A tech glitch on the live-stream of a Chinese video blogger named Our Highness Qiao Biluo has lead to an unexpected revelation and a lengthy discussion on online beauty standards in China.

Followed for being a “cute goddess” the video blogger, it turned out, was a middle-aged woman posing as a younger, glamorous woman using a camera filter.

However, things did not go quite as planned on July 25 when Biluo’s filter slipped during a joint live-stream with another user, Qingzi, on the Douyu platform.

Qiao Biluo with the camera filter (left). Without (right). | Via Twitter

Ironically, the episode was one where Qiao Biluo collected donations worth several thousand dollars from fans with promises that if their collections amounted to 100,000 yuan (a little over Rs 10 lakh) she would reveal her real face. The plan went a little awry when the filter went rogue on her without her knowledge.

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While her co-host managed to keep a straight face and did not react during the livecast, several members of her audience began leaving her VIP chat room.

Qiao Biluo has since suspended her platform.

Avidly followed by male fans, the video blogger is renowned for her “sweet and healing voice”. She now has 650,000 followers on Douyu – a loss of 300,000 since the incident.

On Chinese social media, some have objected to the way Biluo deceived her followers, while others have questioned the intent of men who followed her. The incident has also brought to light the lengths to which China’s video bloggers, who operate under many restrictions, go in order to stand out.