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| Contracts of Topping-up and Rewarding for Live-streaming by Minors |
| Xiong Bingwan |
| Law School, Renmin University of China, Beijing 100732, China |
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Abstract Minors tipping during live streaming has brought about hard legal issues regarding the validity of such act and the legal consequences therefor. It is necessary to make a divide between the stage of recharging and that of tipping so as to better address such issues. The two stages are distinct in nature and contain two independent civil juristic acts. In the absence of statutory grounds for regulating standard clauses, the People’s Courts shall honor the distinction between the “recharge service contract” and the “tipping contract” as arranged by the parties. The tipping contract is, by nature, akin to a service contract of online performances, with a clear attribute of remunerative service. The object and consideration of such service are determined through continuous interaction between the streamer and the user. And both the rights to set prices and make payments fall into the hands of the service recipient. Where there is evidence that a minor used the user account or payment account of the parents’ to conduct tipping, the minor itself should be recognized as the contracting party of such tipping contract. The recharging act and tipping act fall respectively into the two-dimensional contractual relationships between “user and platform” and “user and streamer”. Judging the validity of the two acts separately serves better to address the claims for restitution and compensation arising from the validity defects of the recharging contract and tipping contract. A minor’s recharging act can be rendered ineffective due to the excess of recharging amount, in which case the live streaming platform is liable to refund the minor the virtual assets unconsumed yet. The validity of tipping act in the business model of “savings-tipping” has a weaker connection to that of recharging act, whereas a stronger connection thereto in the model of “instant payment-tipping”. The People’s Courts shall consider whether the parties have agreed upon such connection when judging the validity of recharging and tipping acts and the legal consequences therefor. In the absence of agreement on such connection in “instant payment-tipping”, the platform’s acceptance of recharging can be regarded as assisting the streamer in receiving tips. Thus, the user can request not only the streamer to return the tipped items but also the platform, which assisted in receiving the tips, to refund. Nonetheless, be it in “savings-tipping” or in “instant payment-tipping” where the parties have agreed on a distinction between recharging and tipping, the People’s Courts shall determine the validity of tipping acts and the legal consequences therefor and those of recharging acts in a separate manner. When the tipping contract is rendered ineffective or void due to the excess of the amount of tipped items, the streamer is liable to return the tipped items to the minor’s virtual asset pool. However, the streamer can seek compensation for its loss of performance service from the at-fault parties, with comparative negligence applied if the streamer is also at fault. When the tipping contract is void due to violation of public order or good morals, the user can merely request the streamer to return the tipped items to the user’s virtual asset pool, but not to make a refund. The platform or streamer can seek compensation for losses from the at-fault guardian of the minor, prioritizing payment from the minor’s assets, and claim offsets for the corresponding part. The adjudication of hard legal issues arising from the platform economy shall neither rigidly adhere to traditions and rush to simple conclusions, nor overstate the changes and establish new rules rashly. Instead, we should patiently test and fully utilize the normative functions of existing legal rules, implanting the medium of platform when necessary, to better seek consensus in rules and theories.
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Received: 18 June 2023
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2026, Vol. 56 
