uses, what matters is money and knowledge. Mi fans who don't have either are actually very pathetic.

The fanatical pursuit of mobile phones is actually no different from those crazy fans who chase Korean stars. The so-called fans are extremely fanatical and lack rationality. When Meizu released the M9, Xiaomi was rising. This group of so-called fans praised Xiaomi in the comments of the Meizu forum and began to talk about Meizu, while they were fanatical kerosene not long ago.

Huang Zhang obviously realized that such fans could not bring any help to the brand, so he started to say directly on the forum that we don’t need fans without quality. As a result, the entire forum was bloodbathed, and no appeal was given, and the account was permanently banned. In the end, the only ones left were the real kerosene fans on the Meizu forum.

Those "kerosene" who were slaughtered were finally attracted to the Xiaomi forum. Lei Jun thought he had found a treasure, but later he gradually discovered that this group of fanatical rabble had high aspirations but no money. Their arrival directly spoiled the atmosphere of the Xiaomi forum. Lei Jun later said the same thing as Huang Zhang - we don't want Mi haters. But in fact, these so-called Mi haters are the original kerosene. Including the group of people in the Xiaomi City Club, many of them are the former kerosene who were banned.

The logic of going from rice fans to rice haters is so simple

After that, the number of people on the Xiaomi forum experienced explosive growth, but Xiaomi has not been able to solve the bad habits brought by kerosene. For example, the grid of the dust screen of Xiaomi 4 is a bit slanted, and Mi fans have been shouting in the forum every day for Xiaomi to recall it. It is actually difficult to define whether this kind of people are Mi fans or Mi haters. They look like crazy fans every day, but when they make some demands, they immediately turn black. They brag about how good Xiaomi is in the forum every day, and when they find that they are not satisfied with it after buying it, they will make a fuss in the forum every day, regardless of whether it is a quality problem. This group of greedy people are getting worse and worse. They even want to force you to make a 3999 yuan machine for 999 yuan and sell it to them.

To be frank, the so-called Mi fans, as well as most of the early Mei fans, are people who have no money but want Apple. Lei Jun said that he could make you a feverish person for 999 yuan, so they thought that they could buy an Apple for 999 yuan. However, after all, the product price is there, and the quality of products at this price cannot satisfy these fans. In addition, there are flaws in Xiaomi's futures model, so Mi fans will completely turn into Mi haters in a very short time.

I have excerpted a simple monologue from a netizen. I believe that after reading it, everyone will be surprised to find that the logic of going from being a Mi fan to a Mi hater is so simple.

What made me become a Mi fan was Lei Jun's release of the Xiaomi phone. At that time, the news that Xiaomi was going to make a phone was released very early, and there were many speculations about its phone hardware configuration and pricing, but generally they were not very optimistic. Because at that time, the high-configuration Android phones of mainstream manufacturers were generally very expensive, everyone hoped that Xiaomi phones would have a more affordable price, but the appearance of Xiaomi 1 shocked everyone. I still clearly remember the shock I felt when I saw the Xiaomi 1.5G dual-core CPU + 1G RAM configuration and the price of 1999.

A phone with the same configuration as a flagship phone but only priced at a mid-range phone, with such a high cost-performance ratio and a good system, basically nothing else to ask for. In an instant, I became a complete Mi fan, and while shouting "Long live Xiaomi", I also informed all my friends who were about to change their phones about Xiaomi, asking them to make Xiaomi their first choice.

After the shock of this super high cost performance wore off, I began to calm down. Reason and experience told me that there are never so many beautiful things in the world, and super high cost performance must be obtained by sacrificing something. But at that time I didn't know what Xiaomi sacrificed. I couldn't find any problems just from the materials used, and the media reviews were all positive.

During this period, a friend who was using Meizu M9 asked me if he was planning to switch to Xiaomi. I still remembered the annoying shortage and price increase situation this friend encountered when buying M9, so I told him, "This kind of phone will definitely be snapped up when it comes out. It would be great if you can buy it at the original price, but I'm afraid you won't be able to buy it." I didn't expect that this unintentional remark would hit the mark, and the situation of Xiaomi is still the same today.

Too high expectations always lead to too high disappointment. Even though I thought Xiaomi might be out of stock, I still didn't expect it to be out of stock to this extent. After Xiaomi 1 was available for purchase, I and several friends rushed to buy it several times, but no one succeeded. Every time it was sold out the moment it was available for purchase. At first, I naively thought that there were indeed too many people rushing to buy it, and I used this reason to comfort my friends who rushed to buy with me. However, the fruitless screen swiping exhausted my enthusiasm, and at the same time, some people found that there were many sources of Xiaomi on Taobao, but the price was more expensive than the official website. I really had no interest in paying a higher price, and I had no interest in rushing to buy it, so I completely gave up on Xiaomi.

The Horrible Effect of the Irrational Destructive Power of the Masses

Le Bon has already mentioned this culture of rice noodles in The Crowd, which is because the masses often represent an irrational destructive force. They are easily instigated, tempted, and guided; they are irritable, fanatical, impulsive, and fearless; they are easy to lose themselves, easy to go to extremes, lack the ability to think independently, and like to resort to violence and bloodshed.

This is like a low-level biological turntable. In fact, it has nothing to do with the individual qualities of the group. What plays a decisive role is instinct and emotion, which is an "unconscious" level, not rationality. Therefore, there is not much difference between the group composed of high-end people and ordinary people. The "God" of the group has never disappeared. The founders of all religious or political creeds can stand firm because they have successfully aroused the fantasy of the masses. They make the masses find their own happiness in worship and obedience, and are ready to go through fire and water for their idols.

It is obvious that Xiaomi has successfully stimulated this fantasy among Mi fans through the community culture of the Xiaomi Forum.

We cause pain to strangers we have never met before. This is a primitive evil impulse hidden deep in the human heart. In reality, individuals feel this destructive desire, but rarely actually put it into practice. However, under the influence of the carnival-like group emotions and the catalysis of the psychological suggestion that they will not be punished, the evil impulse will suddenly erupt.

The process of turning from a Mi fan to a Mi hater is not just a change of personal subjective factors, but a kind of blind obedience under collective carnival. This is the terrible thing about the irrational destructive power of the masses, and this may become the biggest difficulty that Xiaomi will experience.

IT Times Weekly Editor's Note: The low-end mobile phone market targeted by Xiaomi has reached the point of being overcrowded. Consumers are no longer as excited as they were when smartphones first emerged and were priced high. As the entire consumer group returns to rationality, reflecting on the past has become a topic of discussion after dinner. The first bird to stick its head out gets shot. As an outstanding representative of the Internet fan economy, Xiaomi cannot escape the fate of being attacked by the crowd. You know, people always like to look back at the road they have traveled, and it is difficult to hide the denial of their childish behavior in their youth, but they ignore that people and things grow together with time.

As a winner of Toutiao's Qingyun Plan and Baijiahao's Bai+ Plan, the 2019 Baidu Digital Author of the Year, the Baijiahao's Most Popular Author in the Technology Field, the 2019 Sogou Technology and Culture Author, and the 2021 Baijiahao Quarterly Influential Creator, he has won many awards, including the 2013 Sohu Best Industry Media Person, the 2015 China New Media Entrepreneurship Competition Beijing Third Place, the 2015 Guangmang Experience Award, the 2015 China New Media Entrepreneurship Competition Finals Third Place, and the 2018 Baidu Dynamic Annual Powerful Celebrity.