Thread by @adadithya

Who wants to know how a $5.2 billion dollar company headquartered in China, listed in the US, and operating in India, is abetting prostitution?

(Short visual story)

THREAD.

This is the story of Joyy Inc, a company listed in the Nasdaq.

Its business: Social Commerce.
Mechanism: Live video streaming.

One of their half a dozen products is @BIGOLIVEapp.

Joyy bought Bigo for $1.45bln in March 2019.
Bigo has more than 22 MAUs globally.

In India Bigo has more than '10,000 paid broadcasters' livestreaming 'content'
Bigo announced a $100million investment in India by 2021.

Story time 👇

This is one of Bigo's many livestreams

Some of them are trained by agencies whom Bigo sponsors. The overall lighting, ring lights on the eye, conversations to be had etc... That's all vetted by agencies to drive traffic.

Rather; a 101 on how to lure the Indian male😏

As I was tinkering with Bigo, I noticed an Instagram handle on this one. Was curious why anyone would advertise a another platform.

Some more digging, and...

Things became clear: Bigo is the Customer Acquisition platform.

"Customers" who are serious will have to give virtual gifts as a way to express their intentions.

When an adequate 'amount' is received, the hosts will accept their message requests on Instagram.

Only 'Serious customers' will be accepted. The validity of this is still questionable, (could still be one of the hosts' friends) but the message is clear: If you want in:

1. Send me Virtual gifts first.
2. Then we'll talk on Insta (maybe, maybe not)

Qualified customer 👇

The Instagram account is temporary (assuming Instagram is vigilant and such accounts can't ever scale)

But the purpose of the account is clear.

The story doesn't end here. So much more to be told about Bigo, but requires a lot more digging up.

If you're aware of anything interesting, leave a comment, or DM please 😊