Back to 1997, I became the originator of online literature

Chapter 412 The Big Move by Qidian
Not long after, Sun Liang delivered the packaged pickled fish and boxed lunch.

Huang Qingya, sitting in front of her computer, was engrossed in reading the draft of "The Romance of Chinese Martial Arts". As soon as Sun Liang left, she took the pickled fish and boxed lunch to her computer desk and continued eating and reading at the same time.

Cao Sheng took the opportunity to take a shower.

He figured that she was hogging the computer and he couldn't type anything for the time being, so he figured he might as well take a shower since he was just killing time.
Huang Qingya, who was eating and reading, heard the bathroom door open. Turning around, she saw him looking like he had just finished showering. She couldn't help but purse her lips, thinking: I knew it. Even if I said I wasn't feeling well these past few days, he wouldn't let me off the hook once I came here. He has so many tricks up his sleeve...

She didn't feel much aversion to it.

Having decided to come to him, she had already prepared herself mentally for that aspect.

She was even prepared to act.

She plays a woman who has her period but still has to satisfy her boyfriend's sexual needs.

So when she finally finished reading all the drafts of "The Romance of Chinese Martial Arts" after spending more than two hours, got up and came to Cao Sheng, and sat in his lap, Cao Sheng was a little surprised.

At this moment, he was leaning against the headboard of the bedroom, holding a book in his hands and reading.

He was quite surprised that Huang Qingya dared to sit in his lap today.

"finish watching?"

he asks.

Huang Qingya nodded slightly, looked into his eyes, sighed with admiration, and praised, "How do you always come up with such interesting stories? I feel like you write about topics that no one else has ever written about before. How is your brain structured?"

Cao Sheng: If you were also reborn and returned to the past, you could too.

Cao Sheng: "Read more books in your spare time, and you will naturally generate different inspirations when reading different books."

Huang Qingya didn't doubt that he was lying, and nodded, saying, "It seems I haven't read enough books."

She paused for a moment, then asked in a low voice, "Do you need me to take a shower too?"

Cao Sheng smiled and shook his head, thinking: Since I can't do anything today anyway, why bother taking a bath?

"Need not!"

After he finished speaking, Huang Qingya said "oh," looked at him for a moment, and then slowly lowered her head to kiss his lips.

Cao Sheng was very surprised.

He thought to himself: Woman! You're playing with fire! You're on your period, and you still dare to provoke me? Are you planning to kill me and then leave me to my fate?
What happened next gradually made him realize that she was very responsible; if she dared to start a fire, she would put it out.

Although she didn't even take off her pants, she successfully extinguished all his anger.

……

Cao Sheng's life here remains peaceful.

But the starting point has already begun to take action.

In the following days, some authors who were serializing their works on Qidian received in-app messages from the Qidian author backend.

For example: old pig.

One morning, when Lao Zhu logged into the author backend and was preparing to update, he unexpectedly saw an in-system message.

Upon opening it, the text message I saw was as follows:
"Dear author, after a comprehensive evaluation by our editorial team, your work 'Nine Sons' is of good quality and is expected to pass the publication review of Yangtze River Literature and Art Publishing House. We are wondering if you still hold the simplified Chinese copyright for this book? If so, and if you are interested in publishing the simplified Chinese version, please contact your editor as soon as possible to discuss this matter. Thank you!"

After reading the text message, Old Pig was both surprised and delighted.

He had heard that Qidian and Changjiang Literature & Art had reached a strategic cooperation, and that Changjiang Literature & Art would select 6 works from Qidian for publication every month. He asked his editor if there was any possibility that his book "Nine Sons" would be published by Changjiang Literature & Art.
His editor at the time said there was hope.

After all, his book is currently very popular on Qidian, ranking among the top few.

It frequently tops the weekly recommendation list.

However, several days have passed, and he gradually began to think that he had no chance.

Therefore, he was quite pleasantly surprised to suddenly receive such an internal text message.

He immediately logged onto QQ and contacted his editor.

"Handsome! I just saw a private message on the site and learned that my novel 'Nine Sons' can be published in simplified Chinese, right?"

After a while.

The editor replied: "It's not certain yet. Our editorial department has only decided to include your book in the first batch of works recommended to Changjiang Literature & Art Publishing House. Whether it will pass Changjiang Literature & Art Publishing House's publication review in the end is not up to us. We have to wait for their review results. Do you still hold the simplified Chinese copyright for your book?"

Old Pig: "Yes! Yes!"

Editor: "Would you be willing to have 'Nine Sons' recommended to Yangtze River Literature and Art Publishing House for review?"

Old Pig: "Yes! Of course I'm willing! It's such a good thing, right?"

Editor: "Okay! Could you please send me the first 7 words of the draft?"

Old Pig: "Huh? I still need to submit my manuscript like this? Hasn't my book already been published on Qidian?"

Editor: "This is their designated submission process; there's nothing I can do about it."

Old Pig: "Oh, I see. Okay then! I'll get it done now, and it should be sent to your email before noon."

Editor: "Okay."

……

On this day, 30 of Qidian's top authors received similar in-app messages.

The authors who received this in-system message were all pleasantly surprised.

Most of their works have already been published in traditional Chinese characters in Taiwan.

But simplified Chinese publishing?
They had long heard that some works could be published in simplified Chinese in mainland China.

However, very few online novels can actually be published in simplified Chinese in mainland China.

Unfortunately, none of the works by these 30 top authors on Qidian have been published in simplified Chinese.

It's not entirely their fault.

After all, Qidian is not yet number one in the industry.

Qidian is unique in that it has not been established for long, its traffic and influence are not the best in the industry, and it has never had any publishing resources.

Until recently, Cao Sheng used the simplified Chinese copyright of his new book as a condition to bring in Yangtze Literature and Art Publishing House for Qidian, which finally gave Qidian access to mainland publishing resources.

As for why Qidian sent such an internal message to 30 authors at the same time?
Doesn't Yangtze River Literature only select 6 works from Qidian for publication each month?

The reason is actually quite simple!
It was Baojianfeng's decision.

At an internal meeting at Qidian, Bao Jianfeng said, "Although President Cao only helped us secure a publication quota of 6 books per month, we want to give more authors hope for publishing simplified Chinese versions! Therefore, I propose that we recommend 30 popular works each month to Changjiang Literature & Art Publishing House. Even if some works fail to pass Changjiang Literature & Art Publishing House's review the first time, we can recommend them a second or even a third time. I think it's not important whether these works pass Changjiang Literature & Art Publishing House's review or not. What's important is that our most popular authors on Qidian know that we have been fighting for them to have the opportunity to publish simplified Chinese versions!"

This decision was unanimously approved by the editors.

That's why on the same day, 30 popular authors received this kind of in-site message.

...Besides these 30 popular authors.

On the same day, another group of authors who were serializing their works on Qidian also received another in-app message from Qidian.

For example, the author of the current top-selling new book—Fingertip Ashes.

That noon, he logged into the Qidian author backend and received an in-system text message.

The message reads: "Dear author, our website will be piloting a paid subscription reading model next month. Once this model is launched, works that are available for paid reading will receive a share of the royalties. Your work, 'Swordsman Reborn,' has been evaluated by our editorial team and deemed suitable for the first batch of subscription reading. For details, please contact our contracted editor, Dandan. Dandan's QQ: ******."

Seeing such an internal message, the cigarette ash on his fingertip was quite taken aback.

Paid subscription reading model?

What is this pattern?
Do other websites have this model?

This was a pattern he had never heard of before.

He understood from the literal meaning that this meant readers would have to pay to read it.

but……

He felt this was very unreliable.

Now, other websites, especially industry leaders like Rongshu, offer free reading, but Qidian charges for reading. Can readers still willingly pay?
Why not read books that cost money when there are free ones available?

He almost laughed.

I think the chances of this model succeeding are extremely slim.

but……

The phrase "will receive a share of the royalties" mentioned in the text message tempted him.

I thought to myself: No matter whether this model succeeds or not, even if I only earn a few hundred yuan, that's still some income! It's better than not earning a single penny.

With that in mind, he logged onto QQ and added the number of the contracted editor, Dandan, from the text message.

"Egg...why did you choose such a strange name..."

He was muttering to himself as he added the egg number.

"Hello! I am the author of 'The Rebirth of a Swordsman'."

When adding the Egg ID, he encountered a question set by the other party, and he briefly introduced his identity.

After waiting for quite a while, the other party finally accepted his friend request.

He immediately sent a message: "Hello! I received an in-app message from you saying that my game 'Swordsman Rebirth' can be signed with you and participate in some kind of payment model, right? Could you please explain what this model is in detail?"

The message has been sent.

But Dandan didn't reply to him for a long time.

More than ten minutes passed, and Dandan still hadn't replied.

This made the cigarette ash on his fingertip start to reflect on the question he had just asked. Had he offended Egg? Was Egg just too lazy to explain to him? Should he apologize?

Just as he was about to apologize, Egg finally replied.

"Hello! I was processing a contract for another author, so I couldn't reply to your question immediately. I'm sorry!"

Before the cigarette ash on fingertips could reply, Egg sent another message, demonstrating Egg's amazing typing speed.

"Yes, your novel 'Swordsman Reborn' has been included in the first batch of paid subscription works. You need to sign an electronic copyright authorization agreement with us. As for the details of the payment model, you will understand after reading our contract."

The cigarette ash between my fingers was still visible when I received this message. Before I could even finish reading it, Dandan sent me an electronic contract.

The dialog box suddenly enlarged, and the right sidebar expanded, showing that he needed to download the contract.

The cigarette ash on my fingertips made me feel like I'd fallen into Egg's trap.

You need to follow the other party's instructions.

He hesitated for a moment, then, with a touch of curiosity, clicked download.

A moment later, the contract was successfully downloaded.

During this time, Dandan sent him two more messages.

"After you download the contract, please take a close look at it. If you have any questions, we can discuss them after you have reviewed the contract."

"By the way, you can take a look at this contract first. If there's anything you need to modify, just let me know later. You can't modify it yourself. Oh, and the verification code for the contract is 4422. You need to enter this verification code to view it."

So formal? It's just a contract, why is there a verification code?

This further fueled the curiosity in the ash on his fingertips.

As soon as the contract finished downloading, he opened it and saw a window that required him to enter a password.

He entered the verification code, and the main text of the contract finally appeared before his eyes.

The sheer length of the contract exceeded his expectations, and the detail of the terms surprised him. However, as he read through the contract, he gained a clearer understanding of paid reading and finally figured out how it was charged.

……

A total of 50 people received this text message.

Some of these cases overlap with those who received the first type of in-site text message.

However, most of them are authors who have recently gained popularity for their new books.

When Cao Sheng was discussing paid subscriptions with Bao Jianfeng, he mentioned that the first batch of works for paid subscription should ideally be newly published books with around 20 words. This is because if the word count is too high, the plot is often padded, which significantly reduces readers' interest in continuing the story and makes them even less interested in subscribing. If the word count is too low, much of the plot hasn't been developed yet, so readers' interest in continuing the story is also low, and their interest in subscribing is similarly small. Therefore, it is recommended to choose new books with around 20 words.

This suggestion was repeatedly discussed at internal meetings of Qidian.

Initially, some people objected, arguing that all works should be selected from the top of the recommendation list, regardless of word count. They believed that works ranked high on the recommendation list indicated a large number of readers and the largest number of readers willing to pay for subscriptions.

But as the discussion gradually unfolded...

Opinions gradually came to a consensus.

More and more editors agree with Cao Sheng's view: In works with more than 20 words, the phenomenon of padding the plot is very common, and the more words there are, the more serious the padding becomes. In fact, the quality of the work and its appeal to readers are declining.

This is not an isolated phenomenon; it is a common phenomenon in the entire online literature community.

It's an inevitable phenomenon!

there are many reasons.

For example, most online novel authors are self-taught. Before writing online novels, they had basically never written a long novel. Most writers create based on passion, which far exceeds their ability to write stories.

Therefore, when they write, they can often write a good beginning, but as the plot deepens and the word count increases, their control over the plot becomes weaker and weaker, and they get writer's block. When they get writer's block, adding filler to the plot becomes an inevitable choice.

For example, the increasing trend of online novels updating daily forces authors to update quickly, leaving them little time to think about the plot. Under this pressure to update, it is inevitable that some authors will pad their works in the later stages.

(End of this chapter)