They are the viral sensations your algorithm loves, ultra-short online dramas starring children.
But after mounting outcries over exploitation and inappropriate content, Chinese regulators have just declared enough is enough.
Today we go behind the crackdown, exploring what these new rules mean for the future of digital entertainment and the real kids caught in the spotlight.
We are live from our studios in Beijing.
This is Roundtable.
I'm Steve.
Thank you very much for sharing your time with us today.
And for the show, I'm with Xinyu and Yushan.
First up.
In response to mounting public concerns over excessively long working hours and the prevalence of inappropriate adult themes, China's National Radio and Television Administration, the NRTA, has unveiled stringent new regulations specifically targeting the booming genre of ultra-short online dramas that feature children in leading roles.
These controversial productions, which have skyrocketed in popularity, by the way, often blur the lines between childhood innocence and mature narratives, prompting a critical examination of their impact on both the young performers welfare and the broader entertainment industry's ethical standards.
This regulatory intervention marks a significant attempt to curb exploitative practices and reshape a digital content landscape where viral success has frequently come at the expense of the children in front of that camera.
It's an interesting story with a very big, big, big gray area.
We're going to get into it all.
Yushan and Xinyu, good afternoon to you both.
Yeah, so this is a move to protect child actors. in viral short dramas.
But I want to start with the dramas themselves.
Give us a little bit of background on what these actually are.
Yeah, the micro short drama or ultra short dramas.
We've covered it on Roundtable several times.
It's been very popular these days.
And, unlike traditional TV shows, these ultra short dramas are those that offer vertical, smartphone optimized episodes that last only a few minutes each episode, and they are specifically designed for casual viewers who prefer a quick, engaging content.
But now here's the new trend, sort of that's going on, that as some ultra-short dramas boom in popularity in China.
There are so many different kinds of genres and varieties, which triggers writers to increasingly reliant on storylines that require the use of preschool performers.
That's often to portray mature characters such as powerful matriarchal figures or tyrannical bosses, but in child form.
And that's what we meant, or that's what I meant, when I said, inappropriate adult themes.
These are themes that we would find, or you would find, typically in a film or a drama that features adults.
Storylines that would typically be intended for adults, because those storylines would typically be lived by adults and not lived by children.
But I guess what's happening here you talked about the writers and the writings, the storylines have to become more creative, I suppose because it's become a very competitive industry.
And there's a lot of players in the game.
And that means that you have to come up with new ways to tell stories.
And I think this is one of the new ways to tell the stories.
Yeah, I think a lot of online viewers.
They have been fatigued by stories, These sort of plays or dramas played by adult characters or actors.
So now with these writers, they are focusing more child led dramas.
They are playing the adult roles.
And for viewers.
I think they for them it's kind of novelty and a big contrast with this adult style environment with this very cute adorable, like children actors playing in this drama.
How old are they?
Some are as young as 4.5 or five to six years old.
And then there are those around 10 or a bit older, 12, 13.
And to give our international listener a more vivid description of how it feels like there are a lot of similar um stories under the title like reincarnation in some sort you know online.
Rather it's a novel or it's an audiobook or it's like ultra short drama.
So you get reborn to become a very um rich girl from a family.
But i'm reborn, reincarnated from my previous life as an adult, but I live in a five-year-old's body.
That's what we're talking about.
Yeah, or war gods, or time travel, or rebirth.
Or superpowers.
Yeah, these themes that we would normally see.
These are not necessarily new themes that are being introduced.
The quirk is, if you will, that like oh haha, there are kids playing these roles.
Yeah, and you can basically see a lot of these short dramas streaming on many platforms that people are already very well known of here in China, like Douyin Kuaishou and WeChat mini programs, as well as some specific apps that only features micro drama, like Hongguo, or other apps like Tomato, who is featuring both reading part and the watching part.
So they have novels and the micro dramas.
So it's of like all over the place in some cases.
And you can see advertisements for these dramas in a lot of different places too.
Yeah, that's what's bothering me so much when I use WeChat these days.
I was just using WeChat as how it is.
It's a chatting app.
But then there are advertisements jumping out that you know.
Play a short clip that hook you up, hang you up.
And as long as you press it, it's going to lead you to the downloading page of one of these microdrama apps.
So...
They're being advertised very well.
They're all over the place.
The shows, just a little bit more background for you.
The shows will.
Typically an episode will be about a minute to maybe up to three minutes max, I suppose.
They're really short, and then you get about 60 to 100 episodes in a series.
So that's, that's quite a few episodes.
Even though the episodes themselves are quite short uh, quite short they do move at a pretty fast pace and you can get uh, maybe the first dozen episodes, or or so, for free, and then after that it becomes a pay to watch type thing.
Um, so the there's three.
They say that there are three hit formulas for these dramas.
What are the three hit formulas?
Yeah, one of them is called Golden Finger.
So in this type of drama, a child has supernatural abilities, such as he or she can foresee, or he has this healing capability.
And the second one is Bloodline Awakening.
So it centers on some hidden heritage.
So it may be the boy or the girl is playing a hidden son or daughter of a millionaire.
And also the third type is called catalyst.
So where In this type of drama, children play a key role in a romantic pairing.
Yeah.
So as you can see here, these are the themes that we're talking about.
And one of the issues is that and one of the issues that people are kind of not loving or not liking about these things is that the kids don't really know what's going on.
What would be an example of that?
Yeah, one good example is this took place in mid-October last year with the child actor actually named Yueyue, and she was dressed in sparkling blue, with white shoes and curly pigtail at the Hengdian Huaxia Cultural Park, which is part of China's largest film and TV studios located in the eastern Zhejiang province in eastern China.
And the four-year-old girl Yueyue.
She played an, An elderly aunt with supernatural powers, in an ultra short drama.
So in one of these scenes, Yue Yue actually needed to tell the other characters that the villain was draining the blood of corpses and trying to summon evil spirits.
So she had no idea what the lines actually mean, but she needed to utter it.
Right, because a four-year-old doesn't know what draining the blood of corpses actually means.
Neither do we.
Yeah.
So her character, she played an elderly aunt.
So she had the mind of an elderly person, the body of a child, but all of these superpowers at her disposal.
And the child, at four years old, of course, she doesn't understand the plot.
She understood that she had magic powers, I guess.
I play with magic.
I'm like fairy.
These lines are really beyond the child's comprehension, I guess.
And another story is a girl called Fang Fang.
And she is at the age of five.
So she played a child who could predict the future and helped her single mother land a wealthy husband in this drama called themed on reincarnation.
And I have digged deeper into her story.
So she began acting in commercials at the age of three.
Oh, she's a veteran now.
And for her, a typical filming schedule can last for five to eight days.
And one of the scenarios that her mother told the interviewer said when Fang Fang was struggling to cry on cue And her mother just told her that if she didn't perform well, then your grandparents, who were visiting her that same day, would have to go.
And then her daughter just immediately burst into tears for that show.
Reason number two, this has become quite controversial.
Yes.
But why now, though, I wonder, why has this become such a hot issue here in the country?
Well, first of all, this has the right on the tide of the booming scale of ultra short drama, or micro drama, here in China.
It's really getting popular these days.
So the overall ultra short drama industry here, that's according to the China Internet Development Report in 2025 shows that by the end of 2025, the number of ultra short drama users in China reached 662 million, with the market size surpassing 50 billion yuan, or roughly 7 billion us dollars, among which the child-led ultra short drama industry is also receiving a growth of um yeah, a relatively good number of growth, because data from data win revealed that more than five percent of the ultra short dramas that saved across various platforms in the 2025 featured children in central roles, meaning that a lot of people 5 of all they save it for later or save it to their watch list as something they'd like to watch.
So, with that popularity, of course, this has caused people, many more people, to notice this genre and to watch it.
And then, of course, caught them on the radar of the regulators.
Growing popularity, growing number of shows.
And all of a sudden, the market regulators are saying, wait a minute, hold on.
We see things that we don't necessarily like here.
And one of the things that they don't like is what they deem as unsuitable for kids.
And here we're talking about the plot lines.
And we've already kind of touched on that a little bit.
Yeah, some that's already been pulled off from the shelf include, like a teenage girl character being married to an adult male character which, thank goodness, is already removed.
It doesn't sound right in the first place anyway.
So that's when the National Radio and Television Administration guidelines came out and note that many child-led dramas increasingly borrow from adult entertainment, plots centered on conflict, manipulation and sensationalism, and all of those are elements that do not align with children's cognitive development or lived experience for them to perform it.
So the claim here is that these plot lines and these children acting out these adult plot lines, it's not good for their development overall.
Yes, so for these children.
I mean they're children but they have to act, speak and behave like adults.
So that kind of triggers an issue and also public concern that maybe prolonged immersion in this type of adult-style dramatic conflict could blur the line between performance and reality for these children who are still forming their sense of self.
Some experts say if children are too immersed in these adult roles, they can lead to cognitive confusion and also it can hinder their psychological development.
Yeah, these are children we're talking about.
They are not merely the carrier of their roles.
That means when they're performing some of them, like little Yueyue we just mentioned they do not understand what's going on but they still repeat lines after lines and that sometimes that can cause mental disturbance along their growth path.
And according to Ian, our friend who paid a business visit to Xi'an in central China's Shaanxi province last year, he was visiting one of those very popular filming sites in Xi'an and he noticed there, right in there, there are some 10 years old dressed up in student tie and those British style very formal kind of down jacket and just walking around feeling so tired because they basically I hate to use this word, but they were used as uh cool in some way to play the roles they were um, responsible to play and say things that they do not understand, but were told to say yes, you know what i mean.
Yeah i, i do know what you mean, and that's one of the okay.
So that's one of the main sticking points is that the kids can't understand.
It could hurt their development.
There was a professor in the school of drama, film and tv at the Communication University of China.
And that professor warned that most kids under the age of six they can't fully distinguish between imagination and reality or fantasy and reality.
So when you put them in roles like this, then it can be cognitively confusing for them and hurt their development that way.
Another thing, another sticking point is that things are always changing for the kids.
These actors are actors, and actors have different roles.
And that means that when you're doing one character one day, you're probably or can be doing another character another day.
And that's part of the issue as well.
So that's the constant change from one crew to another.
And also because these children are playing these online dramas, they are vulnerable to the risk of cyber bullying in the online world because they are still young and they have this early exposure to social media and people are going to leave comments.
Some comments can be really hurtful.
Um, and also, like yushan mentioned, hard work.
I i feel like i've seen some of the examples these children are working overtime, Like the Fang Fang that we've talked about.
The five-year-old veteran.
Yeah, the five-year-old veteran.
Her mother recalls that her daughter once shot 20 scenes in a day and she spent more than 10 hours on a standby.
10 hours?
Yes.
I think at the age of five, they should have plenty of time to play and rest.
But instead, they are working.
For the age of four to five years old, even they're...
If they're in school or preschool, the studying hours is not even that long.
And they should have enough time to sleep.
Because one of the examples that I've checked on is a boy called Xixi and he's also four years old and he once arrived at the scene at noon to have his hair and makeup done and the shooting the next morning he was still shooting.
So he says sometimes the shooting often starts at four to five am.
Yeah, and so the issue here, this issue, this other issue, is that yeah, it's long hours, but it's not done by choice of the kids, right?
They're being put to work, essentially.
And yes, of course, these types of scenarios are things that adult actors deal with being on set for 15 hours at a time, being on standby for 10 hours at a time.
But again, obviously these are adults, and And here we're talking about children, which is another sticking point.
And this is when we get into kind of the legality of things.
And there were loopholes before.
Yes, even though china's labor law prohibits employers from recruiting minors under 16, exemptions are made for those in certain industries such as the arts or sports or, you know, the performing industry, and provisions set out by the national radio and television administrative administration relating to child actors before did not really set any limit on how long they can work and stating it states only that their clothing and performance should be age appropriate.
So here we are seeing a gray area of sort.
You're right.
What does that mean?
Yeah.
All right.
So when we get to the new guidelines, then what exactly do they entail?
Yeah.
The new guidelines released by the National Radio and Television Administration prohibit portraying children in adult-like roles or building plots around scheming, manipulation or manufactured rivalries in order to create dramatic conflict.
So examples include casting children as like we've talked about tyrannical CEOs, or centering stories on extreme bullying.
Or some of the values such as fighting evil with evil.
And also the guidelines also recommend we avoid too entertainment oriented content, such as avoiding content that lacks basic logic or is disconnected from these children's understanding or cognitively inappropriate content.
What are your opinions on this?
I mean, we have a few issues that we can discuss now and let's tackle that one.
The one that kids don't necessarily understand what it is that they are performing.
They don't understand the lines that are saying the tyrannical CEO.
We've never seen a five-year-old CEO before.
Probably not going to see a five-year-old CEO.
Do you have an issue with this or do you not?
The new guidelines state those types of plot lines are now prohibited.
Do you agree or disagree with this?
I certainly agree with it.
Because well, I'm not a parent yet, but if I am to be one, I'll never allow my kids to get anywhere close to this industry.
Well, I mean, that's kind of a different issue, though.
And for the very reason that I see from what we've discussed so far, and well, it's not that it's wrong to want to plan a career of stardom for your kids, since they're young.
There's nothing wrong with that, but there are so many other ways to do it.
Like three-year-old playing in a commercial and you know, child actor from Disney or other very big companies.
That's fine.
But playing in ultra short drama is, As a kid, as some other role's kid, that I understand.
That's been done all the time.
But as some kid who speaks lines like what we've mentioned earlier.
Drawing the blood of the vampires or whatever that was.
Because you know, like when we were young, we play little like dollhouse and imaginary fiction lines that we make out of our living experiences and story that we like.
And sometimes even our parents will stop us from saying certain things.
Saying that don't say that it's bad.
That's a strong parenting and a strong guidance of what's right and wrong as you grow up and learn about the values of the world.
But here, these kids, they are going without that filter of guidance.
They are just receiving lines.
That can be whatever if this gray area is not managed as it is now by the new guidelines.
So
Yeah, I think I have pretty much the same opinion as Yushan, because these children they are not mature cognitively, psychologically.
So they don't know what these lines actually mean.
But we, as adults TV I mean ultra short drama producers we're like putting these lines to these children's heads.
And even though they don't not comprehend, but they understand.
Because of their saying, speaking like that, it can have probably a long-term impact.
Isn't that part of the attraction for the viewers?
Why they are enjoying these types of... I believe so, too.
They found it cute.
Right.
And that's my point, is that you get to see a kid who's four years old, or five years old say this is my company.
And I will not have my employees, right?
So I think there's the angle, right?
There's the angle for the writers and the producers like ha ha, you get to see kids say things that they normally wouldn't say.
But you think this is part of the problem too.
I believe for those type of preference of a genre, AI can do all that now.
You don't need real kids playing a five-year-old boss.
That's a good option.
So if you want to enjoy this type of content, just let AI do it.
Which is also very popular nowadays, isn't it?
Yeah, we see a lot.
Well, you know, I mean...
The story or the controversy of paparazzi suddenly comes to mind, right?
When paparazzi bother or get intrusive photos of celebrities, who's to blame here?
The paparazzi is to blame?
In my opinion, no.
The people to blame are the people who consume the content.
Because if people didn't consume that type of content, if nobody wanted to see a picture of a celebrity in their private life doing their private things, whatever it is they're doing buying a coffee at a cafe if nobody wanted to consume that, the paparazzi wouldn't exist.
There's no market.
I wonder if we can blame the producers or the writers or the directors of these short dramas.
Because if nobody's watching these things, they're not going to make them.
But people are watching these things.
So I guess that's why we need to step in.
Okay.
So that's one issue we had.
What about the acting on demand type thing, where and I want to go back to that example of the mom saying she made her child cry by saying your grandparents are going to leave if you don't, if you don't perform up to standard in this scene?
What are your thoughts on that?
Um, and not just um, i think maybe, for from the mom's perspective, she is directing, she's telling her daughter how to like perform, But also, as a parent, you should take full responsibility of your child's safety, well-being and overall development.
So it's not just about selecting scripts.
Because for Fang Fang's mom she also mentioned that she unwittingly once agreed to a project with a romantic storyline that involved her daughter kissing a boy in this drama, and she first declined.
She suggested the director if we can drop the scene, but the director said it's a selling point, so we have to.
We have to have that scene that's exploitative.
Yes, and then mother like she agreed to that one, but she says she now turns down similar scripts.
From a parent's perspective, i think It is your job to keep your child safe and sound.
And it's not just about communicating with the producers or you are selecting the scripts.
But overall, when these such kind of things happening to your child, you should have to be very well aware of what's happening or what's taking place in your child.
Part of the problem falls on the parents.
Then you think so and and and.
Just one quick anecdotes here to illustrate the point you raised earlier about how scaring a kid to cry so that he can act like he's crying.
Many years ago i was traveling.
I would do.
I was doing a family trip with another family friend who has a very young kid, like about six year old back then she's she's a girl And in order for our parents to enjoy their time better, I was assigned the task to manage the daily playing and accompanying of that six-year-old.
And in order for it to be easier for me sometimes, if she goes too far away from me, I'll say oh, there will be bad people coming to catch you later.
Or if she goes down to a tunnel that we don't know where it ends.
I'll probably just tell her, oh, there's like monsters underneath the ground.
Don't go down.
I was bad.
I didn't know anything, any ways better to manage a kid back then.
I was only a teenager myself.
So that led to a long talk between her mom and me saying that I would like that you guys play around and you don't tell her things like that anymore, because you have no idea what that can mean.
Alter her as she grow up.
She'll probably stay fear of the dark or walk down from many tunnels in the future.
You have no idea where that might lead to.
Same with the crying kids forcing him or her to perform well in the crying scene.
That's a lost trigger triggered in the child actor's heart.
I wholeheartedly agree with you on this one.
You're creating a traumatic event for a human being that doesn't understand the difference between reality and fantasy.
So when you say to a four-year-old child, your grandparents are going to leave and they're not going to come back to elicit tears,
That is irresponsible to me.
And we didn't get to the pay aspect of things.
These kids, if you're wondering, they are indeed paid.
And depending on their experience, paid quite well, I would say.
The newbies, the newcomers, they receive a lower amount, of course.
But to me, that's dangerous and it's irresponsible.
I don't have an issue necessarily with some of the storyline, but again, this is why it's a gray area in my opinion.
Some are okay but some are not okay.
I don't mind a five-year-old saying i'm the ceo of this company.
It's kind of funny actually.
Yeah, but when you have a romantic plot line where a one child is giving a kiss to another child, you're crossing a line there.
Yes, right now, whose responsibility is that?
Blame the writer's.
With no regulations in place, they can write whatever they want to.
That's why these types of regulations are necessary, in my opinion.
The parents need to be on top of this as well.
What's okay and what's not okay?
Is my kid okay?
That's got to be question number one.
Is my kid having fun doing this?
That has to be question number one dash two.
So that's why this is such a complicated and tricky issue.
But there do need to be clear boundaries in place.
And I guess that's one of the things that can be done.
Yeah, I think there's a lot to talk about when it comes to these types of things.
Establishing those clear boundaries, having appropriate content that's age appropriate.
You have to have platform oversight, making sure that the rules that are implemented are very strictly put in place.
And then parental responsibility matters as well, but the fact of the matter is that these are popular and a lot of people are watching them, so we just need some rules to make sure that it's safe.
It's a safe space for everyone involved.
