The world is in trouble

Chapter 305 Liao Feng in Unbearable Pain! Global Focus!
In Lin Xiao's view, WeChat is actually a product that developed naturally.

After using QQ for many years, most people feel a deep-seated need for a more mature chat software.

It's less flashy and more concise and mature.

Most importantly, social relationships are more genuine.

However, it's a bit early to release it now. There are still too few people with smartphones, and if it's only available on a computer, it won't have much of an advantage and will never be able to beat QQ.

But for Lin Xiao, this timing was just right.

Zhang Xiaoyan is 29 years old this year. She graduated from Zhejiang University and works for a state-owned enterprise.

Born in a rural area, she was the pride of her parents and the village from childhood. She attended the best university in the village and was almost the first person from the village to receive a master's degree from a prestigious university.

Although she doesn't earn the most money now, she has the most respectable job in the village.

But gradually, she became afraid to go home.

Because she is not married yet.

Every time she returned to the village and walked along the road, she would inevitably be asked about it. Of course, she knew perfectly well that people weren't necessarily doing it on purpose; they just really didn't have anything in common to talk about.

Moreover, she is the center of attention and will definitely be the subject of much discussion among the villagers.

Therefore, whenever she returns to the village, she will definitely be urged to get married.

Her parents were the most anxious, even on New Year's Eve. Her father had a little to drink, so he couldn't stop talking.

"You'll be thirty-one after the New Year. Look around the village, look around the town, who's thirty-one and still not married?"

"Other people's children are already in elementary school, and you're not even married yet."

"If you don't get married now, it will be too late to have children later."

"If I had known, I wouldn't have let you study so advancedly. You only come back a few times a year. If you hadn't studied so advancedly, you might have two children by now."

At times like these, Zhang Xiaoyan could only remain silent.

What do you mean by "you'll be 31 after the New Year"? Does that mean you'll be that old by the traditional Chinese age reckoning?
And is it that I don't want to get married? I just can't find anyone.

Almost all the unmarried men in my workplace are from the city, and they don't want to date someone like me who comes from a rural background.

She also went to a dating agency, and even became a member of Jiayuan.com.

She knew her problem; she wasn't very materialistic, but she was a little bit obsessed with looks, though she herself was only of average appearance.

So it's been delayed like this.

My parents kept nagging on and on, even while watching the Spring Festival Gala.

She could only take out her phone to play, the Quantum Phone Pro, the one that costs 5999 yuan.

There have been minor disagreements at home regarding this phone.

Her father kept complaining, asking why they had to spend so much money on a cell phone? There are tons of cell phones for a few hundred yuan these days, aren't they just for making calls?
Many people in the village can't even save six thousand yuan a year.

Zhang Xiaoxiao earns a decent salary, averaging around 12,000 to 13,000 yuan, but she owns a small apartment in Hangzhou, so she's usually quite frugal. However, when it came to buying a phone, she couldn't resist the rose gold look of the Quantum Phone and impulsively bought it.

But... after buying it, she really didn't regret it.

She even deeply felt the meaning of that saying: expensive things, good things, only make you feel uncomfortable at the moment of paying for them, the rest is all pleasure.

I glanced at the TV occasionally and saw Xia Xi.

Her eyes immediately became glued to the TV. She was a sucker for good looks, not just men, but also for beautiful women.

Xia Xi is so beautiful.

She's probably every girl's idol.

Immediately afterwards, WeChat advertisements were ubiquitous throughout the CCTV Spring Festival Gala.

For chatting with acquaintances, use WeChat.

Classmates chat using WeChat.

WeChat, a chat app that's easy and hassle-free.

WeChat is a chat app for adults.

Compared to historical advertising slogans like "The world may be vast, but it's still just between you and me," "I wasn't born strong, I was just born ambitious," and "If God gives you too much talent, He's destined not to give you a smooth road," Lightning Group's advertising slogan is much more down-to-earth. This is a choice made after careful consideration and weighing of various factors.

Perhaps in the future, Lightning Group will continue to use these more distinctive advertising slogans.

But at least this first wave of advertising slogans was catchy and simple, which is actually something they learned from Alibaba, because when Taobao was advertising on TV, it was also very simple and straightforward.

Zhang Xiaoxiao instinctively picked up her phone and opened QQ.

She suddenly realized that she rarely opens QQ anymore, as if she really had a mental burden about it.

She has been using QQ for several years, which has been a part of her college and graduate school life. She even had QQ when she was in her senior year of high school, and she has more than a hundred friends on it.

But... she always had a feeling.

This QQ account holds memories of her youth. Perhaps it will be a beautiful memory in the future, but at least for now, she doesn't really want to look at it.

Like most people, she has a need to reset her social circle.

But she also finds it difficult to manually reset everything in QQ, so over time, she doesn't open it much anymore.

A chat app that's easy to use and suitable for adults?

Zhang Xiaoxiao keenly sensed that she had this need, but she didn't know how to satisfy it.
What are chat apps for adults?

It means not being too enthusiastic, nor too cold; maintaining a certain distance and a relatively dignified way of chatting.

Under the constant barrage of advertisements, she instinctively downloaded WeChat.

Opening the app store on the quantum phone, WeChat was indeed at the very top of the list.

After downloading and installing, a login page appeared.

You can log in using your mobile phone number or your Facebook account.

She directly selected her Facebook account, and then a pop-up appeared asking if she wanted to load her friends list. She clicked yes.

Then, my Facebook friends appeared.

Furthermore, the higher the frequency of interaction, the higher it is ranked.

She started selecting manually, and in the end, out of about a hundred Facebook friends, she chose about thirty.

Suddenly... she saw a familiar face.

Is this my high school classmate Li Xiaochen?
She remembered that Li Xiaochen didn't do well in school and went to remedial classes after failing the college entrance exam. He was considered good-looking at the time, but he was introverted and rather thin, so he wasn't particularly outstanding among his classmates.

But... that face is really good-looking.

As if possessed, she clicked the button, and a few seconds later, the other party accepted the request.

But... there was no chat.

I just gave a brief greeting.

"You're in Hangzhou too? I heard you're at the Mobile Innovation Research Institute?"

He specifically inquired about me.

"Yes, you're here too?"

Li Xiaochen: "Yes, I opened a training class in Hangzhou to teach children to play the piano and draw."

Then, both sides stopped after only a brief encounter.

Zhang Xiaoxiao began exploring the functions of WeChat and found that it was really very simple, with far fewer functions than QQ.

She even felt it was too simple.

However, upon closer inspection, she discovered that WeChat has some new features in certain details.

For example, you can send voice messages.

For example, the settings for Moments are very detailed, allowing you to assign who can see your Moments, who can't see them, and so on.

Moreover, you can directly shoot a video and post it on your WeChat Moments.

Because she saw Li Xiaochen's WeChat Moments, which showed a family of five waving to each other during their New Year's Eve dinner.

Then she was surprised to find that Li Xiaochen was actually so handsome?

She instinctively continued exploring the functions inside, and then, almost inexplicably, clicked "like".

I immediately felt incredibly panicked, as if I had inadvertently sent out some kind of signal, only to discover that the like could actually be canceled.

So she quickly canceled it.

But... after canceling it, I felt I had overreacted, so I liked it again.

Because of the nature of her work, she immediately noticed it.

WeChat is indeed an opportunity to reset social interaction; it's a social software that helps people mature.

Moreover, it was truly designed for mobile phones.

..............................

It's hard to say whether this astronomical promotion was a success or a failure.

First of all, WeChat's installation volume is astonishing.

Within just ten days, the number of users who downloaded, installed, and registered the app reached more than 60 million.

This is undoubtedly an unparalleled success.

However... the daily active users after downloading and installing the app are not ideal, and are even declining.

Many people come just for the novelty, or simply for the prize draw.

Because the odds of winning are just too high.

However, very few users own smartphones; the vast majority log in on computers. They initially played around with it with interest, but later discovered it wasn't much better than QQ, and even had far fewer features—nothing like the feature-rich QQ.

Besides, I already have QQ, so there's no need for me to use WeChat anymore. That's why many people download and install it, then just leave it aside.

Only a small percentage of people actually use it consistently.

And coincidentally, this group of people highly overlaps with quantum phone users, and even iPhone users.

They need to reset their social circles and need a more mature and pure chat software.

They don't know why they're increasingly reluctant to log in to QQ. Maybe it's because they have too many friends, it's too bloated? Or maybe it's too childish, too flashy?

But inexplicably, WeChat perfectly met their needs.

Looking at the data in the backend, Xia Xi couldn't help but say to Lin Xiao, "Aren't we doing this too early?"

At this moment, Lin Xiao understood Lei Jun's words even more: "Wait for the wind to come!"

WeChat is indeed best promoted when it has a large number of smartphone users; it's a bit too early now.

but……

Lin Xiao has always done things like this.

Instead of waiting for the wind to come, we directly create the wind.

In fact, even now, Lin Xiao has felt a bit of delayed gratification.

Whether it's Facebook's domineering presence, the success of the quantum phone, or even the restoration of his reputation, it will all come later than he imagined.

He fantasized that a qualitative change would occur at some point, but it never happened. However, after waiting for more than half a year, or even a few months, that qualitative change would still come.

Lin Xiao: "Let's continue. Anyway, the one thing we have plenty of right now is patience."

Immediately afterwards, Xia Xi's assistant walked in.

"President Lin, President Xia, and Chen Yizhou are here to visit."

Lin Xiao: "Then I'll excuse myself."

Xia Xi, unable to bear it any longer, rubbed Lin Xiao's face: "What are you pretending for? What are you pretending for?"

A moment later, Chen Zhouyi walked in and was slightly taken aback when he saw Lin Xiao.

"Mr. Lin, I never expected to meet you."

Then, he said to Xia Xi, "President Xia, Microsoft China and Microsoft headquarters have basically agreed to acquire Renren.com for three hundred million US dollars."

Lin Xiao was also slightly taken aback. So it went so smoothly?

Microsoft gave up so easily?

Renren.com has developed quite impressively now, at least in the areas of high-end sharing and social networking, showcasing high-end lifestyles, and targeting female users, it has done a great job.

Although profitability is still a long way off, it's pretty awesome in this market segment.

A few years ago, Renren.com could be considered a semi-junk asset that was redundant with Facebook.

Renren.com is now considered a high-quality asset in a niche market. Microsoft is actually willing to sell it for only $300 million?

This is normal, because for Microsoft, Renren.com is not even a drop in the ocean; its original mission was simply to help promote MSN.

For Microsoft today, Xbox and mobile operating systems are the top priorities.

February 14, 2009, Valentine's Day!
Lightning Group and Renren.com jointly issued an announcement.

Lightning Group acquires Renren.com in its entirety!
Three hundred million US dollars was not a particularly large number in the Chinese internet industry at that time, but the news still caused a huge sensation.

Facebook and Renren have been battling it out for six years!

There was a time when Renren surpassed Facebook in terms of user numbers and daily IP visits.

For most of 2004, Renren gave the impression that it was dominating Facebook.

Unexpectedly, Renren.com has now been wholly acquired by Lightning Group and become a subsidiary.

Immediately afterwards...

Renren.com issued an announcement.

One month later, Renren.com will be renamed Xiaohongshu, and the entire website will be completely redesigned.

"We will absolutely not give up on Renren.com. On the contrary, we will invest more funds in its development."

"I believe that in a few years, Xiaohongshu will become an indispensable part of the internet landscape."

"Little Red Book, marking my life."

"Xiaohongshu, the encyclopedia of life for hundreds of millions of people."

....................................

Inside a prison!
Liao Feng has been inside for almost three and a half years. Although his family has considerable influence, he still needs to stay for a while longer.

Because the amount of money involved in this case is too large.

Liao Er came to visit him today.

"I have a few things to tell you."

"First, Renren.com was completely sold to Lightning Entertainment for $300 million, a full acquisition. Microsoft has completely given up on it."

Liao Feng didn't react much; in fact, he even found it somewhat absurd.

Three or four years ago, he specifically approached Lin Xiao, wanting to sell Renren.com to him for only two hundred million US dollars, all to save Renren Games.

And now Lightning Corporation has spent another $300 million to buy it?
Liao Er: "Actually, Renren.com has done very well in recent years and has fully developed its own track. This time, someone offered Chen Yizhou a higher price, even up to four hundred million US dollars, but Chen Yizhou's team was determined to sell it to Lightning Group."

"Actually, someone told me that in a few years, Renren.com, which is now renamed Xiaohongshu by Lightning Group, may see its market value soar more than tenfold, exceeding three billion US dollars."

At this moment, Liao Feng's face twitched completely.

This...this is the most heart-wrenching thing ever.

A few years ago, they poured money into Renren.com and used every means at their disposal, trying to push the company's valuation to around one billion US dollars.

The result was not only a complete failure, but also the demise of Renren Games and even pushed Renren.com to the brink of death.

And now... back in the hands of Lightning Corporation, you're telling me its market value might reach three billion dollars in the future?
Who told you this? Which analysis company or consulting firm is this?

"The second thing is that Lingxi Island may not be able to hold on any longer," Liao Er said. "Currently, Lingxi Island's board of directors is in talks with JD.com about an acquisition, but don't have too high expectations for the price."

“In the past few years, Taobao and JD.com have developed very rapidly, while Lingxi Island’s business has been shrinking.”

This is another fatal blow.

Lingxi Island e-commerce was once Liao Feng's greatest pride and source of confidence. After he went to prison, the Liao family had no choice but to send someone to take over Lingxi Island.

The result was that the person sent to take over was far inferior to Liao Feng.

At least in the e-commerce field, Liao Feng has tasted success, so he has his own set of successful experience and methodology.

After the management team was changed, it coincided with the period of rapid expansion of Taobao and JD.com, so things went downhill and it's almost finished.

Seeing Liao Feng's pained expression, Liao Er remained calm and said, "The third thing is that the game 'Perfect World' has been completely revived. After it was bought by President Chi of Hongen, its revenue in 2008 exceeded 5 million!"

"The huge success of World of Warcraft and Jade Dynasty has actually boosted the development of this series of games. The free version of Perfect World has filled this market gap."

At this point, Liao Feng was already convulsing.

Perfect World was a game that died under his management, and coincidentally, he had already decided to release a free version at that time.

However, at the time he was focused on promoting World of Warcraft, so he completely put Perfect World on hold.

Later, he went to prison, and all of Renren Group's assets were sold off cheaply. President Chi bought back "Perfect World" for only a few tens of millions of yuan.

As a result, their annual revenue is now several hundred million.

Furthermore, although he spent an astronomical sum to secure the exclusive distribution rights for World of Warcraft in China, the results proved that it was entirely worthwhile, and he still made a fortune.

In 2008, World of Warcraft's revenue exceeded 20 billion RMB, and it is still growing rapidly.

These projects all once belonged to him.

He's only one step away from success.

Liao Er continued, "Of course, these projects are nothing compared to Wu Lingxi's overseas Facebook."

"You've heard about it to some extent."

"Nasdaq is currently lobbying Facebook to push for its IPO."

“External investment banks and professional investors predict that if Facebook goes public overseas by the end of this year or early next year, its market value will exceed $30 billion.”

At this moment, Liao Feng was already heartbroken, as if being stabbed with a knife.

His Renren Group once used any means necessary and did everything in its power to try and reach a valuation of one or two billion US dollars.

Now, Facebook, which is managed by Wu Lingxi, is about to break the $30 billion mark?
Am I, Liao Feng, really that worthless?
After Wu Lingxi left, did she just soar to great heights?

Liao Er slowly said, "Is it painful? Does your whole heart feel like it's burning? Then carry that feeling with you."

"You'll be in there for a few more years, so don't let it wear you down and make you lose your fighting spirit."

"Remember this pain, experience it every day until you get out."

In the dead of night, lying on his bed in the prison cell, Liao Feng finally felt the excruciating pain, a pain that seemed to burn from the inside out, as if his internal organs were being torn apart.

..........................................

October 2009, 2!
The 81st Academy Awards ceremony has officially begun.

At least at this time, the Oscars still held authority and were watched globally.

This year, WeChat became one of the major sponsors of the ceremony.

It's called WeChat domestically and Wechat overseas. Several groups simultaneously launched a fierce global promotion campaign.

But... to be honest.

Lin Xiao didn't know whether sponsoring the Oscars was the right or wrong thing to do, because it was actually quite incongruous.

It seems more appropriate for Quantum Phone to sponsor the Oscars, since it aims to build a high-end mobile phone brand.

WeChat's sponsorship of the Oscars only generates buzz and is suitable for large-scale promotion to implant the term in people's minds; its user conversion rate is hard to say.

It's not just the Oscars; WeChat ads appear on international dating shows, domestic dating shows, and even talent shows from various countries.

It costs a tremendous amount of money.

The force was extremely strong.

It's really just repetition, repetition, and more repetition.

The goal is to make this name known to users worldwide.

Host Hugh Jackman announced, "Next up is the Oscar for Best Animated Feature!"

"Disney's 'Bolt' is among the nominees!"

"Kung Fu Panda: An Eastern Fantasy!"

"Disney's WALL-E."

The camera focuses on Lin Xiao and Amy Pascal's faces.

Because "Kung Fu Panda" was also nominated.

Hugh Jackman said slowly, "We know that Oriental Fantasy was a huge success when it first entered the world of animated films. This film also left a deep impression on us and brought me great joy."

"I still remember Mr. Lin Xiao's words: 'Kung Fu Panda' is a love letter to movie fans around the world."

"This love letter is absolutely wonderful. Thank you, Mr. Lin Xiao, and thank you, Dongfang Huanmeng!"

At this moment, the suspense seems to be building, giving the impression that this year's Oscar for Best Animated Feature will go to "Kung Fu Panda".

Then, Hugh Jackman said, "The winner of Best Animated Feature is WALL-E. Congratulations to Disney, and congratulations to the producers of WALL-E."

At this moment, the camera once again focused on Lin Xiao's face.

Honestly, this was the first time that audiences worldwide, especially in the United States, had seen Lin Xiao's face up close.

Is this the infamous Er Gou Cult Leader?
Is this the King of Miracles?

Immediately afterwards, the host raised his voice and announced loudly: "Next, we are very honored to invite the father of Kung Fu Panda, the father of The Hunger Games, and the father of The Graveyard Book."

"Mr. Lin Xiao, please present the award to the cast and crew of 'WALL-E'!"

Immediately, enthusiastic applause rang out.

The camera focused once again on Lin Xiao's face, following his steps as he arrived on the Oscars stage.

....................................

Note: I've edited some of the plot, but it's finally finished. It's the last day, so if you have any extra monthly votes, could you please give them to me? Thank you!

(End of this chapter)