Nation takes to latest trend lying down

Xiao Yao, who is in charge of marketing at Xiron Books Co, initiated the idea for Liu and posted his photos on her WeChat Moments feed. The private company publishes many popular novels, including Liu's new work.

Xiao believes the Falling Stars Challenge is just a fad and that many people post such photos online purely for fun and to break life's monotony.

However, it gives writers an opportunity to present a new book to readers in an innovative way, Xiao said, adding, "It also breaks the public's stereotypical view of the book industry－they find out that being a book editor can be fun.

"Being a book editor means that you have to be multitasking. It's a busy job and you need to communicate with a lot of people."

Xiao uses various promotional methods on social media to promote new publications to readers.

She said that in the internet era, people can easily access massive amounts of data, so it is essential to take advantage of this and provide in-depth information.

"Content always counts. As for books, only good quality is coming through and receiving positive feedback from readers, which has a far-reaching influence," she said.

"You have to be careful when you follow this fad. It is challenging for us to 'cultivate' the good content of our books and do our utmost to spread it online in a proper way."

Fang Shishi, assistant professor from the Institute of Journalism at the Shanghai Academy of Social Sciences, said the trend is just another successful example of an internet meme spreading from person to person.

"Things that are popular on social networking sites to some degree arouse people's social awareness, ranging from taking selfies to self-mockery on social media," she said.

These are the "social genes of the internet meme" and they can be inherited, transformed and chosen by the public, Fang said.

"Imitation is the main communication method of the internet meme. Transformations are all about the details－you cannot just keep the original version unchanged, or change it a lot," she said.

However, she added that an internet meme is easily commercialized on social media, and then it becomes viral marketing and clickbait－content whose main purpose is to encourage readers to click on a link to a particular web page.