Chinese Entertainment Intelligence King

Chapter 335 The Weibo War: Sina Was Forced to Consider Calling the Police

The Weibo Night event has ended, but the discussion has only just begun.

Centered on Weibo, various related trending topics emerged one after another, including award controversies, celebrity gossip, and ceremony highlights, while other platforms also saw a large amount of discussion.

The sheer scale and popularity of the event has frustrated many platforms that wanted to imitate it or had their own celebration plans.

Among them, Sina is the most prominent.

Because of their media advantages, in previous years, the Sina Gala was the most popular event among various internet platforms in terms of entertainment industry elements and celebrity lineups.

But this year, Weibo stole the spotlight, and what's even more frustrating is that this year also marks the 10th anniversary of Sina's founding.

The tenth anniversary is not even as good as the first one...

Unfortunately, Sina only has media resources, not film, television, or advertising resources.

Celebrities might give face, but they are far less influential than Yi An in the entertainment industry, not to mention the rise of Weibo and the accumulation of a large amount of media resources.

To put it simply, Yi'an is now a super-enhanced version of Sina. Except for some foundational advantages and distribution channels, Sina is completely outmatched in every aspect.

Sina's stock performance was already poor during last year's financial crisis.

The newly launched Weike has been lukewarm at best, posing no threat to Weibo. Instead, Weibo has been encroaching on its core business, causing its stock price to fall. If there is no clear sign of recovery next year, there may be changes in Sina's top management.

Although Sina's current CEO, Mr. Cao, made great contributions in resisting Shanda's acquisition, he was unable to lead Sina out of its predicament. He was able to replace the CEO in the meantime back then, and he is still able to do so now.

Immediately after the Weibo Night event concluded, Sina held a confidential internal meeting with its top executives to discuss its next steps.

Soon after, Yan Li obtained the meeting minutes and final decision of Sina's senior management meeting.

During the meeting, Sina considered whether to abandon microblogging and micro-businesses and instead operate other businesses.

For example, video websites are still in a booming industry and are not yet saturated. Sina has a huge media lineup and user base, and using blogs and microblogging platforms to drive traffic and transform its business is a good direction.

However, the competition in this industry is also quite fierce.

Tudou and Youku are locked in a fierce battle, with Sohu and several other companies eyeing the fray. It's also rumored that Baidu and Tencent are considering getting involved.

Broadband, storage, copyright, and video content creation support – this stuff burns through money even more fiercely than the Weibo wars.

The same applies to other areas: they either cost a lot of money, have unclear prospects, or offer little return, failing to meet Sina's declining fortunes.

After much discussion, we concluded that our side's strongest suit is microblogging, which has already seen significant investment and has established a foothold to some extent. Overall, this is one of Sina's best options at present.

With the support of some senior executives, Sina's CEO Cao, who was already inclined to continue with microblogging, ultimately overruled other objections.

Fight Weibo to the death!

However, Weibo is developing too fast now, and microblogging platforms can hardly keep up. Even if they try to compete head-on, they need to be strategic, otherwise they'll just be stubborn.

In response, Sina's CEO Cao offered three solutions.

First, it's expensive.

They were already outmatched, and without spending more money, they absolutely couldn't compete. So they had to burn money. Yi'an burned 1 million, and Sina burned 2-3 million to make up for the gap with funds.

Second, they sabotage and use underhanded tactics.

Weibo is the most popular platform, but it is also the most controversial. Last year, Weibo did a lot of positive things, but some socially sensitive topics attracted some dissatisfaction. Sina could capitalize on this.

It's difficult to shut down Weibo, given its size and Yan Li's connections, but it still caused him a lot of trouble and dragged him down.

Official stance is one factor, public perception is another; in short, they're operating in the shadows, trying to tarnish and discredit Weibo.

Third, expand into mobile platforms.

The first two moves are just to catch up and make up for the gap. They might cause some trouble for Weibo, but they are unlikely to cause any serious damage.

The mobile platform is the decisive weapon for victory, and it's also the reason why Sina is determined to fight to the death. If this move is executed well, Sina Microblog has a good chance of overtaking others; if it's executed poorly, the microblog market will be doomed.

"That's pretty creepy."

Yan Li flipped through the intelligence report. To be honest, none of the three moves were too unexpected for him. If it were him, he would probably have done the same.

However, the second trick wasn't as dirty as Sina's.

If you're going to do business, do business. Using this kind of trick is too underhanded. If you can use it, so can others. When the time comes, you'll run away abroad and regret it too late. Some Pandora's boxes can't be opened.

Shaking his head, Yan Li took out his phone and made a call: "Let's get ready to make our move."

So far, Weibo hasn't really targeted Weike, after all, it's in a leading position, and its biggest blow is simply to develop itself.

In addition, Yan Li felt that Sina was being somewhat indecisive, and Weibo had a chance to win without a fight.

In this situation, with intelligence gathering information, it's best to remain inactive to avoid pushing the enemy to the brink of a desperate fight.

At the same time, Yan Li also made relevant preparations. If Sina gave up, everyone would be happy. If they chose to continue, then he would act decisively.

Now that we know Sina's intentions, and their methods are so underhanded, Yan Li no longer needs to be polite.

...

On December 31, just two days after the Weibo Night event, Weibo officially announced the update of several new features.

Weibo accounts can apply to become XX bloggers and enable the long-form content feature, meaning that you can now post blogs on Weibo.

Additionally, after enabling the long content feature, the blog migration function is supported, allowing for one-click import of previously high-quality blog posts to Weibo.

Let me translate this: digging into the roots of the blog.

Weibo emphasizes brevity and speed, which has its own unique advantages, but it also rejects some content creators who write long reviews and articles, such as film reviews, travelogues, digital articles, essays, historical sharing, and short stories.

These people cannot utilize their strengths on Weibo, so they can only stay on blogs or scatter to platforms such as Douban and Tianya.

To be fair, these people aren't exactly mainstream, but their respective small circles still have a certain influence.

The concentrated traffic is also considerable, serving as a good supplement to Weibo content. Most importantly, it can target platforms such as blogs, Douban, Tianya, and Tieba, further reaping users from all angles.

That's right, blogs are just the front-stage competitors; Weibo is also eyeing Tieba, Douban, and Tianya, because these platforms are somewhat similar to Weibo.

They are also Weibo's competitors.

Among them, Tianya Forum was the first to be affected, with its sharing, gossip, discussion, and trending topics features being particularly impacted.

Weibo can do the same thing, and do it faster and better.

Nowadays, many of Tianya's functions have been replaced by Weibo, and a large number of users have turned to Weibo for information acquisition and discussion, resulting in a sharp drop in traffic.

Tianya is still struggling to stay afloat, but it's starting to show signs of transformation, focusing more on in-depth creative works and long-form serializations.

Now that Weibo has enabled long-form content, its massive user base will inevitably attract a large number of creators, which will be a fatal blow to Tianya.

The Weibo war is far from over. Platforms like Weike and Taotao have powerful backers, so they won't be defeated and forced to leave the scene anytime soon.

Without capital support, Tianya might become the first cannon fodder to fall in a battle between experts.

The second casualty was Douban!
Film reviews, cultural discussions, enthusiast interactions, and content creation—Weibo can completely cover most of Douban's functions.

Douban ratings have not yet gained widespread influence, while Weibo ratings, with their larger user base, have formed Weibo's evaluation system and become the primary standard for evaluating films and television shows.

That's right, Douban is actually irrelevant to Weibo, but it's very important to Yan Li and Yi An.

This is equivalent to having control over the referee's scoring; which athlete wouldn't be tempted by that?

Compared to Tianya, which is destined to decline, Douban may not be completely eradicated.

If the transformation is successful, it may become a gathering place for hardcore literary and artistic youth, forming a niche circle far removed from the so-called internet noise.

However, Tieba will not suffer the same fate as Douban and Tianya.

The former two are small in scale and have limited functions, making them easy targets for Weibo.

Baidu Tieba is different. It belongs to interest groups, which are relatively scattered, with hardcore, in-depth and vertical content, while Weibo is a large public square. The two have different organizational forms.

With Baidu backing it, Weibo might be able to attract more users and suppress other platforms, but it cannot replace Baidu Tieba.

Therefore, this new feature, which seems simple, is actually a large-scale harvest.

With the likely release of creative subsidies in the future, if implemented well, it could potentially kill or cripple blogs, Tianya, and Douban in one fell swoop.

Isn't Sina looking for a decisive battle?

Weibo should first target his base, then destroy his blog, cutting off his escape route and support.

In addition to these features, Weibo also announced that it would cooperate with mobile phone manufacturers such as Samsung and Nokia, as well as operators such as China Mobile, China Unicom and China Telecom, to massively install and promote the Weibo mobile app on January 1, 2009.

Previously, Weibo could be logged in with a mobile phone and posted via SMS, which was rather cumbersome and resulted in a poor viewing and user experience. Now, installing the Weibo app is convenient and quick, allowing access to most of Weibo's functions.

In short, you can now browse Weibo anytime, anywhere on your mobile phone!
To attract users to use mobile devices, Weibo will launch a series of benefits.

They're giving away free phone credit, free data, free memberships, and holding numerous events, both online and offline promotions, blah blah blah.
In short, the goal is to convert existing Weibo users to mobile devices in the shortest possible time, getting smartphone owners to download and register for the Weibo mobile app.

This plan wasn't entirely aimed at Sina. Even without Sina, on January 1, 2009, with the official arrival of the 3G era, Weibo was still scheduled to launch and take the lead in the mobile market.

This announcement is also a blow to Sina.

What you consider a brilliant plan and a shortcut to success, Weibo already knew about long ago, and was even better prepared than you were.

In addition, there are some minor features that more or less suppress Sina, and even copied a feature of Sina that was still under development and testing.

And these are just the overt tactics. Privately, Yi'an also began to specifically smear Sina and its affiliates. Well, it shouldn't be called smearing; rather, Weibo simply exposed what Sina and its users had done.

From its inception, Yan Li consciously controlled the direction of public opinion on Weibo, trying to maintain an objective and neutral stance, and even leaning to the left, resisting and suppressing related topics.

In today's internet environment, this is actually not a very popular practice, because there is negative public opinion everywhere.

Weibo is too left-leaning, which is going against the tide and makes it easy to be labeled as a lackey or a news anchor.

To avoid these issues, and also for the sake of popularity and public perception, Weibo sometimes "speaks up for the people" and reports on sensitive social topics.

Although there are some risks involved, given the nature of Weibo, one cannot remain silent. The only thing to do is to be mindful of the scope, focus on the issue itself, avoid escalating it further, and maintain the correct direction.

This approach has drawn some criticism, but also some support, and has received considerable praise from the general public.

In the current Weibo ecosystem, some public intellectuals, or rather, dissidents, face many restrictions and are not as free on Weibo.

That's all. These days, it's impossible to completely eliminate it. Just by restricting and suppressing it, Yan Li has already received a lot of criticism.

If you can't make it on Weibo, many people turn to blogs or microblogging platforms.

Yan Li initially thought that such remarks were hard to find, and even prepared himself to take them out of context.

Upon collecting the data, it was discovered that there were far too many such comments.

Furthermore, it also eliminated Sina's underhanded tactics.

With Sina, the stronghold of dissidents, pointing the way, Weibo will encounter less trouble than Sina, whether it's inappropriate comments or sensitive social topics.

If you want to investigate, investigate Sina first.

If anyone's going to die, it'll be Sina first.

"Kill the chicken to scare the monkey"—on Weibo, as long as it's a monkey, it doesn't matter which chicken you kill.

...

Sina's CEO, Mr. Cao, is speechless!
The high-level meeting had just ended a few days ago, where only the direction was outlined but no concrete implementation plan was yet, and Weibo's three-pronged attack came first, each one more ruthless than the last.

Sina is scrambling to retain blog users from being poached by Weibo, while also considering whether to enable long-form content on Weibo or merge/absorb blogs.

On one hand, they were frantically negotiating with various parties to quickly launch the mobile app, otherwise they would fall behind Weibo and have no chance at all.

Before they could even catch their breath, blogs and microblogs were once again branded as the headquarters of internet rebels.

The public was outraged, and the authorities questioned and inquired about the matter. There were even rumors that an investigation team would be sent in, leaving Sina in a state of utter chaos.

"There's a mole?!"

President Cao has been thinking about this matter for quite some time now. It has been rumored in the industry that Yan Li is skilled at gathering intelligence and is an expert at bribing and planting spies.

At first, Mr. Cao was somewhat skeptical. After Sina launched Weibo, many of Sina's actions were understood and tightly controlled by Weibo.

From that time on, President Cao was convinced that Yan Li had definitely planted or bribed people at Sina, at least at the middle or higher level.

To this end, Sina even orchestrated the arrest of two moles, one from Sohu and the other suspected to be from Weibo, but no evidence was found.

The other party's methods were very professional and clean, leaving no trace pointing to Yan Li or Weibo. Not to mention prosecuting for commercial espionage, even using this to put pressure on Weibo would be self-humiliating.

What's even more infuriating is that even after these two people were exposed, there may still be deeply entrenched moles within their ranks.

This caused a great deal of tension within Sina, as evidenced by the recent high-level meeting which was kept strictly confidential, but it still didn't work.

Don't call it a coincidence. Sina had just finished its meeting when Weibo, contrary to its usual practice, made several major moves that seemed to be aimed at Sina. Not only were they extremely damaging, but they also effectively neutralized Sina's actions.

This wasn't done by an insider; could it be that Yan Li guessed it himself?!

Does he have some kind of supernatural ability?!

While smoking in his office, there was a sudden knock on the door. Mr. Cao responded, and his chief assistant entered, looking serious with a hint of despair.

"President Cao, you asked me to check the situation of the senior executives who attended the meeting on that day. I checked through the channels and found that President Chen and President Chu's wife's accounts were each transferred money twice yesterday and the day before."

Mr. Cao dropped his cigarette: "Who did that?"

“I asked a classmate who works at a bank, and he said that it’s very difficult to trace the specific source of accounts in Hong Kong. Even if you do find out, it might just be a front.”

At this point, the assistant added, "The other party doesn't seem to be trying to hide anything; I think it might be a setup."

It's most likely a setup!
Mr. Chen is the editor-in-chief of Sina.com and the key figure in blogging and microblogging.

Mr. Chu is in charge of commercialization and strategic partnerships. He is basically responsible for how to make money and generate profits from blogs and microblogging platforms.

These two are the absolute core of Sina. If they are the moles, Sina is doomed.

But then again, there were only a few people at the meeting that day, and they repeatedly emphasized secrecy, so the mole could very well be one of those people.

At this point, a sum of money appeared in both of their accounts. Who wouldn't be suspicious?!

President Cao smiled wryly. This was Yan Li's open scheme, revealing the presence of a mole. Whether it was one of the two men or not, they could guess for themselves.

I don't believe these two are the mole; what if it's a ruse?
I believe the two are moles, perhaps they are framing someone or covering up for the real mole.

Or, if one person is a yes and the other is not, how do you distinguish them?

It's inappropriate to use them together while taking on all the risks, and it's also inappropriate to take all the precautions.

More importantly, the two individuals involved must have known that such a large sum of money had been transferred to their accounts. Even if the company trusts them, wouldn't they worry about being abandoned by the company? And what would be the attitude of other senior executives if they heard the news?

If this isn't handled properly, things will get chaotic at Sina's top management.

"Damn, that's so dirty."

The more Cao thought about it, the more upset he became, and he couldn't help but curse. He used to have a lot of goodwill towards Yan Li, a young hero with outstanding abilities, but now he felt that this bastard was just a hooligan.

"Mr. Cao, should we call the police?"

The assistant offered a suggestion, which made President Cao laugh in anger: "What should we say when we call the police? That there's a corporate spy. Where's the evidence? Are we going to send President Chen and President Chu to jail?"

If everyone knew that Yan Li had a mole in Sina's upper management, and that this made everyone in the upper management feel insecure, the stock price would collapse immediately.

Reporting it to the police won't work, suspending him won't work either; suspending a core executive would be too much of a fuss.

But he couldn't remain silent, otherwise the mole would become even more arrogant, and that wouldn't be fair to the other executives either. He was also a little unsure of himself.

After some thought, I decided to make things difficult for the two of them by telling the public that they would be adjusting their work and temporarily leaving the microblogging and blogging businesses.

Once the two left, there were only a few people left. He didn't believe that the mole would dare to leak information to Yan Li again.

Ok?
Why not turn the tables and release a false message to divert Weibo's attention?

...

Hengdian, Hotel

Yan Li, who had just returned to his room after his personal wrap party, raised an eyebrow as he looked at the daily news that had been triggered in the early hours of the morning.

I never expected that a casual move would have such a great effect!
Sina certainly didn't have any undercover agents, but Yan Li would bribe some people to gather miscellaneous information as cover for the system.

Otherwise, if nothing is arranged and messages are received incessantly, it seems too unrealistic and goes against common sense.

Once arrangements are made, things change. How many people are bribed and what information is obtained are all up to Yan Li himself.

The money given to those two executives was not a bribe from Yan Li, but rather a way to confuse the issue, muddy the waters, and leave Sina bewildered.

Unexpectedly, Sina was willing to cut off its own arm for this, it seems they were really scared by the "insider".

Yan Li, who has a cheat code in the system, sometimes can't quite understand the torment and helplessness of being betrayed everywhere and seeing everyone as a traitor.

This highly distrustful environment can sometimes force people to make extreme choices, even knowing it's a trap, preferring to kill the innocent rather than let the guilty go free.

Although Yan Li didn't quite understand, Sina's approach was beneficial to Weibo.

As for the fake news that President Cao was so concerned about, he knew whether it was true or false, and so did Yan Li.

He wanted to turn the tables on Yan Li, who also wanted to find a suitable opportunity to "frame" another Sina executive.

Even without concrete evidence, as with the two examples above, as long as there is suspicion, Sina will have to be suspicious.

Three core executives were suspected and isolated, but the morale of the remaining Sina executives remained high, and he gave Cao a thumbs up.

Well, after defeating Sina, in two years, he'll find a way to invite one or two senior executives to join Weibo or its subsidiaries, thus putting an end to the Sina mole incident.

In this way, the system is protected, and it also serves as a deterrent and reassurance to other competitors.

Yan Li really can bribe core executives, and then everyone will start playing Werewolf again.

"Tsk tsk, I'm wasting my talents in the business world. If I were to go into the intelligence field, I'd have to be the world's top spy."

Yan Li leisurely lit a cigarette and continued studying the annual intelligence triggered on January 1st of this year.

This year's annual intelligence forecast is not extensive, but it serves as a valuable supplement and reference for Yanli's various industries and sectors.

Once Yan Li has thoroughly studied this intelligence, his control and decision-making over the various companies will be much more effortless…

　(7000/196000)

　　
　
(End of this chapter)