A century-old wealthy family that rose from Shanghai

Chapter 142 Newspaper Public Opinion
The March 3th (Thursday) issue of Oriental Daily featured a prominent advertisement in the center of the main edition: "Thanks to our readers, we give back to our readers!" Starting March 14st (Thursday), anyone who purchases a numbered copy of Oriental Daily will have a chance to receive a large yellow croaker gold bar, valued at approximately 3 yuan. Three winners are available daily.
As soon as the news came out that day, readers of Oriental Daily in Shanghai and surrounding areas became agitated, and their relatives and friends were also affected.

For a time, many people were looking forward to that day, and even the sales of Oriental Daily News began to soar that day.

After all, gambling is human nature, and this move made many intellectuals who usually looked down on the Oriental Daily secretly think about it.

It’s just buying some newspapers, it doesn’t matter whose newspapers you read!

"Manager Chen, are you looking for me?"

Reporter Wang Chunhua came to the general manager's office and looked at his 'mentor' Chen Guangliang with some admiration.

The news series he reported on "Ruan Lingyu and Zhang Damin" attracted great social attention, and he was awarded a bonus and company status.

Chen Guangliang said, "I want to form a team specializing in reporting entertainment gossip about celebrities and movie stars, and I plan to put you in charge!"

Wang Chunhua said happily: "Thank you Manager Chen for your training. I will definitely do my best!"

Chen Guangliang thought for a moment and added, "Reporting on other people's private lives is never a good thing, so you have to strike a balance."

scale?

Wang Chunhua said thoughtfully: "Okay, I understand!"

Even if you don't understand, you have to understand that just report the facts and don't report fake news. In addition, don't mess with people you can't afford to mess with, such as Du Yuesheng, Huang Jinrong, or even the commander of the Shanghai garrison, the mayor, the government, and the commander-in-chief.

That's probably it!
Chen Guangliang added, "By the way, celebrities should choose actresses and socialites to report on. This will be more interesting. For example, in the marriage between Lu Xiaoman and Xu Zhimo, how luxurious Lu Xiaoman's daily life was, and how Xu Zhimo had to run around to make money to support his family, and how frugal he was. Topics like this will definitely be very popular!"

There is no need for Oriental Daily to report this, as it has already been published in the magazine before.

On December 1927, 12, the Shanghai tabloid "Sherlock Holmes" published an article titled "Sister Wu's Massage Made Her Friends Sick." The author, "Pizhe," clearly betrayed the article's vulgarity. It was a salacious parody of celebrities, recounting the affair between masseur Hong Xiangjia and socialite Sister Wu. "Sister Wu is indeed petite, graceful, and mature," a reference to Lu Xiaoman. Sister Wu's scholarly husband, "the poet and philosopher Yu Xinma," was naturally a reference to Xu Zhimo. Yu Xinma's ex-wife, "Gong Shuheng's sister," was Zhang Youyi. The masseur named Hong Xiangjia was Weng Ruiwu.

Weng Ruiwu was an amateur masseur, and thanks to his massage, Lu Xiaoman's body, which "never felt completely comfortable for even half a day in a 24-hour day," finally found some comfort. He also got Lu Xiaoman hooked on opium, and they sat on the smoking couch, puffing away smoke.

Wang Chunhua immediately understood: "It's good, but this kind of news is likely to cause a lawsuit?"

Chen Guangliang laughed and said, "As long as you tell the truth and don't use pornographic content when writing news, the company will handle the rest. Isn't it up to you to decide the limits?"

"I understand"

You can be a 'moderate', but you can't give up on this kind of popular news.

Faced with the offensive of the Oriental Daily, local newspapers in Shanghai such as the Shenbao, the Xinwen Bao, and the Current Affairs News finally could not sit still.

When Oriental Daily was first published, it offered a 'free giveaway' and boosted its sales to third in the country (later falling back to fourth).

If the Oriental Daily succeeds again this time, it will firmly rank third in the country, and will directly lead to a significant drop in the number of readers of Shen Bao and Xinwen Bao.

Even now, the sales of Shenbao and Xinwenbao have each decreased by several thousand copies.

All of a sudden, these local newspapers began to publish various attacks:
Shenbao: The general manager of a certain newspaper comes from a lower-class background, having only attended a private school for a few years. He now runs a newspaper whose content is filled with vulgarity. He's also resorting to a "lottery," which is undoubtedly a form of gambling.

Although this news did not say it explicitly, it implied that Chen Guangliang came from the market and was a businessman who ran the newspaper, so the newspaper was full of money and vulgarity.

"Newspaper": A certain newspaper has repeatedly adopted commercial measures full of money-making to develop its own newspapers, which goes against the essence of news and culture.

Current Affairs News: The intention to give back is fake, but the real purpose is to increase sales. Instead of this, why not improve the quality of the news so that readers will buy in?

Starting from the next day, major newspapers took turns to publish targeted comments on the actions of Oriental Daily.

It feels like everyone is uniting together to boycott Oriental Daily.

Of course, the more this happens, the more they fear the rise of Oriental Daily.

On the other hand, Oriental Daily does not need to build good relationships with these competitors because even if they want to buy news now, they buy it from newspapers and news agencies in other cities.

No need to make friends!
The comments in major newspapers always seem to target Chen Guangliang, saying that he is poorly educated and has a strong sense of money, but he just likes to run a newspaper and meddle in the affairs of intellectuals.

There were even newspapers that implied that Chen Guangliang came from a car dealership background and was a gangster. Of course, such remarks were just insinuations that could not be tolerated in public, rather than direct naming.

But no matter what, it seemed that Chen Guangliang had offended all the newspapers in Shanghai at once, and his situation became worrying.

So some friends who knew him well called to show their concern, and some even offered to help testify, which made Chen Guangliang feel very good.

In fact, he doesn't care about these things at all. For a modern man, this kind of public opinion is simply vulnerable!
Chen Guangliang was a little surprised by Du Yuesheng's call.

"Guangliang, is everything okay? Do you want to put things on hold for a bit? After all, we've achieved our goal a little bit now. I heard the newspaper sales have already exceeded 30,000 copies."

Du Yuesheng on the phone greeted with great concern.

Chen Guangliang couldn't help but admire him for taking care of such a small matter. Moreover, as a shareholder, Du Yuesheng should be more concerned about the sales of "Oriental Daily News". What was the big deal for Chen Guangliang to make a sacrifice?

"Thank you for your concern, Mr. Du, but this little bit of wind and waves won't scare me. Mr. Du, just watch the show. The more frightened the enemy is, the louder they'll scream!"

"You're awesome!"

After giving a final compliment, Du Yuesheng hung up the phone.

Chen Guangliang fell into deep thought and then began to write.

Although he doesn't care about the strong public opinion in recent days, some of it is even directed at him.

However, it is still necessary to make some simple excuses.

Of course, the article ultimately focused on the Oriental Daily's philosophy. Chen Guangliang wrote that the Oriental Daily's philosophy is to keep readers informed of global affairs without leaving their homes. Oriental Daily's news is not subjective, as we believe newspapers shouldn't use their power to pressure others, condemning or accusing them. I believe this is wrong. Similarly, when reprinting the opinions of scholars, newspapers should carefully state, "The above opinions represent my personal opinion only, not the opinion of this newspaper." After all, those who are passionate about politics are often those who have nothing.

After finishing the article, Chen Guangliang called the editor-in-chief, Zhang Jinglu, and said, "Please publish it in tomorrow's newspaper for me. Please help me polish the text and sign it in the name of the newspaper!"

Although Zhang Jinglu was busy, he looked at her curiously and then said, "Manager Chen's philosophy on running a newspaper should be correct. I'll go prepare it right away."

He often heard Chen Guangliang tell editors: "Report objectively, without emotion, and without comment."

He also heard Chen Guangliang tell management many times: "Talk less about politics, and make money first. It's not that we don't want to touch politics, but we hope to maintain a neutral approach. That's all we hope for."

In fact, it is very difficult to do so. Sometimes the Southern Whale Party does not want the Oriental Daily to do this, and would rather side with the Southern Whale government. This requires a certain amount of courage and wisdom to refuse.

Therefore, the knowledge involved here is not simply "neutrality", but a complex approach.

"Well, tell the people at the newspaper not to compete with others, but to promote the philosophy of our newspaper."

"Okay, I understand."

Engaging in a war of words can certainly stir up a greater wave of public opinion, but it will not bring any more benefits to the Oriental Daily.

Therefore, although Chen Guangliang was angry about the bullying of newspapers such as Shen Bao, he was more defending the Oriental Daily.

After a while, Han Chufeng, deputy editor-in-chief and editor-in-chief of the supplement, came to his office.

"Manager Chen, this is a good novel submission. Let me show it to you!"

When Oriental Daily was first published, it advertised inviting submissions of martial arts novels, so it would often receive some medium and long martial arts novels, but in fact there were not many, after all, this was not mainstream.

But in fact, "Swordsman of Mount Shu" was serialized for two months and the response was very great.

Chen Guangliang picked it up and took a look, then he immediately laughed. Isn’t this the “Heroine of the Wild River” by the Suzhou novelist Gu Mingdao that he knew?

He deliberately skimmed through it quickly, then said, "Not bad, this is the first novel I've found appealing. If you think it's worth serializing, buy it. I can give you a slight raise in your salary."

"it is good"

It is not impossible for the supplement to serialize two novels.

Moreover, this Gu Mingdao can later write "The Demi-Gods and Semi-Devils" for him.

He was planning to plagiarize this novel again, but later the Oriental Daily News developed and was no longer needed.

"declare".

Shi Liangcai was talking with Chen Jinghan, the administrative director of the editorial department at this time. Zhang Zhuping's departure was inevitable, and among the people he would rely on next, Chen Jinghan would be the first to bear the brunt.

He called Chen Jinghan and said, "Don't publish this attack on the boss. As the saying goes, 'The winner takes it all.' Attacking him now will only make him a laughing stock."

Chen Jinghan blushed. This matter really concerned him. Now his immediate superior Zhang Zhuping had decided to leave Shenbao. He just wanted to show off in front of Shi Liangcai, but he didn't expect to hit the horse's leg.

"Everyone is attacking Chen Guangliang right now. Our comments aren't out of line. Compared to what he did, we're nothing!"

After hearing this, Shi Liangcai showed a mixture of approval and contempt on his face. Indeed, he looked down upon the behavior of Oriental Daily.

"That's the newspaper's behavior, it doesn't affect the boss. You'd better be careful!"

After all, he was unwilling to give up - the plan of kicking the man when he was down!
"Fortunately, the Oriental Daily is holding a lucky draw this time. I'm afraid it will have a huge impact on our sales!"

The Shanghai Stock Exchange is so small, and there are only so many people who read newspapers. Many people who buy the Oriental Daily will not choose the Shenbao, except for some staunch progressives.

Therefore, the reported sales volume is now only 14 copies, and there is no sign of it emerging!

Shi Liangcai said: "After the event, everything will return to normal, so what are you afraid of!"

He calculated that the Oriental Daily's circulation could only temporarily increase to over 30,000, and would probably remain at 30,000 in the future.

In this case, the threat is not that big and there is no need to be too nervous.

In fact, at this time, he still owned 50% of the shares of the Newspaper. Although he no longer had control, he still received dividends. So he was a little uncomfortable when the sales of the Newspaper dropped by .

News

Wang Boqi and Wang Zhongwei, who inherited their family business, were also discussing the affairs of the Oriental Daily.

Their father, Wang Hanxi, was one of the founders of the Xinwen Bao (Newspaper), though the majority shareholder was the foreigner Fu Kaisen. After Wang Hanxi's death in 1924, his sons, Wang Boqi and Wang Zhongwei, became general manager and assistant manager, respectively. Wang Boqi adopted a popular and commercial editorial approach, focusing on social news, which attracted readers from a broad range of urban communities and significantly increased newspaper sales.

The sales of the "Xinwen Bao" also ushered in its second "glorious decade". This year's sales have even surpassed the "Shen Bao", with the highest record being 150,000 copies.

However, after the rise of Oriental Daily, the two newspapers had greater conflicts, so the News lost 10,000 in sales.

"The styles of our Newspaper and Oriental Daily are quite similar (popular). If Oriental Daily really takes it to the next level this time, the sales of our Newspaper will decrease!" Wang Boqi lamented.

Wang Zhongwei immediately suggested, "Should we do the same?"

Wang Boqi said with some excitement: "Let's see the effect of Oriental Daily first. Also, don't stop the public opinion against the owner of Oriental Daily!"

Wang Zhongwei nodded and said, "I understand this."

Compared with Shi Liangcai, the Wang Boqi brothers are obviously more businessmen. At this time, they are naturally more willing to follow the trend and join the crusade against Chen Guangliang.

(End of this chapter)