The Birth of Shanghai's First Conglomerate

Chapter 51 Lucky General

Chapter 51 Lucky General
Zhao Liying was a little confused.

However, she soon discussed the current situation in the entertainment industry with Chen Pingsheng.

Leaving aside movies, the situation in the television industry is also closely related to the current internet.

Currently, the three major internet giants are all trying to seize mobile traffic, and mobile video has become a battleground for these three giants.

Tencent invested in Tencent Video, Alibaba acquired Youku, and Baidu is supporting iQiyi.

These three dominant forces have also made video websites a major force in television industry investment.

In the past, TV dramas mainly made money by selling to TV stations, which in turn made money through advertising.

It's worth noting that television stations are unlikely to engage in too many unprofitable businesses.

In other words, they won't spend too much money on purchasing TV dramas.

Unlike the three video websites supported by BTA, internet platforms are accustomed to using money as a means of revenue generation.

For them, as long as they can crush the other two companies, losing tens or hundreds of billions a year is no big deal.

It won't cause any serious injury.

After all, BTA is really rich.

This has led to TV dramas becoming longer and longer since 10.

Moreover, the salaries of those popular celebrities are getting higher and higher.

There are even female celebrities with absolutely no acting skills who openly say things like, "I'm worth 90 million," which is incredibly arrogant.

The main reason behind this is the competition from BTA (Baidu, Alibaba, Tencent).

In other words, they drove up the salaries of popular celebrities, which in turn boosted their popularity.

As for so-called "traffic stars," most of them are fabricating data.

Things like having hundreds of millions of followers or getting hundreds of millions of reposts on a single Weibo post.

Anyone with a discerning eye can see that this is all to create a false sense of virality.

The underlying purpose is nothing more than to increase their market value, endorsements, and film salaries.

From 00 to 10, TV dramas were mainly limited to twenty episodes.

Thirty episodes is quite a long time.

Nowadays, TV dramas often start at forty episodes, and fifty episodes are considered few.

Sixty episodes is the minimum; seventy episodes are the standard.

Compared to the TV dramas of the past, these nowadays are undoubtedly much less substantial.

The middle dozens of episodes are often just boring and pointless.

These people film these videos just to make more money.

This was unthinkable before, since TV stations wouldn't be foolish enough to pay for these low-quality dramas.

It's worth mentioning that TV series are priced based on the number of episodes, and so are the actors' salaries.

Zhao Liying explained, "Brother Chen, this problem has existed in the television industry for the past two years. In fact, most viewers are complaining about it, but there's nothing they can do. After all, they can't change the capital or the competition from BTA."

To put it bluntly, if it weren't for the competition between BAT (Baidu, Alibaba, Tencent) in the mobile video sector, the TV industry would never have experienced such a chaotic situation where traffic reigns supreme for so many years.

Ultimately, it's the viewers who enjoy watching TV dramas who suffer from this.

Chen Pingsheng nodded. "You mean if we can change this situation, our company will become incredibly popular?"

"It's definitely possible. Focusing on quality is the way to survive in the long run."

Zhao Liying then gave him an example to illustrate that the Korean style has been very popular in recent years.

South Korea's film and television industry is also world-renowned.

This is certainly due to censorship and subject matter restrictions, but the key reason is that South Korea is producing TV dramas.

The screenwriter is the most important person. In order to ensure the core quality of the TV series, the screenwriter can not only choose the actors at will.

They can even directly replace the director, a power that is unimaginable in China.

In domestic film production, investors have the most power.

Even if they don't understand anything, they can still arbitrarily assign the female lead.

What's even more outrageous is that these actresses, once on set, can freely instruct the screenwriter to change the script.

This means that editors are simply unable to guarantee the integrity and quality of the script.

After all, they have the least power on set.

A good script is often altered beyond recognition midway through production because of actors supported by capital.

Chen Pingsheng also invested in two TV series, although they were both low-budget productions.

The best part is that he never participates in scriptwriting, which is quite rare. Zhao Liying is also reminding him that the editor's role is crucial to making a truly good TV series.

It even truly determined the fate of the show.

This is why editors in South Korea have so much power, and also why their dramas are so good.

If you compare domestic dramas with those from South Korea, you'll see just how big the gap is.

Those shows usually have ten or twenty episodes.

Each episode has its highlights, which is different in China.

Often, the first few episodes are good, but the rest is just filler.

Later on, various unimportant supporting characters started to steal the show.

They really managed to force-feed the audience shit.

Chen Pingsheng chatted with her for a whole morning and managed to get a rough idea of the current state of the drama industry.

I have a general idea of what to do now.

"Lu Zhen, now that you've finished filming, do you have any plans for the next step?"

"Of course."

Zhao Liying said, "Ancient costume fantasy dramas are the most popular right now. I saw a novel online that mainly tells the story of a forbidden love between a master and disciple. The story is very touching. I feel that if it could be filmed in its original form, it would definitely be very attractive."

"Do you have the title of the novel? Let me take a look."

"Yes, it's called Hua Qiangu."

Chen Pingsheng nodded and took the book from her. He then planned to use his "golden finger" to test it.

It's worth mentioning that his entertainment industry investment analysis function has certain limitations.

It can probably only be used once a day, and there's an old saying about investing in TV drama production: nine out of ten investments result in losses.

Truly good TV dramas are definitely a rare resource.

Every time he used it, it was extremely precious.

"Target Analysis: Hua Qiangu"

"Target parsing in progress: please wait."

One second, two seconds, three seconds passed.

A golden panel reappeared in front of him.

"Target analysis is complete."

"Title of the drama: Hua Qian Gu".

Filming period: one year.

Total investment: 100 million.

"Return on investment: 1000%, no upper limit, super hot product."

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