How can you become a star without money?

Chapter 245 You've isolated the gaming community all by yourself? (2-in-1)

Symbolic interactionism is one of the most important methods in communication studies.

Because the essence of human information dissemination is to acquire public meaning through language, images, and interactive events.

To quickly spread a niche message, you need to find a 'symbol' that the public is most interested in.

Whether it's anime conventions or traditional Chinese style, these are currently niche circles in China. If you want to break out of this circle and attract more viewers and audiences, it's difficult to achieve results by simply actively promoting and generating interest.

It is necessary to condense or create a label for it, and make a strong impact on the public, triggering passive dissemination and discussion.

Communicators cannot decide what the public thinks, but they can decide what to guide the public's thinking.

Anime and manga are seen as outliers, strange costumes, and problems by mainstream culture, and are inherently repulsive. As long as a point of view that mainstream culture can 'despise' is found, a trivial topic can be transformed into a topic that must be discussed.

On the second day of the Comic Con, after the trending topics on major search lists had subsided, many sharing posts suddenly appeared on various forums. The content was mostly large-scale photos of cosplayers with their faces blurred, accompanied by a short essay from the author.

She recounted the entire process of how she struck up a conversation and ended up hooking up at a comic convention, and shared photos and evidence to show just how chaotic and open the cosplay community is. Her writing was delicate and warm, like spring flowers in bloom.

These posts began to spread rapidly across various forums.

Negative topics are a natural outlet for emotions. People are used to satisfying their sense of moral superiority and relieving their own pressure by attacking controversial objects. Moreover, this kind of negative news is the easiest topic to trigger widespread discussion.

In addition, the clothing styles in the cosplay community are indeed quite avant-garde and trendy, satisfying stereotypes and further satisfying the public's curiosity and voyeuristic desires.

Topics such as "Magic Comic Gate" and "Cosplay Chaos" have quietly reappeared on the trending lists of various social media platforms, as well as in the comment section of the blogger who shared about Magic Comic Con yesterday, attracting a huge amount of attention.

In the afternoon, the number of viewers on Bilibili's live stream suddenly surged, jumping from over 2 to over 10. Later, the actual number of viewers reached 5 and continued to rise.

In the early stages of live streaming platforms, it's normal for data to be inflated.

The abnormal data was immediately reported to Wang Yao.

“If you want others to remember something, you have to make a mistake first, and then correct it, but it doesn’t matter who corrected the mistake.” Wang Yao turned to Fu Rui, who had just been selected as the nominal person in charge of the ‘Chinese Style Travel Photography’ project, and said.

Fu Fu is a photography and travel enthusiast, which meets the requirements for project implementation and representative speech promotion. Wang Yao plans to package her as a "travel blogger who eats, shops, and takes photos," and combine her identity as an actress to leverage the project's traffic and buzz.

"So, when faced with this kind of negative news, we just ignore it?" Fu Huan blinked.

“This is a negative attack on the entire anime and manga community. Whoever is the first to jump out is more likely to become a target,” Wang Yao said with a smile.

"But the frequency of appearances at the Comic Con is very high, it feels like we've become a target." Fu Ru had just learned how to read the keyword data in the background.

"But our discussion volume and ticket bookings are rising. Don't just focus on public opinion data, but also on conversion data. As long as the conversion data is not affected, the public opinion issues can be taken lightly."
Negative news is more likely to break through the information cocoon because the human brain is far more sensitive to threatening information than to safe and mundane information. So, to break out of the circle, one needs to rely on these dangerous negative messages. "Wang Yao laughed.

“But what if the negative news gets out of control?” Fu Rong frowned.

"This is actually very common in the entertainment industry. It's called 'black-and-red' marketing. You can see that most of the top-tier celebrities in the industry use this method to break into the mainstream. As long as they don't cross any uncontrollable red lines, there's no such thing as being unable to control it."

The previous "anti-three storm" in the industry caused quite a stir, right? But in the end, it all fizzled out. Unless it's like the Jackie Chan and Little Dragon Girl incident, which targets a specific event, then intervention and control are necessary.

"Let the rest ferment naturally. Once the information has spread sufficiently, and those who should see it have seen it, and those who are interested have become interested, then we can consider using other methods to gradually reverse public opinion. For this kind of scattered, map-based negative news, we can choose 'delay is better than speed' and not rush things." Wang Yao shook his head.

"Then let's just pretend we didn't see it?" Fu Huan asked, puzzled.

"As the project leader, you need to consider how to turn these negative reports into tangible, monetizable resources that will benefit the team," Wang Yao said with a smile.

"We could find a few reliable representatives to participate in the discussion from an anime/manga perspective. That might increase popularity and cohesion," Fu Rui pondered for a moment.

“That’s right, this is indeed a matter of interest. External pressure will compress internal density and make the internal structure more united. A crisis is also a kind of touchstone. You can take some people to look around and see if there is anyone willing to be the standard-bearer in this crisis.” Wang Yao nodded.

Fu Huang nodded and left.

Wang Yao then focused his attention on the information transmitted in the internal group. After buying the trending searches last night, he mobilized the business team to contact major game companies to sponsor the Magic Comic Exhibition.

The CJoy event has just ended this year, so these game companies can move their booths directly to the Magic Comic Exhibition to continue their promotions. Moreover, Wang Yao's fees are not expensive, with a booth rental fee ranging from 1 to 5 yuan per day, which is half the price of CJoy.

However, the results were somewhat disappointing. More than a hundred domestic game companies read the message but did not reply. Some smaller companies that had replied yesterday that they were willing to try for a day changed their minds overnight.

Clearly, this collective rejection is not a coincidence, but rather something that is being pushed forward by someone.

It's really hard to guess who in the gaming industry has such influence.

Wang Yao tapped his fingers on the folder on the desktop, looked at the discussion in the business group, and finally picked up his phone to dial Ding Lei's number.

Ding Lei and Lei Jun are old friends and old rivals. They met during the Internet BBS era. Because they were both tech enthusiasts, they quickly hit it off. Later, Lei Jun wanted to acquire Ding Lei's NetEase but was rejected, so Lei Jun turned to running Joyo.com.

At that time, the two were still friends. It wasn't until 2003, when Lei Jun entered the game industry and developed the online game "JX Online 3" and invited Ding Lei to be his technical advisor, that the two had a big debate and conflict over the direction of the game. Ding Lei even made a bet that if the game had 50,000 users, he would give Lei Jun 100,000 US dollars.

However, "JX Online" was ultimately a success, which is why Lei Zong later liked to make bets with others whenever he had free time.

However, Ding Lei's money wasn't lost for nothing. He turned around and poached all the core technical staff of "JX Online", which almost made Lei Jun furious. He was also known in the industry as the 'most famous poacher'.

As the two parted ways, they also began competing in various fields. Lei Jun turned around and poached Li Xueling, the editor-in-chief of NetEase, to found DuoY, which has led to DuoY's current status as the leading game portal.

Therefore, Ding Lei was not present at the "Game 100 Forum" founded by Lei Zong the day before yesterday.

Moreover, in the past two years, the competition between Lei Jun's "JX3" and Ding Lei's "Tianxia 3" has been very fierce. However, due to NetEase's ugly behavior, the loss of players has been quite serious. On the contrary, "JX3" has gradually caught up with "Tianxia 3" in terms of player numbers because it fully imitates the "World of Warcraft" model and uses YY voice to play on the edge of online dating.

This year, facing the backlog of Tencent and Tencent in online games, NetEase presented a new version of "World of Warcraft" and several PC games such as "A Chinese Ghost Story", "Genesis Journey to the West", and "Datang Wushuang" at CJoy.

However, in reality, NetEase Games has always been at a disadvantage in terms of publicity and promotion because the largest game portal website is in the hands of its old rival, Lei Jun. That's why Ding Lei personally took action to create NetEase's Weibo account, in order to disrupt the monopoly of game portals.

"President Wang? What brings you to my side?" Ding Lei asked, sounding somewhat surprised.

Wang Yao and Ding Lei have a fairly close collaboration on NetEase's Weibo account. In addition to signing Qu Shou for a high price, many of Tianhuo's models who take the "goddess of otaku" route are also NetEase game's contracted spokespersons.

Therefore, the two sides have a good relationship.

"Hasn't Mr. Ding been checking the trending topics lately? I've been hosting a comic convention," Wang Yao said with a smile.

"Is Xingyou really a company under President Wang? They've kept it well hidden." Ding Lei said with a wry smile after a moment of silence.

Although Ding Lei did not attend the meeting, he was absolutely well-informed about all the news that day. Wang Yao was the behind-the-scenes boss of Xingyou, so he naturally knew about it the day before yesterday. However, NetEase has no plans to enter the mobile game market. The main focus is still on PC games and web games.

"It's not that I intentionally hid it, it's just that Xingyou is really not presentable," Wang Yao said with a smile.

"Tsk tsk, it's been in the top three on iOS for a consecutive year, so the number of players on Android must be in the tens of millions," Ding Lei laughed.

"Three months of hard work doesn't even equal the revenue of 'Fantasy Westward Journey' in a single day. Mr. Ding, please don't make fun of me. I heard that NetEase has four flagship games that need promotion this year?" Wang Yao smiled.

"Is Mr. Wang here to invite the pig farm to participate in the Comic Con?" Ding Lei pointed out.

"Someone has said that no one from the gaming industry is allowed to attend the Comic Con. I've been thinking about it, and the only person in the gaming world who can defy powerful figures is Boss Ding," Wang Yao said with a light laugh.

"Tsk, Mr. Wang, don't flatter me. But I'm curious, how did you offend Mr. Lei?" Ding Lei asked.

"Mr. Lei wanted to invest in Xingyou, but I refused," Wang Yao said with a smile.

"Oh, that's exactly what Mr. Lei would do." Ding Lei smiled.

"So I'm planning to make a PC game and play it too," Wang Yao chuckled.

"Hmm?" Ding Lei was taken aback: "Investment in PC games is much different from that in mobile games, and the market competition is almost fierce now. Is Mr. Wang prepared for this?"

“We’re just copying what ‘JX Online’ is doing,” Wang Yao laughed.

Ding Lei listened with great interest. "Young people are really ambitious. They're going straight for the old guard." But since the opponent is Lei Jun, he was indeed interested in helping out.

"Mr. Wang wants to collaborate with me on development?" Ding Lei asked.

"No, that's not it. The Magic Comic Con has been recognized as a major cultural tourism project in Shanghai, and there may be four events every year in the future. Games are an important part of ACGN. I plan to isolate the current game industry and rebuild a new game industry based on the ACG community. Mr. Ding, are you interested in joining? I've already persuaded Mr. Zhang of Sohu and Ms. Lan of Wanmei," Wang Yao said with a smile.

?

Did you isolate the gaming community all by yourself?
"Really?" Ding Lei was stunned for a moment, then burst into laughter.

"The offline audience for the Comic Con will reach at least 100,000 people. Add to that the content collaboration with Bilibili and NetEase's Weibo, and it'll definitely be more interesting than those dry game reports on YouTube, right? I've already prepared a series of collaborative marketing strategies."

"Isn't Mr. Ding's 'A Chinese Ghost Story' about to be released? I happen to be in charge of the publicity and distribution for the movie 'A Chinese Ghost Story,' and I have a pretty good relationship with Liu Yifei. I can help you promote it while I'm at it, and maybe even get Liu Yifei to be the spokesperson," Wang Yao said with a smile.

Upon hearing this, Ding Lei had an idea. Tianhuo Media's content marketing was already unparalleled in the entertainment industry, and it had recently acquired Chengtian Entertainment to enter the first-tier entertainment media field. Its publicity resources and content creation were definitely top-notch.

"A Chinese Ghost Story" is a key game project for NetEase, which even started developing its own engine system for the first time. If it fails, it will be a major blow.

Because all these years, pig farms have been living off the legacy of "Fantasy Westward Journey".

Most importantly, NetEase's current promotional channels are indeed somewhat blocked. The expansion of NetEase's Weibo account has not been ideal. The vertical circle that it originally wanted to build around the gaming/sports field has been disrupted by the intervention of Tencent Weibo, which has disrupted the competition in the sports field.

Tencent, with its deep pockets, has signed a series of top sports stars such as Liu Xiang and Yao Ming. If NetEase follows suit, it will be pointless except to burn money. On the other hand, if it retreats entirely to the gaming field, it will be difficult to support the size of the platform.

More importantly, the recently emerging Ms platform has completely overturned the style of traditional Weibo social media platforms in terms of its model. With built-in player and bullet screen push functions, NetEase is now investing too much in research and development and is considering giving up the competition in the Weibo field.

In the future, game promotion will be dominated by Lei Jun again, which is indeed quite frustrating. However, with the Magic Comic Con and Bilibili as channels, plus the highly compatible groups of anime and games, the promotion can indeed be guaranteed.

As for the risks, they are almost negligible. Besides, there are also Wanmei and Sohu, the fourth and fifth largest players, along with them. How can they not be considered half of the gaming industry?

"How does Mr. Wang plan to cooperate?" Ding Lei asked curiously.

"The Comic Con provides NetEase Games with customized content services for cultural and entertainment promotion, including stage plays, fan works, and songs. 'JX3' started with fan culture, and Skyfire has a more comprehensive and efficient content team in this area. We'll settle at around 20 RMB/CPM, based on the market price. In addition, with a cultural and creative promotion budget of 1000 million RMB/year for the Comic Con, I will sign a group of influential bloggers in the gaming industry to NetEase's Weibo account to help maintain their activity," Wang Yao said.

The pig farm's annual marketing budget is close to 8 million yuan, with nearly 1.5 million yuan invested in online media advertising, search engines, social media KOLs, and offline activities such as e-sports events and campus brand promotions, totaling 1 million yuan. The remaining 5.5 million yuan is mainly used for targeted marketing of games like "World of Warcraft," "Fantasy Westward Journey," and "Tianxia 3." Wang Yao's proposed cooperation model is quite conventional; the only question is whether there will be any additional returns from promoting the annual Magic Comic Exhibition.

"Based on Qu Shou's influence, this 10 million yuan sponsorship should bring at least 3 million signed bloggers to the pig farm's Weibo account, as well as over 100,000 offline exposures." Ding Lei quickly calculated the figures.

“If the customized stage play is successful, we might even be able to finance a movie for you. Shengda’s Dragon Nest is getting a movie made. With such a great IP like Fantasy Westward Journey, we should at least make an anime adaptation, otherwise it would be a waste of such a good foundation,” Wang Yao continued to persuade.

With Perfect World's official announcement of its acquisition of the film and television industry, it has a significant impact on the entire gaming industry. This is the second major gaming company, after Shengda, to attempt the "interactive entertainment" model. The question remains whether this will generate synergistic revenue from the collaboration of "games, comics, and film and television."

Pig farming has entered a bottleneck and slowdown period. If it wants to continue to grow, it will inevitably have to try the entertainment route. After all, the game market has entered an era of competition for existing players, and the cost of acquiring customers is gradually increasing. In the future, what can retain players will probably not only be the game itself, but also the influence of peripheral products.

Hollywood and Japan have already established a mature path in the areas of comics, games, and film. In China, it remains to be seen who will find the patterns first, which will determine the next stage of the landscape for certain industries.

Ding Lei is not a decisive person; he has a tendency to plan before acting. If he were to venture into the unfamiliar field of entertainment and film, he would rather raise pigs. However, if he could spend a little money to have someone else test his abilities, he would give it a try.

Anyway, the money spent on publicity is spent no matter where it's spent.

"This concerns the core business of the pig farm, so Mr. Wang still needs to come up with a decent plan for us to discuss in detail. However, I can agree to place ads on Bilibili," Ding Lei said thoughtfully.

"Then Mr. Ding should send someone to the Comic Con first, otherwise it will be difficult for me to get involved," Wang Yao said with a smile.

"Okay, I'll have someone contact you." Ding Lei chuckled.

After hanging up with Ding Lei, Wang Yao immediately called Zhang Chaoyang.

“Some of the Foxes are no longer under my jurisdiction; they’re managed by President Chen. But how did you offend Lei Jun?” Zhang Chaoyang asked curiously.

Sohu Games was spun off and listed independently in 07, although Sohu was still responsible for its marketing and distribution channels.

Wang Yao then explained the background and hinted at Lei Jun's ambitions in mobile operating systems and mobile games.

"Tsk, that old guy really has a keen eye and a strong ambition. Back then, when I tried to recruit him as CEO of Sohu, he refused outright. He seems amiable on the surface, but he's actually incredibly ruthless." Zhang Chaoyang commented, then changed the subject:
"But you really aren't being fair, huh? You're keeping such a great project like Star Trek all to yourself?"

"I thought it was interesting at the time, so I invested. Who knew it would be successful? It's not that I'm keeping it all to myself; Xingyou is now operating independently and doesn't lack money," Wang Yao chuckled.

"But you have to be careful of Lei Jun poaching people. Ever since Ding Lei got his foothold, Lei Jun has been poaching a lot of people these past few years," Zhang Chaoyang warned.

However, the fact that it became one of the top three in iOS sales with just a little effort is indeed a bit unpleasant to hear.

"I'm not worried. After all, there aren't many R&D companies that offer weekends off. I don't believe CEO Lei has the guts to make the entire Xiaomi and YY groups have weekends off." Wang Yao said dismissively.

The 520 work system is rare in the entire industry, and Wang Yao's salary is not low. Lei Jun may have enough resources to poach people, but he has to consider the issue of implementing the 5-day, 8-hour work system.

Having become accustomed to the 520 work schedule, it would be difficult to adapt to going back to the 996 schedule, and it would also affect the work enthusiasm of the original team, which is a kind of "culture shock".

Wang Yao dared to use this system because he knew that although increased labor costs would reduce net profit, it could stabilize the company's operation and at least reduce employee turnover.

Moreover, the Spark Group has an internal incubation system and encourages internal entrepreneurship. Any employee with a suitable project can apply to form a separate team and receive direct angel investment from the parent company, which is also an incentive for ambitious employees.

"And what's with this Bilibili? Are you going to start a video website too?" Zhang Chaoyang asked again.

"This is just a niche platform to support the gaming industry. It's just something I casually set up. I don't have the resources to burn money like you guys do," Wang Yao laughed.

"Your live stream has over 10 viewers, and your hourly bandwidth costs must be hundreds of thousands. You still say you're just doing it casually? I think you're up to no good." Zhang Chaoyang sneered.

"The live stream data is all exaggerated; the actual number of viewers in the backend is less than 30,000," Wang Yao said with a laugh.

"Really? That's quite a lot. But your event is quite interesting; it's made a lot of people famous. What? Are you going to go for a different style of Meishe? You're not going to rebrand Meishe.com and start selling cosplayer photos later, are you?" Zhang Chaoyang asked cheekily.

Although Meishe.com has long since faded into history, Zhang Chaoyang, like many others in the internet industry, knows the value of Meishe.com's millions of paying users.

Moreover, these Chinese-style/anime cosplayers seem to be at least as daring as the models on Meishe, but they are also something new. As long as the website name is changed, the UI is upgraded, and a message is sent to the millions of old users, it can probably be resurrected.

"Mr. Zhang has reminded me." Wang Yao raised an eyebrow slightly.

Zhang Chaoyang's mind is indeed quick. The group of old perverts on Meishe.com are indeed quite valuable, and they are a highly compatible group with the cosplayer community. However, the usage of Meishe.com is definitely not going to be imitated.

"This project is good, but unfortunately I don't dare to invest. Tell me what you're trying to achieve with this Magic Comic Con," Zhang Chaoyang sighed.

"It's just a normal offline cultural and tourism event related to ACGN (Anime, Comics, Games, Novels) culture, and it's one of the channels for promotion and distribution within the ACG (Anime, Comics, and Novels) vertical of Tianhuo.com," Wang Yao explained.

“You swore that Bilibili would not get involved in the video platform market,” Zhang Chaoyang said with a smile.

"Bilibili mainly consists of two sections: comics and animation. I can only guarantee that we won't get involved in the live-action film and television market, but we will definitely do animation and film and television," Wang Yao said seriously.

Wang Yao wasn't lying to Zhang Chaoyang; Bilibili will indeed be pursuing a strategy of creating high-quality UGC videos in niche categories.

"Like Miss Puff?" Zhang Chaoyang asked.

"Pretty much, but I'm more inclined towards 'Pleasant Goat and Big Big Wolf.' I was just talking to Mr. Ding about the possibility of 'Fantasy Westward Journey' being adapted into an anime/film. Soyou has 'Demi-Gods and Semi-Devils,' 'The Deer and the Cauldron,' and 'Water Margin' which are all high-quality themes that could be adapted into anime."
"And I've also invited Ms. Lan from Wanmei. With the four of us working together, we might just be able to forge a new path for the game industry," Wang Yao tempted.

“I’ll call Mr. Chen and see what he thinks. Souyou really needs new, diversified formats to compete in the market,” Zhang Chaoyang thought to himself.

Having persuaded Zhang Chaoyang, Wang Yao then made a final call to Lan Qi of Wanmei Games. Although Wanmei had participated in Lei Jun's Hundred People Meeting, they didn't have much involvement because Wanmei Group had its own established procedures.

"Both Pig Farm and Souyou are participating? President Wang is trying to cause trouble for our Wanmei Interactive Entertainment." Lan Qi joked after hearing this.

Originally, only Wanmei was exploring the path of combining games and film and television entertainment with Shengda. In January of this year, Shengda announced that it had acquired the film adaptation rights to "Hot Blood Jianghu" and was preparing for production. In March, it invested 600 million yuan with Mango TV to establish "Xiasheng Film and Television" to launch the film adaptation of the online novel IP "Stellar Transformation". In June, after acquiring the agency rights to "Dragon Nest", it officially announced the film adaptation plan.

It was because of the series of positive announcements from Shengda, coupled with the fact that Wanmei's micro-movie "Fantasy Zhu Xian" made some noise last year by riding on the popularity of "Chinese Paladin 3", that Wanmei reluctantly followed suit. Although both parties are currently in the stage of "making promises" but not yet realizing them, after all, no one knows whether there is a market for game-to-film adaptations in China.

If the film/television adaptation fails, it will not only be a failure of film and television investment, but it may also affect the commercial value of the game IP. Therefore, everyone is in a stage where there is a lot of talk but little action.

Although Wang Yao kept talking about the development prospects of the Magic Comic Exhibition, Lan Qi could tell that Wang Yao, by bringing in Pig Factory and Souyou, seemed to really be testing the waters.

While Tianhuo hasn't achieved much in film and television yet, its variety shows are quite successful. With the added support of Tianhuo's theatrical releases and marketing, it might actually succeed in becoming a pioneer, which would put Wanmei in a difficult position.
"Is Mr. Wang's Bilibili going to become a video platform?" Lan Qi asked after thinking for a while.

Wanmei Group currently has three business segments: film and television, novels, and games. It does lack an online platform for in-depth cooperation and binding. The surge in viewership on Bilibili's live streams in the past two days has brought in a lot of targeted ACG (Anime, Comics, and Games) users. Perhaps we could start by cooperating with them.

“Bilibili and Magic Comic Con are both platforms focused on ACGN (Anime, Comics, Games, and Novels), and they are online and offline integrated platforms. In the future, when the time is right, we may add a game live streaming section.” Wang Yao put it another way when speaking to Lan Qi.

"Game streaming? Technically, that's still a ways off." Lan Qi became interested.

"With the interconnection of the three networks, the barriers have been broken down. It will indeed take some time in terms of technology, but it is definitely a trend. In the future, game promotion will not only rely on text and images. Video and live streaming will change the game industry," Wang Yao said seriously.

"Does Bilibili accept investment?" Lan Qi asked in a deep voice.

"We haven't considered financing yet, but it might be possible by the end of the year," Wang Yao said with a smile.

“We can participate in the Comic Con, but Mr. Wang needs to promise us a priority investment right,” Lan Qi said with a smile.

“That’s no problem. After all, Xingyou and Wanmei have a long-term, in-depth cooperation going forward overseas,” Wang Yao agreed.

“Okay, then we’ll do the same as hog farm and wait for Boss Wang’s promotion plan. After CJoy takes down its booth, I’ll have someone set up a booth at the Magic Comic Exhibition.” Lan Qi readily agreed.

Since both NetEase and Souyou have already participated, Wanmei isn't afraid of offending anyone by participating as well.

Wang Yao then relayed the news that Wanmei had decided to participate in the Magic Comic Exhibition to Ding Lei and Zhang Chaoyang. This time, the two of them did not hesitate and immediately agreed to participate.

Wang Yao assembled the directing team of Kaixin Mahua in Shanghai to prepare a stage play project based on the three companies' main games. He also launched a fan song solicitation campaign for the ancient-style song teams under his company, and packaged all of these into the overall plan.

If this model works, the online promotion and offline cultural and creative parallel game marketing model will directly subvert the traditional game portal website. Including the channels such as Ms, Mulan Street, and A/B Station under Wang Yao's control, if he can capture 20% of the promotion share of these three game companies every year, that is a business scale of nearly 4 million, which is enough to support the ACGN industry line.

Just as Wang Yao was calculating the profits, he received a call from Gong Yu, the CEO of iQiyi.

The gaming community banded together to boycott the Comic Con, but it didn't affect Bilibili's ever-growing traffic and popularity. Although it attracted the attention of the video industry, several large companies are about to go public and don't care about Bilibili, a newly emerging small platform. In addition, Bilibili's anime and manga content is a niche category.

There is currently no direct competition between the two parties, but the situation is different for Kiwi. Kiwi has a deep partnership with Wang Yao. The IP library authorized by Kiwi alone brings in tens of millions of yuan in advertising revenue every month and supports Kiwi's user stickiness in the early stages.

The e-commerce procurement model has brought more than a dozen large brand clients to Kiwi. If Wang Yao really does create his own video platform and these two projects refuse to cooperate with them, or try to squeeze them out in other ways, it would be like stepping on Kiwi's Achilles' heel.

So others can ignore Wang Yao, but Gong Yu can't.

"Don't worry, Mr. Gong, this platform is specifically designed for the ACG (Anime, Comics, and Games) business, so it won't affect our cooperation. Oh, but Bilibili's 'ghostly' (parody/remix) section might involve film and television re-editing and promotion in the future, which could bring a lot of traffic to iQiyi." Wang Yao explained with a smile what 're-editing' meant.

The most essential and captivating clips from movies and TV dramas are edited out and released on the platform. After being pushed out, they arouse the curiosity of the audience. If they want to watch the full version, they either have to search for pirated versions themselves or click on the link in the comments section to jump to the 'video platform'.

Gong Yu instantly understood that this was a request for secondary lead generation services.

"No problem, we'll settle according to the market CPC (click-to-redirect) rate," Gong Yu readily agreed.

Baidu has the world's most advanced CPC system, so it has no worries about the risk of Wang Yao engaging in fraudulent transactions. Moreover, Bilibili is a vertical platform with more loyal users, so its conversion rate is definitely higher and more accurate than other platforms on the market.

"Don't worry, Mr. Gong. The premise of our cooperation is mutual trust. As long as you don't betray me, even if Sohu offers me a high price to cooperate, I will refuse it directly," Wang Yao reassured him.

"I acknowledge Mr. Wang's character. I was just asking as a formality, and I had absolutely no other intentions. As you know, I'm not the only one who makes the decisions in the company," Gong Yu said with a smile.

“I understand.” Wang Yao smiled and then told Gong Yu that he had recently bought the online streaming rights to a lot of popular Japanese TV dramas and suggested that they could open a special section for Japanese and Korean dramas.

Since there was no need to pay copyright fees upfront, Gong Yu naturally accepted all offers.

After hanging up the phone with Wang Yao, Gong Yu looked at Li Yanhong on the other end of the line.

"See, Mr. Li, I told you you were overthinking it. Even if he were to start his own video platform, the penalty for breach of contract would be a huge sum of money. He wouldn't be so reckless," Gong Yu said with a smile.

“It’s better to be cautious. After all, we’re getting too close to Zhang Chaoyang, so we need to be careful. Once we’ve developed the platform that’s benchmarking Mulan Street, we won’t be in such a passive position anymore,” Li Yanhong said with a smile.

Gong Yu gave a helpless smile upon hearing this.

(End of this chapter)