I remember a few years back there was a story on how apparently in China there was a man who successfully sued a woman for six figures due to her not revealing that she had an enormous amount of plastic surgery done on herself. The story goes on that he only became suspicious that something was wrong when he noticed that his children were “ugly” and that is when she fessed up. I saw this story on various TV news channels at the time and it is one of those stories that seem too over the top to be true. Even memes began to be generated over it.
Just today I was reading stories about this where apparently the whole thing was fictional as it was essentially an advertisement. The reason why this story came back up is the model in the meme photo, Heidi Yeh, was expressing how this one picture has ruined her modelling career. Basically, no one believed her that she never had plastic surgery before. Combined with the negative stigma of it, she wasn’t able to get anymore decent work. As a result she is attempting to sue the talent agency and cosmetic clinic for damages.
That’s kind of a scary thought in many ways huh? Like for myself, I don’t necessarily research like crazy when I hear these types of news as to me it’s just one of those “You learn something new every day” scenarios. It’s kind of crazy though in terms of a career that the potential employers wouldn’t actually do a thorough research. Then again, I guess I can believe it as with any type of job most people simply scan candidates quickly. This could hold true for apparent positive news as well such as a person claiming they were responsible for high profile items when it may not even be true.
Like here too, since most people without a personal attachment to the story won’t research it the news will simply spread to the point where it will be a fact. While I think it’s fair to say that’s how crazy fast the Internet can change your image, it does make me think if you can simply reverse the situation just as fast. Example, do you as a solo entrepreneur or a small business have a social media presence to be able to respond back quickly to these types of incidents?
In many ways, it seems like you have to be prepared as anything can be perceived as a fact. It also seems like if you don’t react promptly in the appropriate way it will be too late.