The richest man started taking advantage of loopholes after joining Alibaba.

The Spring Festival is over.

Hangzhou experienced three consecutive days of cold rain.

The glass curtain wall of Alibaba's Binjiang Park is covered with gray watermarks.

The kumquat tree next to the workstation aisle, which was purchased by the administration department before the Spring Festival, has withered and died.

The leaves were curled and yellowed, and the red "吉" (auspicious) character hanging on them was covered with a layer of dust.

The cleaning lady on the early shift bumped her mop handle against a flowerpot while mopping the floor.

Splash!

A few dried leaves were shaken off and fell into the gaps of the mechanical keyboard of the programmer next to him.

No one cleans it.

The air in the entire wireless business unit was filled with a smell even more unpleasant than moldy oranges.

That's the taste of failure.

The attack on Pearl Harbor on New Year's Eve has ended.

The result was disastrous.

WeChat, through its "Shake" and "Red Envelope" features, linked 200 million bank cards overnight.

Despite burning through tens of millions of dollars in budget and having everyone focused on KPIs to recruit new users, "Laiwang" still couldn't stop users from leaving like a receding tide.

Except for one sector.

On the monitoring screen, the data split into two extremes.

The area on the left is the "social interaction area".

The blue curve representing chat activity is as flat as a dead person's electrocardiogram.

The right side is the "Benefits Zone".

The red curves representing coupon redemption, lucky draws, and red envelope grabbing surged like a tsunami, even breaking through the server's peak warning line several times.

Product Director Lao Wang stood in front of the screen.

He was holding an empty Red Bull can in his hand.

The knuckles are white.

Click. Click.

The aluminum can was unconsciously crushed, producing a piercing noise.

"That doesn't make sense."

Old Wang muttered to himself, his eyes dark circles like a panda's, "The red envelopes were sent, and people came. The money's all gone, why aren't they chatting?"

Lin Che sat in the corner, looking at the two completely opposite curves.

He was twirling a pen in his hand.

The reason is very simple.

Because he used Alibaba's money to buy a group of people who were "greedy for bargains" instead of people who "wanted to make friends".

For Alibaba, which is committed to becoming the "Chinese version of Facebook," these users who only care about money and not people are trash.

But for Lin Che, who wants to be an "e-commerce shopping guide," this group of price-sensitive users is a gold mine with a purity of 99.9%.

This misallocation of resources was the opportunity he had been waiting for.

The more divided the current situation becomes, the more advantageous it is for him.

"Meeting."

Old Xiao pushed open the door, his face grim. "The group's COO is personally leading the debriefing. Be prepared to be scolded."

Top floor conference room.

The atmosphere was even more oppressive than the "trial rally" held before the Lunar New Year.

Mr. Ma didn't come.

The meeting was chaired by the group's COO, Mr. Zhang, a "ruthless executioner" known for his iron-fisted methods.

His task was clear: to cut his losses.

If a project proves to be a failure, then cut it off, no matter how much sunk cost was initially invested.

Why did the online communication fail?

Mr. Zhang tapped the table, without saying a word.

No one dared to speak.

The product manager looked down at his toes, while the operations director pretended to write in his notebook.

"Because the positioning is unclear."

A sound broke the silence.

Li Mo stood up.

After a Spring Festival break, he seemed to have regained his energy. His Armani suit was sharp again, and his hair was styled meticulously.

He was holding a thick report in his hand.

There was a gray shoe print on the cover of the report.

That was stepped on by the cleaner in the printing room just now. These user complaint documents are usually thrown away in a corner by the operations department as trash.

But now, it's a knife in Li Mo's hand.

"Mr. Zhang, distinguished leaders."

Li Mo slammed the report on the table, raising a cloud of dust.

"We were building a sophisticated social network, a circle of acquaintances. But now, what has our app become?"

He turned on the projector.

The screen lights up.

That was a screenshot from a Laiwang user's phone.

There were no heartwarming family photos, no pictures of friends having dinner together.

The screen is covered in red psoriasis-like patches:

[Cut the price down! 9.9 RMB with free shipping!]

[Click here to claim 5 yuan phone credit, hurry up!]

I'm participating in a group-buying event with 10,000 participants, but we need one more person! Please help!

Densely packed, noisy, and chaotic.

It looks like a utility pole in a rural-urban fringe area covered with little "GG" stickers.

"This is exactly what Lin Che's team did."

Li Mo pointed at the screen, his finger almost poking Lin Che's nose.

"He brought in a lot of bargain hunters and price comparison bots. These people don't chat or share their lives; they just spam 'GG' in the group and harass normal users."

"Originally, there were a few real users who wanted to experience the social features, but after seeing the environment, they immediately uninstalled it."

Li Mo's voice echoed in the conference room, carrying a sense of heartbroken indignation and righteous indignation.

"This isn't attracting new customers; it's like drinking poison to quench thirst."

"Lin Che, you've turned 'Laiwang' into a giant dumping ground."

The conference room was deathly silent.

Old Xiao frowned, wanting to say something in Lin Che's defense, but when he saw the appalling interface on the screen, he shut his mouth.

Facts speak louder than words.

From a "social" perspective, Lin Che really ruined the product.

All eyes were on Lin Che.

We await his counterattack.

Just like last time, he took out a VGA cable, threw out a set of astonishing data, and slapped Li Mo in the face.

Lin Che raised his head.

He stared at the "junkyard" on the screen, his eyes devoid of anger or even the desire to defend himself.

He simply looked at Li Mo calmly.

That look in his eyes was like he was looking at a perfectly matched partner.

Li Mo is right.

This is a cancer.

Only when it is defined as a "malignant tumor that undermines the core strategy" will the company be eager to remove it.

Every attack Li Mo makes now is helping Lin Che complete the final piece of the asset stripping puzzle.

"Mr. Li is right."

Lin Che spoke up.

The voice was soft, carrying a hint of weariness and helplessness.

"In order to meet KPIs, the actions were indeed distorted, and the introduction of these users has definitely affected the community atmosphere."

He did not refute it.

He confessed.

Li Mo was stunned for a moment. He had prepared a whole host of backup plans, ready to fight Lin Che for three hundred rounds.

It was like punching cotton.

Mr. Zhang, who was sitting in the main seat, pushed up his glasses and gave Lin Che a sharp look.

"Since it's trash, let's clean it up."

Mr. Zhang's voice was cold and ruthless.

"Alibaba doesn't need a false sense of prosperity. In order to save the social attributes of 'Laiwang,' it must purify its ecosystem."

He paused for a moment, then delivered the verdict.

"Cut off the benefits section, ban all accounts posting GG (Golden Tickets), and eliminate all price comparison bots."

This is the logic of large companies.

When a limb is necrotic, amputation is the only option.

Even if that limb carries blood bought with tens of millions of dollars in funding.

It rained harder and harder.

Rainwater meandered down the glass of the floor-to-ceiling windows, forming distorted curtains of water.

Through the water curtain, the new headquarters building of Alibaba's Xixi Park, which is under construction in the distance, appears blurry.

It's like a future whose shape is indiscernible.

The meeting has ended.

The crowd dispersed.

Lin Che remained seated, without moving.

He took off his employee badge from around his neck.

The blue ribbon was wrapped around my hand twice.

My fingers gently traced the small print on the edge of the employee badge that read "P7 Product Expert".

He wore that plastic sign for three months.

Now, it's time to take them off.

Someone kicked him under the table.

It's Lao Xiao.

"Are you crazy?"

Old Xiao lowered his voice, his tone urgent, "Why didn't you defend yourself just now? Those millions of users may have made a fuss, but that's real money spent on traffic! If you cut it, it's really gone!"

Lin Che turned his head.

He looked at Lao Xiao's anxious face and gave him a cold look.

That was a look that said, "Shut up, don't mess things up."

Old Xiao was stunned.

He had never seen such an expression on Lin Che's face before.

It's not the dejection of a loser, but the cruelty of a hunter seeing his prey fall into his net.

Lin Che stood up.

He stuffed his work badge into his pocket.

"Mr. Xiao, the company's decision is correct."

He straightened his collar and his tone returned to its usual respectful manner.

"Since it's a poison pill, you should spit it out. Keeping it will only poison you."

He picked up the worn-out laptop bag and walked out of the conference room.

The corridor was empty.

Only the overhead fluorescent lights emitted a buzzing sound.

Lin Che walked to the corner of the stairwell.

There are no surveillance cameras here.

He took out his phone and found a number.

That was a college classmate of his from the group's legal department.

They have a very close relationship, but they rarely contact each other to avoid suspicion.

Now, there's no need to avoid suspicion.

Fingers flew across the screen.

There were no small talk, no formalities.

Only one line of text:

"I'm drafting a 'Non-Core Asset Divestiture Agreement' because I want to buy some of the company's 'scrap'."

send.

Lin Che looked at the green checkmark on the screen that said "Sent successfully".

Li Mo thought he had removed a malignant tumor.

Little did he know that he was cutting off the very beginnings of Pinduoduo, a company with a future market value of hundreds of billions.

Lin Che, meanwhile, planned to use the scrap metal price to pocket the diamond that Ali had discarded.