Living in a county town, starting as a stock market maker...

Wang Tianqi's voice came through the receiver, trembling slightly.

Special? Not active?

Gu Ming's smile remained unchanged, but impatience flashed in his eyes.

Is there anyone on this land who is less active than Shen Guodong?

He dared to touch Shen Guodong, so why would he be afraid of someone on the list?

"Speak," Gu Ming said, uttering only one word.

Wang Tianqi on the other end of the phone trembled slightly and quickly said, "Boss, this person... his name is Zhou Shen."

Zhou Shen?

Gu Ming's mind raced.

The name vaguely reminded him of something. Was it some future pop star? But he wasn't quite sure.

"His identity?" Gu Ming asked.

"He...he's the champion of this year's CCTV Young Singers Competition...and now he's a specially recruited young singer with the National Song and Dance Troupe." Wang Tianqi's voice was choked with sobs.

Grass.

Gu Ming cursed inwardly.

No wonder Wang Tianqi was afraid.

Taking action against an ordinary internet celebrity is a commercial dispute.

Moving someone who has an official position or is a member of the national team who came from the CCTV Young Singers Competition is a completely different matter.

This is called undermining socialism.

"Don't touch him." Gu Ming made a decision immediately. "Send me all his information, encrypted at the highest level. Also, remove him from your list, as if you've never seen him."

This Zhou Shen, since he was deliberately blacked out by himself, must have some value.

But now, the timing is wrong.

We need to deal with the big guy in front of us first.

"Yes! Yes! Boss!" Wang Tianqi quickly hung up the phone.

Gu Ming had just put down his phone when the office door was violently flung open.

Su Qingying rushed in.

Her usual composure was gone; her face was deathly pale. She wasn't wearing a bespoke suit; instead, she was wearing a loose sweatshirt she'd worn while working late into the night.

She was followed by people from the Ministry of Justice.

Everyone was carrying stacks of documents, and their faces looked terrible.

"Gu Ming, you're here." Su Qingying's voice was a little hoarse as she slammed a document on the table. "They've made their move."

Gu Ming didn't need to look to know what it was.

But he picked it up anyway.

A lawyer's letter demanding the immediate removal of infringing content.

Signatures: Warner Music, Universal Music, Sony Music, JVR Music...

Below is a joint stamp from almost all record companies, film studios, and major TV stations in China.

"Overnight, our legal email received 1342 lawyer's letters," Su Qingying said quickly. "All the popular videos on our platform, including the background music and movie clips used, were also included."

"They demanded that we remove all related videos from the entire internet within 24 hours, and reserved the right to pursue our platform for joint liability for inducing infringement."

"Wall Street is already reacting; our stock price is fluctuating wildly in pre-market trading, and several investment banks are selling off!"

The office was quiet.

The general counsel, his forehead beaded with sweat and his voice trembling, said, "Mr. Gu, this isn't an ordinary copyright lawsuit... this is... they want us to cease operations."

"They're not after the money; they want us dead. If the court grants their injunction application, over 90% of the popular content on our platform will face removal. At that point, we won't even need them to lift a finger; the loss of users will be enough to bring us down."

The entire senior management team remained silent.

Everyone looked at Gu Ming, waiting for him to make a decision.

However, Gu Ming simply leaned back in his chair, rhythmically tapping his fingers on the table, a slight smile on his face.

He can imagine it.

At this moment, in a private club in Beijing.

Shen Guodong must be holding a glass of red wine, celebrating this war with a group of old guys.

"In the content industry, copyright is king."

Shen Guodong would definitely say this to the people around him.

"That kid named Gu Ming is still too young. Does he think he can overturn the rules with his cleverness? Ridiculous. He doesn't understand at all that the foundation of this industry is in our hands."

A group of old men nodded and laughed.

They thought they controlled the copyright and the rules.

They simply don't understand that in the internet age, these things are worthless.

The real king is traffic.

It's attention.

Who can fill users' free time with the lowest cost and highest efficiency?

"What's the panic?"

Gu Ming finally spoke.

"It's just a few sheets of paper. Is the sky falling down?"

He stood up and walked to the huge floor-to-ceiling window.

"Does Shen Guodong think that by closing the door on our access to music, we're just waiting to die?"

Gu Ming turned around and looked at everyone.

"Wrong."

"He's just forcing us to do something we should have done a long time ago, but we've been too lazy to do it."

A smile played at the corners of his lips.

"Since you're not allowed to use other people's things."

"Then we'll build it ourselves."

"Su Qingying," he called out.

"Here!" Su Qingying straightened up instinctively.

"Hold an online press conference immediately, right now. Announce the official launch of the Starry Sky Open Audio Engine today, at this very moment!"

"What?" Su Qingying was stunned. "We...we don't have such a thing?"

"If I say it exists, then it exists." Gu Ming's tone left no room for argument.

"This engine will be permanently free and open to all independent musicians and audio creators. We don't want their copyrights, we only ask that they authorize us to have non-exclusive usage rights on the Starry Sky platform."

What should we give them?

"Traffic." Gu Ming uttered two words, "Give them the most precise algorithmic traffic support they never dared to dream of before."

"Right now, get Wang Tianqi's team moving. They have the largest list of independent musicians in the country who are being exploited by major record companies."

"Tell those musicians that their era of being buried is over."

"Starry Sky Holdings aims to leverage the entire platform's traffic to propel them into the most dazzling stars of this era!"

boom!

The entire conference room was reeling.

This is equivalent to bypassing Shen Guodong and his group directly.

I'm not playing with your regular army anymore.

I will unite the vast number of people you oppress and build my own music library!

Su Qingying's eyes lit up instantly.

She got it.

This is not just a public relations tactic, but a way to use ordinary creators to fight against capital monopolies.

"I'll take care of it right away!" Su Qingying turned to leave.

"Wait," Gu Ming called out to her, "There's one more thing."

He dialed Shen Lian'an's number and put it on speakerphone.

"An'an, are you busy?"

"Brother Gu Ming! Do you miss me?" Shen Lian'an's voice came from the other end of the phone.

"Your dad, along with his old friends, bullied me." Gu Ming sounded aggrieved.

"What?!" Shen Lian'an's voice immediately rose on the other end of the phone. "That old fogey! He's up to his old tricks again! How did he bully you? I'm taking people to his board meeting right now!"

"No need for that," Gu Ming laughed. "They formed a copyright alliance and sued us, trying to shut us down. Right now, there are definitely a lot of online trolls attacking us, calling us a thieving company."

"Damn it! They've gone too far! Our company is clearly a pioneer in technological innovation!" Shen Lian was furious.

"Therefore," Gu Ming's tone was suggestive, "we need you, our Starry Sky Holdings' Chief Brand Officer, our most capable individual, to redefine the nature of this war."

There was a three-second silence on the other end of the phone.

Shen Lian immediately understood.

"Got it!" Her voice was filled with excitement. "It's just a war of words! I'm an expert!"

"This isn't a copyright dispute; it's old capital bullying technological innovation!"

"This is a war between the new and the old!"

Hang up the phone.

Gu Ming looked at the speechless crowd in the conference room and shrugged.

"See, the problem is solved."

Technically, we have an audio engine.

In terms of content, we have a large number of grassroots musicians.

In terms of public opinion, we have the moral high ground.

A three-pronged approach.

Shen Guodong, how did you lose?

……

In the next few hours, the situation changed across the entire Chinese internet.

Two o'clock in the afternoon.

The legal department email address of Star Holdings is being flooded with lawyer's letters and is on the verge of collapse.

Four o'clock in the afternoon.

The legal department's email inbox at Star Holdings was once again flooded with emails.

However, this time, the email attachment changed from a lawyer's letter to a letter of intent for collaboration, which included an original music demo.

Many independent musicians who have been exploited for years took immediate action after seeing Starry Sky Holdings' announcement of "traffic in exchange for licensing".

They sent their best-kept secrets to this email address.

Six o'clock in the evening.

Just as the entire internet was discussing "Starry Sky Holdings may be facing the biggest copyright crisis in history".

A brand new Weibo topic quickly rose to the top of the trending topics list.

#The shameless bullying of innovation by old capital#

When they clicked in, everyone was surprised.

The host of the discussion was Shen Lian, the heiress of the Shen Group.

She personally took to the issue and published a long article.

She characterized the copyright lawsuit as a premeditated strangulation campaign targeting China's emerging technology companies.

She vehemently denounced the old capitalist alliance, led by her father, for being complacent and using monopolies and lawsuits to suppress anything new that might threaten their position.

At the end of the article, she concluded with a line of bold red text:

"Today, they can crush the stars. Tomorrow, they can crush the innovative dreams of each and every one of us!"

This article instantly went viral across the internet.

Countless young people, burdened by the 996 work schedule, the cutthroat competition, and the exploitation of large companies, have had their emotions ignited.

"Damn! That's so true! The world has suffered under the influence of capital for far too long!"

"A friend of mine works in music. He sold a song to a record company for 3,000 yuan, then the company resold it to a platform for 300,000 yuan! That's outrageous!"

"Support Xingchen! Support Gu Shen! Let's take down these old bastards!"

"Miss Shen is amazing! She even dared to attack her own father for the sake of justice! That's a true socialite!"

Online, voices supporting Xingchen instantly drowned out all negative information.

Shen Guodong spent tens of millions hiring online trolls, but it had no effect and was overwhelmed by netizens' comments.

Private club in Beijing.

Shen Guodong looked at the constant stream of questioning phone calls from various family members popping up on his phone, as well as the trending topic that had received millions of likes.

For the first time, his face looked ugly.

He smashed the wine glass in his hand on the ground.

Snapped!

Red wine splattered on the carpet.

He lost.

Before the trial even began, he had already lost the battle of public opinion.

Just then, his personal cell phone received a text message.

It was sent by Gao Jun.

"Boss, Gu Ming, he... he's also at the court."

Shen Guodong's pupils contracted.

He came in person?

What is he doing here?

Is he here to flaunt his victory?

A sense of humiliation welled up inside me.

Shen Guodong took a deep breath. He knew he couldn't just give up like that.

He has one last card.

With trembling hands, he sent a text message to Gu Ming.

"Admit defeat, and I'll reserve a vice president position for you."

……

At the entrance of the courthouse.

Gu Ming glanced at the text message from Shen Guodong on his phone screen, a cold smile appearing on his lips.

Vice President?

He still thinks I'm trying to steal his job?

He handed his phone to Su Qingying, who was standing next to him.

After reading it, Su Qingying's eyes flashed with shock, which quickly turned into admiration.

This man, once again, accomplished the impossible.

Gu Ming did not reply.

He deleted the message immediately.

Then, he strode forward, facing the flashing lights, step by step, up the steps of the courthouse.

His back was very straight.

He thought, "Shen Guodong, do you think this is the end?"

No.

This is just the beginning.

He wants to win the public opinion battle.

He will also utterly defeat you in law, in business, in capital, in every area you are proud of.