Guo Degang, a Xiangsheng (cross-talk or comic dialogue) phenom last year for his original and innovative approach to the traditional art form, has been widely talked over again in the past few days, not about his fame as an artist, but the shame as the image representative of a sub-par weight-losing product.

CCTV, China Central Television, held an evening show exposing products of poor quality on Day for Protecting Consumers' Rights, March 15, in which Zang Mi Pai You, or Tibetan Secret Fat-Eliminating medicine, was made a typical example of low-quality product. Its image representative Guo Degang's name was also made sure to be heard on the national TV.

Guo Degang in an advertisement promoting Zang Mi Pai You, or Tibetan Secret Fat-Eliminating medicine.  

Guo responded promptly the second day on his blog, in which he implied CCTV's pummel to him is a retaliation of his refusal to take part in CCTV's Spring Festival Evening Gala. His blog entry also revealed a number of misfits concerning celebrities as image representatives of various products, immediately stirring up heated discussion on the internet.

According to CCTV, the Tibetan Secret Fat-Eliminating medicine began its large-scale advertisement bombard even before it was registered in the Industry and Commerce Bureau, and Guo could not shirk the responsibility in making the advertisement.

Guo said he tried the medicine himself, and asked a number of his friends and neighbors to do the same thing, only to discover the medicine is "pretty good," also noting he is among the very few celebrities who actually try the products they shoot advertisements for. He got reassured after he learned the product was authenticated by authorities.

"So now you say the product doesn't work, then just go ahead ask the authorities! Meanwhile, if the medicine is really as inefficient as stated on CCTV, then how come our supervising departments let it sell over the country for as long as one year, and let it suck out the blood and toil of the taxpayers? Is that how you serve the people? CCTV has slapped ruthlessly on the face of the supervising departments!" said Guo on his blog.

Interestingly, the evening show on March 15 was jointly held by CCTV and a number of supervising organizations including State Administration for Industry and Commerce and Chinese Consumers Association. A large-scale program was launched to take down the health care medicine from shelves after the evening show.

"Logically, the administration for industry and business and consumers association should know the product was disqualified beforehand, and then provide this story to CCTV, so as to make the evening show an exciting program. Then why did they decide to make the move after the program was aired? Are they just waiting for CCTV to make this story public? If this were true, what kind of responsibilities should they take?" asked Editor Wang Xiaofeng from Lifeweek Magazine on his blog, "now that they had known the product has problems, why didn't they make a more instant move to reduce the damage to the consumers? Even dereliction has been incorporated as part of the entertainment today."

After learning the star giving misleading advertisements, most netizens are dissatisfied and feel disappointed with Guo, but some are also calling for a different approach to tackle the same type of problems in the future. "I recommend relative government organizations constitute some laws as soon as possible to regulate stars making advertisements, so as to eliminate false ads that harm and mislead consumers on a more fundamental and systematic level. It should be law that everybody should abide by, rather than just media playing the heroics to the people," said another blogger Ma Muyang.

(China Daily March 23, 2007)